Instrument Proficiency Check

[shamrock104]

Am in search of a no nonsense flight school either in Alberta or BC that can assist me with some Instrument refresher training along with the IPC
Rusty on procedures as I have not used the rating, would like also to do some Multi hours but maybe the IPC in the Sim.

[lazyeight]

Calgary flying club. http://www.calgaryflyingclub.com/the-school/rates/

[Centennial]

Not sure exactly what you mean by "no nonsense", but we can certainly provide you the training you've described in a timely and efficient manner. We're at the Villeneuve Airport (CZVL) just outside of Edmonton.

We've got a Seneca with Garmin 430/530 for any multi time you'd like and a Redbird FMX for the IPC. Website is http://www.centennial.ca and also check our Facebook page.

[Cessna 180]

One note. Might not be a bad idea to do the whole multi-ifr flight test if you don't have an ATPL and you're getting close to it. An IPC in a (non-full motion) sim isn't good enough from what I understand.

[ahramin]

Centennial here's a list of nonsense that I have come across at various clubs including some listed in this thread:

1. Have to fly our C-172 every 60 days or you need to fly with an instructor.
2. Have to fly our C-172 with all four seats full with an instructor or you can't put people in the back seat "gross weight checkout".
3. Can't fly to a grass aerodrome without a "grass checkout".
4. Can get instruction in a twin but can't rent the twin as PIC.
5. Can get IFR training but not if it's cloudy out.
6. Aircraft and instructors are not ready and available when you book them.
7. Want a detailed W&B done before every flight.

The list goes on but if this sounds like your school then I'm guessing that's what the original poster is trying to avoid.

[Beefitarian]

Hey Ahramin,

We should start a thread to ask, "Is there any FTU that has solo multi engine rental in Canada?" I have heard the rumour there is not one left.

The Calgary Flying club used to have 90 day currency for those with a certain amount of hours. That changed because too many renters bent the airplanes. Annoying for those of us that don't taxi into the fuel tank, but I understand why it changed.

I think the OP wants to avoid the old, 5 to 9 hour refresher course with an extra 23 hours "Bonus" time.

[CpnCrunch]

That changed because too many renters bent the airplanes.

And I think you've just identified the reason why FTUs have all these silly rules! After reading all the dumb accidents that pilots keep doing over and over again, I think you'd be insane not to have rules like these (unless you want to somehow vet each renter).

I think the OP wants to avoid the old, 5 to 9 hour refresher course with an extra 23 hours "Bonus" time.

Pacific Sky would probably be a good option. They're pretty flexible and reasonable, only giving you the training you need. DR is a good instrument instructor.

[RNAV30]

We should start a thread to ask, "Is there any FTU that has solo multi engine rental in Canada?" I have heard the rumour there is not one left.

.

Cooking Lake Aviation rents their PA44-180 out. New avionics upgrade too.

[photofly]

Centennial here's a list of nonsense that I have come across at various clubs including some listed in this thread:

1. Have to fly our C-172 every 60 days or you need to fly with an instructor.
2. Have to fly our C-172 with all four seats full with an instructor or you can't put people in the back seat "gross weight checkout".
3. Can't fly to a grass aerodrome without a "grass checkout".
4. Can get instruction in a twin but can't rent the twin as PIC.
5. Can get IFR training but not if it's cloudy out.
6. Aircraft and instructors are not ready and available when you book them.
7. Want a detailed W&B done before every flight.

The list goes on but if this sounds like your school then I'm guessing that's what the original poster is trying to avoid.

Tslk is cheap when it comes to other people's policies and airplanes.

Let's see what Ahramin Aircraft Rental Inc's policies are. On the day you open, and whether they're the same after ten years in business.

[ahramin]

$50 / hour dry photo, no accidents yet .

[CpnCrunch]

$50 / hour dry photo, no accidents yet .

I'm guessing you're pretty particular about who flies your plane? I don't think flight schools have the time to properly vet each person coming in the door and decide what they can and can't do.

[photofly]

$50 / hour dry photo, no accidents yet .

I'm guessing you're pretty particular about who flies your plane? I don't think flight schools have the time to properly vet each person coming in the door and decide what they can and can't do.

Actually flight schools absolutely have the time to vet each person coming in the door and decide what they can or cannot do. It's called a "checkout with an instructor", the renter pays for it, and has to repeat it if they haven't flown for some period.

Perhaps ahramin can describe what he'd expect to see from an unknown 63.7 hour (19.3 solo PIC!) PPL who wants to fly off in his plane before the $50/hr offer stands, what his (commercial) insurance company would expect to see, how much his uninsured losses for lost revenue over a month of downtime for minor wing repairs add up to, and how much time and fuel he wants to donate before charging the putative pilot for the checkout.

Not to mention the shitstorm of crap rained down on him, as an FTU, by TC for every single CADOR report caused by a clueless renter who busts airspace, violates a clearance, fails to obey an instruction or gets too close to commercial traffic - how much is dealing with all that for free because he he's soft and he handed over the keys to a muppet with no common sense or ability out of the goodness of his heart?

Honestly I think people should be damn glad there's a single place in this country to rent something as harmless as a C150 when you see what some people do with them..

Rant over.

[ahramin]

You beat me to the answer photofly but I think I've covered your points already so I'll just click submit.

Crickey CpnCrunch, you of all people should know I'm not that particular .

Jokes aside, the schools have an hour to go through silly exams with prospective renters without actually trying to find out if they have any decision making skills or systems knowledge. They have an hour to fly around which should hopefully tell them whether or not a pilot can fly a plane, but apparently tells them so little that they aren't sure if the same pilot can fly the plane with people in the back seat. It's not a question of time as they are already spending far more time than necessary. I've seen schools with enough time for the on duty flight instructor to make weather decisions from the ground for every pilot flying that day, as if the weather is the same everywhere and never changes.

Anyone who thinks that you will get safety out of blindly setting up silly procedures to follow is engaging in some very wishful thinking. Anyone remember this one?

http://tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-reports/a ... 1p0106.asp

Can't rent a plane and take it through the mountains without a mountain checkout from one of our instructors. End result 2 people dead. Safety doesn't come from magic, it comes from proper instruction, checkouts, and due diligence on every pilot who comes through the door. In one cases I did 10 hours of flying with a renter before letting them go. In the most recent case less than an hour was plenty to determine that the pilot had no problem handling the aircraft, and another hour was sufficient to make them familiar with the peculiarities of the aircraft.

Currency is a big issue with renting people aircraft. Hard and fast rules that take little to no account of past flying experience and currency outside the school are a joke. If someone is new to an aircraft type it doesn't matter how much experience they have, they need some time on it in a short period to get comfortable with the aircraft. One flight every 60 days is not nearly enough. My aircraft is quite particular so I insist that once someone is cleared to rent they do 3 flights in the first 30 days and I debrief them fully over the phone after each one. "How did it go? Any questions? What went wrong? Any problems with the aircraft?" I have never seen a school bother to do this no matter how inexperienced or rusty the renter is. Instead they say "You must fly our C-172M every 60 days or you aren't current". After the first 3 flights my renters are on their own to ask for a phone briefing or a ground refresher or a quick flight if they haven't flown in a while and feel rusty. That would certainly be difficult for a school to accept due to the volume of renters but there are many ways of doing due diligence that would lower the risk without the silly "You must fly our C-172M every 60 days or you aren't current".

Schools have loads of time to check your licence every time, check that you have done your weight and balance, check that your medical is current, check that you have initialed the safety memos, but no time to actually do anything towards assuring the proficiency of their renters. The one good thing they do - and that maybe I should do - is require an annual check. The times I have done them with a flight school was always a good refresher and I have always learned something. But then the school takes all that information and boils it down to pass/fail, you can/cannot rent the aircraft without making use of it. If someone goes through the checkride with no issues, that should mean something. If someone is struggling because of proficiency, they need more training. If they are struggling because of currency, they need to fly more often.

Photofly you make the point about "after 10 years in business". I'm nowhere near there but it does bring up the point that the longer a school has been in business, the more likely they are to have accumulated a plethora of rules for renters. This is how you end up with "gross weight checkouts" for 172s. This kind of knee jerk, "we had a crash so we need to do something" may seem like it adds safety to people who believe in magic but it doesn't. Safety comes from proficiency, good company culture, good instruction, good maintenance (oy vey), and effort. Lots and lots of effort. I had the opportunity to speak to someone last week who started up a flight school recently. I was able to ask what the insurance insisted on for currency: "Nothing, they just asked if we had currency rules in place". His rules seemed eminently reasonable to me. Time will tell if this is a bad idea but I don't see how they could end up with a worse track record than the schools we are discussing.

Oh and don't get too excited about the $50 an hour. That's dry.

[photofly]

"We had a crash so we need to do something" does indeed do nothing for safety, but if you're an FTU it keeps the TC monkeys off your back and keeps your OC on the wall where it belongs instead of suspended, and sitting on the inspector's desk.

Let's wait and see what your buddy with the new flight school says when a renter takes his 172 offline for four months while the wing is reskinned. Hes not going to get any money from an insurer to cover the revenue he loses while an aircraft that he's still paying the bank for is grounded. If he's still in business after that, his rental checkout policy is going to change pronto - but it's a big if.

The elephant in the room at this point is that there is no money in aircraft rentals. It's done here - at any rate - as a convenience to students so they have an incentive to train, but at my local FTU walk-ins are a PITA, and if they're not prepared to ante up for a couple of hours with an instructor the boss doesn't want to see them. Cant blame him really, on that one.

If you're not prepared to turn up and hire his aircraft for 30 minutes once a month at a minimum, what good are you to him? What does he owe you?

[ahramin]

if they're not prepared to ante up for a couple of hours with an instructor the boss doesn't want to see them. Cant blame him really, on that one.

Nor I. However,

If you're not prepared to turn up and hire his aircraft for 30 minutes once a month at a minimum, what good are you to him? What does he owe you?

I can see why someone with a customer service and safety attitude like that would indeed have trouble making money renting aircraft. Not to mention who the heck wants to do their training at a school that isn't going to rent them the aircraft afterwards? I rent my aircraft because I don't fly it enough and planes need to fly. Frankly if someone had a school like the old Juan Air (1979) in Victoria I wouldn't need a plane. Bruce Gorle was a very sharp operator, and I'm convinced he made a very good profit renting and instructing. Only once in all the years I called him to rent an aircraft did he ask me to do an extra refresher with one of his instructors and I had no problem with it. He had personally looked at my training and my currency and made that decision. I'm certainly willing to spend a couple thousand a year on renting a nice 172 for an annual checkout and the few trips a year I want to do and I'm sure I'm not the only one out there. There's money to be made.

I'm curious about the CADORs issue though.

Not to mention the shitstorm of crap rained down on him, as an FTU, by TC for every single CADOR report caused by a clueless renter who busts airspace, violates a clearance, fails to obey an instruction or gets too close to commercial traffic

I wasn't aware that a CADOR ever turned into a shitstorm and I've seen my share. Any examples? What does this look like?

[photofly]

In this case there's no issue with airplanes not flying enough - there's easily enough flight training going on to max out the AME resources available; you can make a margin of $25/hr on plane rentals or $75/hr on training. Same difference to the maintenance team. Actually no - students fly more often than renters so they're even better as customers.

In your case if your renters are doing you a favour by keeping the aircraft turning then that's not a commercial operation and your permissive policies are not a fair comparison with those from a commercial FTU.

CADOR reports "look like" enquiries from TC, written reports, interviews with safety inspectors and any other amount of unpleasant and unwanted attention from TC, airport operators and so on. Which everyone - everyone - can well do without.

Look - if someone doesn't like an FTUs rental policies - go somewhere else! if it's such a profitable enterprise then no doubt there are four or five aircraft rental outfits competing for business at each airport vying against each other each with more lax and permissive policies than the next. Oh wait - no there aren't. Too bad for the renter who only wants to fly 30 minutes every six months and be treated like royalty. He can't.

[ahramin]

Look - if someone doesn't like an FTUs rental policies - go somewhere else!

That's how this discussion got started. Someone representing a school didn't seem to know what this nonsense was that would potentially drive a customer away, so I made a list. If your FTU resembles that list and is insulted, my apologies. However since it was to help someone stay away from renting from an FTU like that, and your FTU doesn't make money on renting and doesn't want renters to bother them, I don't see why they'd be unhappy about any of this discussion. They get what they want.

CADOR reports "look like" enquiries from TC, written reports, interviews with safety inspectors and any other amount of unpleasant and unwanted attention from TC, airport operators and so on. Which everyone - everyone - can well do without.

At first glance this doesn't sound like a shitstorm to me, just one more way to get information on what our renters and students are doing wrong and get input on what to do with it. Should make the operation safer overall if it's dealt with positively rather than something we could do without. I could be very wrong here though as I've seen many hopeless TC inspectors. Without details I couldn't say for sure.

[photofly]

Anyone is welcome to generate as many CADORS reports as they like if they really think it's a great way to improve safety - you can never be too safe, and so you can never have too many CADORS reports about you, right?

In fact most people I know work very very hard to avoid being "CADORSed" and in a wider sense (for both people and organizations) not coming to the attention of TC or anyone else is very much the best way to a quiet and paperwork-free life.

[PropToFeather]

you can never be too safe, and so you can never have too many CADORS reports about you, right?

CADORs are supposed to be about "occurrences" which are abonormal. I humbly suggest that if there is a pile of CADORs about you or your organization (that aren't all initiated by someone with an axe to grind), you're either doing some really exciting flying, or you're doing some pretty reckless flying (and one doesn't preclude the other).

[ahramin]

Every go-around at a towered airport generates a CADOR. Does that mean go-arounds should be avoided?

[photofly]

If that is the logical inference, and you consider it undesirable, you can lay the blame squarely with TC for turning a reporting system into a system that records black marks against people and punishes them for it.

[ahramin]

If that's true then ATC and FSS should refuse to file them. Not in anyone's interest to have bad blood between NavCanada and thier customers by playing policeman.

[co-joe]

If you do go with a Red Bird sim, and I would over the aircraft for cost, it is worth downloading the manuals for the Garmin 430/530, as well as the King 140 autopilot to minimise time spent figuring out their quirks.

A/P:
http://www.n612sp.com/KAP%20140%20AUTOPILOT.pdf

Garmin 530:

http://static.garmin.com/pumac/GNS530_PilotsGuide.pdf

Not sure if the garmin link will stay active, I had to go to Garmin's web site, search 530, then go to manuals, then select Pilot's Guide. It's very helpful to know the capabilities of both of these key pieces to the RedBird's panel.

[lazyeight]

Centennial here's a list of nonsense that I have come across at various clubs including some listed in this thread:

1. Have to fly our C-172 every 60 days or you need to fly with an instructor.
2. Have to fly our C-172 with all four seats full with an instructor or you can't put people in the back seat "gross weight checkout".
3. Can't fly to a grass aerodrome without a "grass checkout".
4. Can get instruction in a twin but can't rent the twin as PIC.
5. Can get IFR training but not if it's cloudy out.
6. Aircraft and instructors are not ready and available when you book them.
7. Want a detailed W&B done before every flight.

The list goes on but if this sounds like your school then I'm guessing that's what the original poster is trying to avoid.

That's not nonsense, that's just normal FTU procedures. Everywhere I went it was like this and it's really not a big deal. Also not many schools rent multi's out solo.

[Cat Driver]

That's not nonsense, that's just normal FTU procedures.

Sure sounds like nonsense to me.

I know what a W&B calculation is, it is not exactly rocket science and most low IQ people can learn to do one if it is really needed.

However what is a " Grass check out " ?