General Tips and Tricks

Hopefully you found your flight school! How is it? (:
We totally understand how stressful it is… that stress never really goes away, instead you’ll learn how to manage all kinds of stress when you learn to fly airplanes. When you are brand new to a flight school you have soooo many things going through your mind. Did I make the right choice? Do I belong here? Is it worth all this money? Am I capable?

It’s A LOT of pressure at first! And the worst part is that it’s most likely completely unfamiliar! So, there are multiple things we want to say about that.

First off, absolutely DO NOT feel like you have to “stick it through” with your first Certified Flight Instructor(CFI). We know how it feels; you want to be respectful, we bet you’ve said “but they’re so nice and I don’t want to make it awkward”

SWITCH CFI’S IF YOU ARE NOT LEARNING/GETTING ALONG WITH YOUR CFI. Trust us, you owe them nothing. You are paying them, they owe YOU a service. Sometimes it isn’t anyone’s fault! Sometimes personalities or teaching/learning styles just don’t match and that is totally normal. Maybe you like Pepsi and your CFI likes Coca-cola. Or maybe it’s something more serious like you learn by doing and the CFI is best at teaching on a whiteboard. Whatever it is, it is important to understand it truly is no ones fault(unless you aren’t studying or your CFI is a jerk). Most people switch CFI’s at least a few times before they finish flight training. It’s totally normal so don’t be worried if your first couple CFI’s don’t work out.

Talk to other students at your flight school! Get to know your Chief Pilot, Assistant Chief Pilot(s), the maintenance team, the dispatchers(they’re often flight students as well) and get involved! An important part of learning is a sense of community. It makes the learning a lot easier when you are surrounded by other people also going through what you are going through. Pilots love to talk. They also love to help each other out! Maybe you have a checkride coming up and other students at your flight had the same DPE for their checkride. If you don’t talk to anyone you’re missing out on valuable information on that DPE!

During your private pilot training you have a lot of stuff to learn. Some of that stuff your CFI will teach you(through ground/classroom sessions), some learning will be from your written test prep software, but MOST will be from your own studying! Ideally your CFI will help guide you through your training by teaching you fundamentals, assigning homework/study material, and overall reinforcement. However, it is up to you to hold yourself accountable and want to learn. Studying for your private is arguably the hardest certificate to study for. It is ALL completely new information; you will have to learn your learning style, your study style, AND LEARN HOW TO FLY AN AIRPLANE?? I mean c’mon, don’t be so hard on yourself.

Study your ground well in advance so when it comes to flying the airplane all you have to worry about is just flying the airplane. There are lots of acronyms(ATOMATOFLAMES to name one). Most of these acronyms will have an associated FAR(Federal Aviation Regulation). It is absolutely important you understand where the acronym comes from and have the specific FAR memorized(91.205(b) for ATOMATOFLAMES, btw). Our Pro Private Pilot Oral Exam Guide has the acronyms we’re talking about! Call us old fashioned but we really like to recommend a paper copy of the FAR/AIM. Tab important regulations(91.205, 61.56, 61.57, 91.213, etc). If you realllllllllly hate paper AND you have ForeFlight you can bookmark pages in the FAR/AIM within the app. Plenty of people do it, but like we said we like paper.

If you are preparing for a checkride, stagecheck, EOC, or a testing event we have some tips for you!

1. On the ground portion, use the acronym KISS. Keep it simple stupid! Answer a question as directly as you can. If the DPE(Designated Pilot Examiner) wants to know more, he or she will ask!

2. If you are getting close to drifting out of tolerances on a maneuver, start fixing AND vocalize it! We cannot tell you how many times this has saved people from receiving an unsatisfactory result on their checkride. “I’m high but I’m correcting” “I need more right rudder” etc. This not only shows you are aware of the situation, but able to correct the error and catch it before the DPE says anything.

3. If you aren’t exactly sure what the DPE is asking, ask for clarification! DPE’s are human too. They may ask a confusing question. They often do.

4. DPE’s want to make sure you will make safe decisions. So choose the safest answer! This should go without saying, but be a safe pilot. It is our duty as PIC’s to be safe. If you’re unsure about whether or not a situation is safe or not, chances are it’s not safe. Practicing go/no-go decisions is a key component to developing good pilot judgment. Having a solid knowledge base of systems, weather, regulations, and airworthiness will go a long way.

5. Ask your CFI any questions you have! Even if you think they are silly questions, ASK! Better to ask a CFI than the DPE.

6. Show up prepared. Bring your FARAIM, PHAK, sectional, iPad, etc. Anything you would normally use on a flight.

7. Stay relaxed and take your time. No one says you have to answer questions fast or perform a maneuver fast. Take your time, relax, and take a few deep breaths every now and then. It is easy to feel that you are answering questions too slow or that if you answer the questions faster the stress will go away faster. Take it slowwwwwww. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast!

8. Treat the ground and flight like you would when you and your CFI would meet! Don’t think of a checkride as a test, but more of a discussion between two pilots(you and the DPE).

9. If you do not know what the answer is, look it up! You can use any FAA published document(FARAIM, PHAK, etc.) on your checkride. This is why tabbing your FARAIM or anything else is super useful. When Jason took his private pilot checkride, he was not confident in discussing icing or fog, so he tabbed it out in his PHAK. Fair game!

10. You will never know what you don’t know. You can’t know everything. Odds are, unless you’re Albert Einstein, you won’t know everything. This is perfectly normal. You will most likely be asked a question you won’t know the answer to. This is because the DPE wants to see how you tackle problems. Will you use your resources(FARAIM, PHAK, etc)? This is also where you can prove to the DPE you can make competent decisions. An example question may be: “During your engine check, you notice your cylinder heat temperature is climbing faster than usual. Why would this happen and would you go fly?” There’s not exactly a legal “yes/no” answer, but it is testing your knowledge as well as your decision making skills. Sure it’s legal to go fly but is it safe? Btw it would happen when there is improper engine cooling(maybe you left the intake plugs in, maybe a bird decided to build its nest in an intake), an incorrect fuel-to-air ratio(fuel will actually cool a cylinder’s temperature, so a lean mixture will cause the cylinder temperature to rise) or the cylinder may just be bad(crack or another fault) Either way, not a good idea to fly.

11. Don’t try to cram the night before. You won’t learn anything by stressing out over something the night before your checkride. It’s important to get a good night’s rest and be relaxed the day before your checkride. But we know how it is. Any checkride that Jason went to he hardly slept the night before. Those nerves don’t ever go away either. Ask any airline pilot and they will say they still get nervous the night before a checkride, and if they say they aren’t nervous then they’re lying!

Oh also… If your CFI is teaching you acronyms or trying to teach you “ground school” in the plane when you are FLYING then that is a BAD CFI! The airplane is the worst classroom. This is one of our biggest pet peeves.