I’ve wanted to learn how to fly for a while now, and I think over the summer I’m finally going to get around to doing it - although I haven’t looked at the cost of flying in over a year, when gas prices I’d imagine have gone up.
Not looking for anything specific, really.
Are you happy with the decision to start flying? Was it worth the cost to you?
Do you still fly? How often? Where?
What are the costs like for you?
Anything along those lines.
If you’ve always wanted to, then you should do it, regardless of what anyone posts here.
That said, I spent about $5,000 getting my license, and I was glad I did, but sadly, I don’t fly anymore. I had a bad spin experience on my first solo flight, and even though I finished the course, I was always a bit afraid when I flew, and it’s my feeling that a scared pilot is a bad pilot, so I gave it up. It just wasn’t meant to be, I guess.
Yes.
Most important is to find a place and people that you are comfortable with and can afford.
They can’t take the knowledge away from you.
Read Broomstick for some idea of what you are in for. She does a good job of telling you how it is if you are starting now.
Yes and Yes
I was averaging 40-50 hours a year at first, but due to finances and family concerns these past two it’s dropped considerably. I’m hoping to fly more this year.
About $100 on average, thought it has been as low as $70/hour and as high as $240/hour depending on what I’m flying.
This summer, in tailwheel training, it’s been about $110/hour.
You’ll need at least $5,000 to get a private license, and I’d recommend budgeting for $7,000 because few people do it in the minimum time. (I certainly didn’t) Two options other than private pilot are recreational pilot (which by the time your done with it, costs almost as much time and money as a private, and doesn’t have cross-country privileges) or sport pilot, which is so new you might have trouble locating an instructor. Although both should cost less time and money than a private, they also have limitations that a private license doesn’t.
The next question you should ask yourself is “what kind of flying do I want to do?” because that will affect where you go to learn, what sort of airplanes you fly, and how much fun you have.
This isn’t a complete listing, but this page o’ links and this second page o’ links points you to a lot of the “Broomstick stories” (with some non-flying stuff mixed in - the search pulled up threads started by me, which includes, amazingly enough, some non-aviation stuff). Although the tailwheel training I took this summer is training above and beyond my initial license it will give you some idea of what the training environment is like, including frustrations regarding weather and mechanical difficulties. Shopping for Taildraggers in particular may be of interest at the moment, since it discusses how I chose my current flight school.
Although I’m the most prolific pilot-writer on this forum, other folks have chimed in, too. Recently, the prefix “Airport Stories” has become a custom in the thread titles. Here’s yet another page o’ links which has considerable overlap with the prior ones, but if you look for threads started by someone other than me you’ll get input from other folks as well, from first lessons and solos to airline pilot recurrency training.
[Minor hijack] Wow, I didn’t realize that “recreational pilot” was different from “private pilot.” What are the differences other than no cross-country? And I’d never even heard of a “sport pilot’s license”! I haven’t been paying much attention to the industry, I’m afraid, and could use some edumacatin. [/Minor hijack]
Here’s a link giving a general overview of various pilot certificates and ratings.
I currently belong to a flying club. The 50 members of the club own 5 airplanes, and several members are flight instructors. You might look at a club in your area as an alternative to taking lessons from a FBO.
It was decades ago when I got my private pilot’s license. It was costly for the time; I think about $2000 total for the lessons. But that was back in the late '70s. It was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to learn; far more difficult than any of my college courses. There is a lot to remember, and it has to be right, or you risk somebody dying. It was also worth every penny. It gave me an immense burst of confidence to have done it. Also, when I went flying, I had to concentrate so intensely on what I was doing that any other things I was stressed out about just vanished.
You can tell when a student pilot who’s just completed his/her first solo comes in. There’s this most incredibly irrepressible grin, and if you look really close you can see that the feet don’t actually touch the floor. At least that’s the way I felt.
I kept it up for a few years, but various other things caused me to fly less often, including some health issues. It’s not a thing like riding a bicycle that you never forget; you have to keep current to keep your skills sharp and up to date. To go back now, I’d feel obliged to take the entire course of study over again, including the tests. But yeah, it was great.
Do some research into the medical requirements. A history of problems with either physical or mental illness can prevent someone from passing.
That is really the strongest selling point to the sport pilot’s license. All that is required is a valid driver’s license. There is no medical exam.
There are tons of little things like taking antidepressants that disqualify soemone from a private pilot’s license that create a large group interested in the sport pilot license.
I’m not sure that’s true. You may not need a medical, but there is still going to be a list of things that disqualify you. It’s just that you’re put on the honor system. If you own your own plane, anyway. If you’re renting, you might be asked to sign a form that says that you have no known conditions that would prohibit you from flying.
We have the same thing for a regular pilot’s license. There are a host of conditions and maladies that are supposed to ground you, even though you may have passed your last medical. It’s the pilot’s responsibility to determine if he or she is physically capable of flying safely. And my guess is that if you are explicitly taking a drug that is on a list of banned substances, you could find yourself in hot water in an incident.
I don’t know much about the American sport pilot license, but are you required to sign an affidavit that you are physically fit and not taking any disqualifying medication?
Agreed. In fact I always recommend that people go and get their medical before they start flying. That way you know that there are no problems and you don’t need to worry about it. Also, don’t just read up about the requirements and then decide that you won’t qualify, go see the aviation doctor and do the medical. You may find that things you thought would disqualify you, are ok (main example being your eyesight, it doesn’t need to be perfect, glasses and contact lenses are ok.)
Although I went straight through and got a commercial licence, I used to continue spending a fair bit of money on recreational flying. I don’t anymore because there are no aircraft available here that interest me.
I think it is one of those things that if you want to do it, then do it, otherwise you will always have regrets. I will never regret having spent the money I have on flying even if it hadn’t lead to a successful career. Even if I had never flown again after completing my licence. It will always be something I’ve done that a lot of people don’t get to do. And when you go for a holiday to another country or state you will have the option of hiring an aeroplane (with an instructor initially) and doing your own scenic flights.
Learning to fly is great because everyone finds some part of it challenging but for the vast majority of people it is not an overwhelming challenge. And after you get the licence, you can push yourself on and keep giving yourself new challenges (as Broomstick does) or you can get to a comfortable level, fly the same aeroplane each time, fly to the same places, and just enjoy flying.
When I was still paying for the odd bit of recreational flying, I was able to do things like fly in and pick up my girlfriend from the international airport and fly her home so she didn’t have to sit on yet another airliner for the domestic part of her flight. Or pack a picnic into a rugged little tail-dragger and take her on a surprise flight through New Zealand’s Southern Alps and land in a paddock beside a deserted river where we could just hang out for a few hours. I also used it to fly home and surprise my Mum on her birthday.
If you hang out at the airport a lot and do a little bit of flying in every type of aircraft you can get your hands on, people start asking you to do things. I got to know people who owned an aeroplane but didn’t have a licence (bizarre concept, I know) who needed someone to take them to business meetings or to drop them off somewhere. There was a lady I met who had a licence but wasn’t a confident pilot so she liked to have someone fly with her. This meant that when she had somewhere to go, she’d fly there with me, I’d bring the aircraft back home, then pick her up the next day when she wanted to come back.
If you’re in the right environment, flying doesn’t need to be a money pit.
I took some lessons when I lived in Wellington in New Zealand. I quite enjoyed them but not enough to want to go all the way and get a licence.
Recreational pilot has been around… oh, at least 10 years? It was an option when I started, but I went for a full private. Rec pilot (unfortunate abbreviation - say it out loud - but the nickname has stuck) limits you to no more than four seats, no more than one passenger, daytime VFR within 50 miles of where you’re based. So, for example, you don’t have to do night flying or hoodwork or full navigation studies. It’s a little bit shorter course than a full private, but what really killed it was that the DOT required a full third class medical, just like the private. There were very few takers.
Sport Pilot only went into effect last year, so don’t feel bad if you haven’t heard about it. No more than two seats in the airplane, some pretty stringent weight and speed limits, no retractiable gear, no in-flight adjustable props but you are allowed 1 passenger and there is no restriction on cross-country privileges. Still just day VFR. It also opens a means to bring the two seat trikes and powered parasails and other such oddities into the realm of legal. It is somewhat like the microlight licenses of Canada and the UK although I wouldn’t carry that analogy too far, there are still significant differences. The BIG thing with sport is that the third class is not required - a valid driver’s license will do.
HOWEVER - there are still some issues being sorted out in regards to the medical requirements. It’s a very complicated issue that I’m not sure I want to drag into this thread. Suffice to say that even if you don’t go for a third class medical, if you have any sort of on-going condition it would be a wise idea to consult with an AME prior to committing aviation because some conditions and medication side effects can be worsened by the flight environment in ways folks unfamillar with that environment would not always expect. For example, some common decongestants that are quite safe to use while driving a car can be hazardous to use while flying.
Not so far.
The self-certifying affadavit is, I believe, for the glider and ballon pilots but, since I’m not one (yet) don’t quote me on that. And I’m not sure it applies in all circumstances, perhaps just to the instructors. I know ultralight instructors in the US had to sign such an affadavit, but not the folks flying ultralights on their own as non-instructors (technically, under US regs, an ultralight flyer is not a “pilot”)
Right now, having a valid US driver’s license in one’s possession is considered good enough, with the caveat that any restrictions on the license would also apply while flying airplanes. For instance, since my driver’s license says I am required to wear “corrective lenses” while driving I would be likewise required to wear them while flying.
We’ll see what happens after the first few accidents, which I hope will be quite some time in the future and very infrequent.
Oh, and if you don’t have a driver’s license? (Quite a rarity in the US, but it’s possible…) THEN you’d need a 3rd class medical for Sport Pilot. So it’s either/or.
Actually, the first couple years after I got my license I was a very boring pilot - I stuck close to home and just did a lot of very short flights in the same couple airplanes to gain experience and confidence, THEN I went nuts. 
I earned my license in 1991, and I don’t recall a recreational license being offered, but I was in a 141 program, and it was a long time ago. I didn’t fly much after that.
Uh, don’t worry, I won’t. Thanks for all the info.
Does LASIK do anything to disqualify you medically? I was also considering getting that soon.
I don’t think so, but it would be best to ask the FAA.
Here are the FAA requirements regarding distance vision (PDF file), note that it makes no mention at all of whether or not you’ve had LASIK.
http://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/avs/offices/aam/ame/guide/media/item50.pdf
So long as you have no bad side effects, no, LASIK is not usually a problem.
It will, however, ground you for six months (IIRC) to allow for healing and to adjust to your new vision.
Also, “monovision” is disqualifying. If you opt for that, you’ll need to wear those “corrective lenses” again, or at least wear one on the side adjusted to near vision, and perhaps take a medical checkride. I think it’s concerns about depth perception.
What exactly is monovision?