Advice on resuming my PPL...

[crayonshinchan]

Hello everyone, long time reader on these forums, might be my first time posting.

I've been inactive on flying for over two years now, the last time I've flown was in September 2009 and in total I've logged ~45 hours (30 dual/15 solo) on a Katana DA-20. I've got off the wrong foot in flight training the first time around: very new instructor with a poor attitude at teaching, I had difficulty juggling university and flight training which ultimately made my confidence suffer in the cockpit. Now that I'm done university I want to resume my PPL and fly out of Buttonville Airport with Toronto Airways, but my question is how can I best prepared myself to become a good pilot?

When I flew back then I was always uncomfortable at making radio calls (still am) so how can I train myself to become better? My medical is a class 3 and I've completed the Transport Canada written test back then, but the test validity is most likely expired now so I will need to retake it. I plan to hit the books and review all flight theories BEFORE I start my lessons so everything's fresh in my mind instead of playing catchup (Flight Training Manual/From The Ground Up/TC AIM).

At this point, any advice is appreciated. Please teach me how to find a good instructor and make the best out of my lessons. Thank you!

[sandecker]

Well for starters you can listen in on ATC/pilot communications here:
http://www.liveatc.net/feedindex.php?type=canada
Scroll down and select CYKZ/Buttonville.

While you're doing that have an airport map of Buttonville and visualize aircraft positions on the ground and air as they enter the pattern.

CYKZ airport diagram available here:
http://www.navcanada.ca/ContentDefiniti ... urrent.pdf

That should help you become more familiar with phraseology and standard radio calls.

Then go up and book a first lesson for next week and don't try to cram your head with every little detail - first flight you can do their 'discovery flight' (even thou you've already flown 40+ hours) which is at a much REDUCED cost then just a regular lesson but its still dual training nonetheless. Let the instructor do the talking on the radio and just go have some fun flying around for an hour - then when you get back you'll be all inspired and motivated. Set up a regular flight schedule - weekly at a minimum if able - and then you can get down to business.

If you don't like the instructor you get - ask for another - its your dime.

[Big Pistons Forever]

If you don't like the instructor you get - ask for another - its your dime.

+ 1

[crayonshinchan]

thanks a lot sandecker for your advice those are great links

[Colonel Sanders]

When you listen to ATC, at first it sounds like incomprehensible jibberish.

Some suggestions:

1) get an ANR headset, esp if you don't have perfect hearing any more
like us old farts. It makes a huge difference.

2) listen to ATC on a scanner or the internet, preferably at your home
airport. After a while, you realize that they are saying the same thing
over and over again.

3) ATC tells you an awful lot of stuff that their rules say they have to,
but a lot of it is not very important. They bury the important stuff,
kind of like a practical joke. For example, let's say you are holding
short of the runway at Some Big Important airport, and ATC clears
you to take off. It will sounds something like this:

"Cessna Alpha Bravo Charlie, cleared for takeoff runway 29. The wind
is from 310 at 5 gusting 6, there are clouds at 3600, 4900 and 8300
feet, the sky is green, there is an aircraft at 2000 thirteen miles to the
southwest, I forgot my lunch, my wife locked her keys in the car,
maintain 1500, my dog needs house-training"

What do you need to remember from the above?

- cleared for takeoff, maintain 1500

everything else is unimportant. You climb through that altitude,
which every student pilot insists on doing, ATC will file a CADORs
on you which Enforcement will review. However, as far as we
know, the ATC's wife's car still has the keys locked in it.

4) All of the above are about listening and comprehending the
fast-talking ATC. Now onto you talking on the radio. Every
radio call you make will have the fundamental form of the 4 W's

Who you are talking to
Who you are
Where you are
What you want to do

Now, once you get good, you will realize that there are slicker
ways to make (eg IFR) radio calls, but the above structure is
a great set of training wheels for you learning to ride a bicycle.

Let's say you are going into Some Big Important Airport. Your
radio call might sound like:

Big Important Tower
Cessna Fox Alpha Bravo Charlie
10 miles south at two thousand with Whiskey
Inbound full stop

About the only thing weird about the above is that you have
Whiskey on board, which is the ATIS you listened to, before
you tuned in the Tower freq. That means you know the wind,
altimeter setting, runway in use, etc.

I should mention that as VFR you DON'T have to read back
the entire ATC instruction issued to you. All you have to do
is acknowledge it with your registration, and that's a really
good idea when the freq (and ATC) is really busy.

However, from flying IFR I have the habit of reading back
the really important bits - altitude and heading assignments,
for example.

Let's say ATC responds to your initial radio call with:

"Cessna alpha bravo charlie, there are eighty-seven aircraft
in the circuit at the moment, altimeter two eight nine nine,
active is runway 95. Report over the tanks that used to be
painted silver, not above two thousand"

I would reply:

"Tanks two thousand, bravo charlie"

Remember there are 87 aircraft in the circuit, and every
syllable counts. Don't speak too quickly, otherwise you're
wasting your tenths of a second on the radio. Say it clearly
with a minimum of works, and say it once. Avoid some
words like "for" and "to", to avoid confusion with four and
two.

Hope this helps,

[azimuthaviation]

I would reply:

"Tanks two thousand, bravo charlie"

The minimum you can respond with is the last THREE letters of your registration only if ATC initiates it. with 87 aircraft in the circuit theres a reasonable possibility theres more than one aircraft ending in -BC.

EDIT: With the number of possible idents available and the possibility of ending in BC you would expect to have 1.67 aircraft in the circuit ending in BC before you made your call. On that note there are only 35 000 idents available for aircraft in Canada (other than ultralights). There must be very close to that number of registered aircraft in Canada, what will happen next?

[Big Pistons Forever]

While you don't have to read back instructions in VFR clearances, you can simply reply with your three letter call sign, I make all my students read back all routes and altitudes. This does two things

1) Gives you practice talking on the radio and like everything else practice improves performance, and

2) Makes sure you really understood what ATC said. If you reply with just your three letter call sign you own the clearance. Get it wrong and bad things may happen. If you read it back and you are wrong, ATC now has an opportunity to correct you.

A good "radio voice" matters. When it is busy ATC will triage traffic on the basis of the first radio call. A crisp, organized and short radio call will get better service than a meandering conversation full of umms and Ahhs and missing important information. It is also good airmanship because if you are hogging a busy frequency with your bad long call nobody else can communicate. Another piece of good radio airmanship is when you change frequencies do not immediately start talking. Force yourself to get into the habit of waiting a few seconds to make sure you are not interrupting a radio call already in progress

Finally the Number 1 Rule for good radio work. Engage the brain before the radio. The classic student mistake is to push the transmit button and then start thinking about what to say. Again take that 2 second pause to get the brain ready with the right script before you push the button

Bad radio work is IMO a result of bad or lazy instruction. Us instructors as a general comment do not IMO work hard enough with our students to correct bad radio habits, and in a discouragingly large number of cases instructors themselves do not appear to have made the effort to learn and practice good radio procedures themselves

[Colonel Sanders]

The minimum you can respond with is the last THREE letters of your registration only if ATC initiates it

I guess. Dumb question: what CAR will you be charged with contravening if you only respond with two letters? Don't be silly and respond with 602.01.

PS I'm really lazy with my radio calls. For example, when flying the C421 I don't call myself "Cessna Four Two One Fox Alpha Bravo Charlie" or "Golden Eagle Fox Alpha Bravo Charlie" or "Golden Shower Fox Alpha Bravo Charlie".

First radio call, my ident is "Twin Cessna Fox Alpha Bravo Charlie" and it gets shorter from there. Fewer syllables is better syllables, and everyone knows what a twin cessna is. Even if they don't, they can probably guess.

You probably don't want to know what ident I use when I am leading a formation of jets: "Jet Formation". While not completely kosher by Emily Post rules of etiquette, I believe it is quite informative, and so far in my experience unique on any given frequency and location I have encountered so far (shrug).

[azimuthaviation]

Dumb question: what CAR will you be charged with contravening if you only respond with two letters?

Wouldnt that be Industry Canada's domain?

[wotai139]

I suggest you purchase a recommended flight simulator during your pilot training.
Simulators are a great tool when you actually start taking lessons, especially when just starting out. It is difficult to book lessons/flights every single day when training at a flight school. Simulators will allow you to practice at home, applying everything you learned at flight school into an exact virtual simulation. It really helps you review and practice during the in-between times before your next lesson. And that means less classtime spent on review.

It is something that I used to help me during my license training and I now recommend it to all my students.

[crayonshinchan]

Hi wotai139, what classify as a recommended flight simulator? I do have microsoft flight simulator X and I play it for some sometimes.

Also, do I need to start from the very beginning since I haven't flown for 2 years and I haven't done my cross countries yet, or can I do a few review/refresher flights then restart from where I was?

[Beefitarian]

My personal advice is don't land microsoft Flight sim. It's good for the rest of your flying. In the past I messed with my real plane landings by practicing with Flight sim. Some guys say they never had an issue.

Depending on your school once you catch up with where you were they should just carry on. It might take more than 2-5 flights to get back in the saddle depends a bit on you and a bit on the instructor/school.

[TeePeeCreeper]

I suggest you purchase a recommended flight simulator during your pilot training.
Simulators will allow you to practice at home, applying everything you learned at flight school into an exact virtual simulation.

Terrible advice to ge giving your students.

Home based flight sims are only good for one thing:

IFR procedures, and then again those hours spent doing various approches may very well be spent following incorrect procedures as you don't have someone next to you to correct your mistakes should you be going at it the wrong way...

Flight sims are great, but have limitations which may very well impede a student's progression while still learning the basics.
Regards,
TPC

[Big Pistons Forever]

I suggest you purchase a recommended flight simulator during your pilot training.
Simulators will allow you to practice at home, applying everything you learned at flight school into an exact virtual simulation.

Terrible advice to ge giving your students.

Home based flight sims are only good for one thing:

IFR procedures, and then again those hours spent doing various approches may very well be spent following incorrect procedures as you don't have someone next to you to correct your mistakes should you be going at it the wrong way...

Flight sims are great, but have limitations which may very well impede a student's progression while still learning the basics.
Regards,
TPC

The absolute worst thing to hear from a new PPL student is "I have done a lot of Micro Soft Flight Sim flying". You will now have to beat out all the bad habits that instrument of the devil has instilled. The most egregious is that all flight simmers in my experience fly on instruments and the only way to get them to fly properly, by reference to the natural horizon, is to cover all the instruments. Personally I want my student to be a blank sheet of paper with no preconceived notions of what they should do.

[TeePeeCreeper]

I suggest you purchase a recommended flight simulator during your pilot training.
Simulators will allow you to practice at home, applying everything you learned at flight school into an exact virtual simulation.

Terrible advice to ge giving your students.

Home based flight sims are only good for one thing:

IFR procedures, and then again those hours spent doing various approches may very well be spent following incorrect procedures as you don't have someone next to you to correct your mistakes should you be going at it the wrong way...

Flight sims are great, but have limitations which may very well impede a student's progression while still learning the basics.
Regards,
TPC

The absolute worst thing to hear from a new PPL student is "I have done a lot of Micro Soft Flight Sim flying". You will now have to beat out all the bad habits that instrument of the devil has instilled. The most egregious is that all flight simmers in my experience fly on instruments and the only way to get them to fly properly, by reference to the natural horizon, is to cover all the instruments. Personally I want my student to be a blank sheet of paper with no preconceived notions of what they should do.

Agreed!