Finally, after two years of school:

"Flyboy is FAA certified insane" (flyboy396)
10/18/2016 at 14:26 • Filed to: Happening

I am a certified private pilot. Now, onto the instrument rating...

DISCUSSION (18)

CRider > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 14:34

Congrats! Now, do you want hear a story about the Blackbird?

Kinja'd!!!

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > CRider
10/18/2016 at 14:36

Yea, I’m the Cessna in that story...

Lol thanks

ttyymmnn > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 14:38

Congratulations. As much as I’m into aviation, I don’t think that I would ever become a pilot.

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 14:41

You could use the Blackbird as a tow vehicle to make you the worlds fastest Cessna pilot. Just have fun when you get back to thicker atmosphere.

TheRealBicycleBuck > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 14:42

Congrats. It’s on my bucket list of things to get done. For now, I’m stuck flying FPV.

Xyl0c41n3 > CRider
10/18/2016 at 14:42

SHHHHHHH!!!!! It’s not in the sidebar right now! You’re going to bring it back!

Though, strangely, my “Oppo, I love you” post from last month is somehow there. I have no clue why.

Kinja'd!!!

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > TheTurbochargedSquirrel
10/18/2016 at 14:53

V never exceed is 163... The fastest recorded school plane was 194 after the student locked up at the controls. Plane was fine. Just shows how sturdy these things are

WilliamsSW > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 14:55

Congratulations on passing the check ride! ! Instrument training is a lot of fun- prepare to spend a lot of time under the hood! Hope you get some actual time along with that— I shot a number of approaches to near minimums in training and found it incredibly valuable.

I also hope you can skip NDB approaches. They always felt like an exercise in futility to me.

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > ttyymmnn
10/18/2016 at 14:55

Thanks. Get a sport pilot rating. Half as hard, and way less expensive.

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > TheRealBicycleBuck
10/18/2016 at 14:57

I was planning to be an airline cargo pilot. But I’ve got my part 107 rating for UAS, and I’m minoring in UAS studies. And my friend just asked me to be a partner in an aerial photography company he’s starting. So who knows.

It’ll still be fun to fly as a hobby, even it I don’t end up making it a career.

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > WilliamsSW
10/18/2016 at 15:08

Thanks, man. I’m right on the edge of the curriculum not having me learn NDB stuff. Whatever. It’s probably useful in some third world country I’ll get stuck flying in.

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 15:23

Yea, when engineers are trying to determine if something is going to work we tend to ballpark figure a worst case scenario and see if it survives that with the understanding that if it survives an overestimated load it will easily survive the actual load. You use that math to generate a Factor of Safety. A FOS of 1 means that your design will withstand exactly the force you are anticipating and no more. Most of the time you work with a FOS of 2 or higher meaning it is designed to withstand twice the anticipated force. Since weight is a concern aircraft and spacecraft tend to be designed with a FOS 0f 1.2-2.

Of course this is just the thought process of the engineer trying to determine if their little subsystem is going to work before submitting it to be part of the final product. The final design is properly simulated with fully calculated loads (though again they err on the side of caution to cover the worst case scenario) to ensure it meets the final FOS goal. The engineer just ballparks it when working towards the final design because doing all those calculations take forever.

I have heard a rumor that when they were designing Concorde they designed it to an FOS of something like 0.9 with the understanding that engineers tend to err on the side of caution and test with more force than they actually need.

In other words they probably designed that Cessna to withstand at least 1.5-2X the force of flying at a worst case of a speed of 200+. Then there is the extra cushion of overestimating the amount of force at that speed. Then they cover their ass by telling you to not get close to that speed. I have been in 2000lbs rated elevators with well over 2000lbs (I think once on a robotics trip we estimated we had at least 3000lbs in a 2400lbs rated elevator) and they won’t even groan because they are actually designed to handle well past that load.

WilliamsSW > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 15:30

Kidding aside, NDB approaches are a different animal. I was at the other end— I got just a little taste of GPS navigation, but spent a decent amount of time on NDB approaches, and a lot on VOR and ILS. They’re great for training and learning situational awareness, at least.

If you can learn to fly an NDB -A approach with a strong crosswind, you can handle anything.

TheRealBicycleBuck > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
10/18/2016 at 15:58

A friend of mine took the long road to becoming a commercial pilot. He started by blowing a large portion of his college savings getting his private pilot license, IFR, and Instructor ratings. To support his flying habit, he started working at the airport as a fuel jockey while still going to school and working at UPS part time. It took him 10 years to finish his degree (!) and another three or four years before he started flying cargo. He finally started flying “self-loading cargo” (a.k.a. passengers) about five years ago.

He was the guy that got me into flying R/C back when the planes were built with balsa, skinned with Monocote, and ran on honest-to-goodness nitromethane & methanol fuel.

MylesD > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
05/19/2017 at 14:53

About to start towards my sport (probably private) and I just had my disocverynfight a few weeks ago. Doing it for fun, but think I still might go private all the way.

Any tips, advice, ways to cut cost?

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > MylesD
05/19/2017 at 15:02

Highly recommend private, especially because you don’t need a medical anymore. Look into the app called Foreflight, it’s an electronic flight bag that can keep all your charts and stuff on an iPad.

Not sure where you’re taking you’re lessons but I’d always start on a round dial aircraft then transition to a glass cockpit, not the other way around.

MylesD > Flyboy is FAA certified insane
05/20/2017 at 16:54

Cool, thanks man. Did my disco in a 172 - G1000, but am going to be training in a 152 with glass cockpit. Rainier Flight Service in Washington State

Flyboy is FAA certified insane > MylesD
05/20/2017 at 17:54

Cool, good luck.