Originally Posted by
Council Van
Every school I instructed at had a 28 day policy and it was not a bad thing judging by several check flights I carried out on PPL's who had exceeded the limit.
I recall one character who did not think it was necessary to take prompt action when the aircraft had a 45 degree angle of bank at 300ft and was quite insulted that I decided to roll the wings level. Another could not understand that continually trying to land a PA28 on the nose wheel was not quite right.
The first gentleman was deemed fit to hire a club aircraft by another instructor and promptly went and attempted to land on the poor individuals who were busy extending the runway at East Midlands rather than aiming for the displaced threshold. A miffed tower controller rang to tell us that he had been literally shouting at him to go around as he was convinced he was going to land amongst the JCB's. When the gentleman concerned was invited to have a chat with the lady owner of the flying school he told her she knew nothing about flyings as she was a woman! He was promptly invited to leave and not show his face again.
Excessive cost is always an issue, but in my experience there is usually a close relationship between a pilot's skill level and the degree to which they object to having to have a currency check (which, yes, is invariably a club rule, not an authority rule).
The good pilots are almost always really happy to do this, and it is very common to find significant deficiencies in the flying skills of pilots who regard it all as a waste of time.
At the same time, most of us have limits to our flying budgets -these requirements can dent that badly. This is particularly true if you fly at more than one club.
G