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Old 28th Aug 2007, 13:03
  #33 (permalink)  
FlyingForFun

Why do it if it's not fun?
 
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Just to add a few thoughts to this thread:

First of all, as others have said, get at least 1 flight with another instructor, asap, and then decide which you'd rather fly with.

As an instructor, I've seen both sides of this coin. I've been in situations where students have put me in danger. I'm not just talking about inexperienced, nervous students (one particular student who, about 15 hours into the course and on her first flight with me while her regular instructor was on holiday, rotated, then - at around 50' and before trimming - took her hands off the controls to adjust her seatbelt, resulting in a large pitch down). There are also the very good students who surprise you (a student who was above average and close to test springs to mind - at the end of a very intense session of instrument flying, he took his foggles off, saw the runway in front of him, and proceeded to bounce the aircraft in the most horrendous way!)

As a trainee instructor, I was briefed on this thoroughly by my instructors. Putting the aircraft in real danger is one of the few things they can't teach you in practice, so they made sure they taught me all the tricks of the trade to enable me to relax around my students. To this day, my right hand is on my right knee for every single landing, just as I was taught to do when I trained to be an instructor (it looks natural to a student, but is very deliberately in easy reach of the controls).

I do not believe that it has anything to do with the instructor's experience, though. I recently had to hire a PA28 from a flying school which was new to me - although they did know the school I worked for, they new I had a couple of thousand hours, and they new I was a CPL/IR instructor. The checkout should have been (and was, in fact) little more than a formality - but the instructor I flew with (who was a very experienced pilot and instructor) was still visibly nervous enough to make me a little nervous!

I would definitely make sure that your CFI, or the instructor himself, knows the reasons why you are changing instructor. If this instructor is never told the reason why you prefer to fly with someone else, he won't have the opportunity to change. He sounds quite inexperienced, which is the perfect time for him to fine-tune his instructing technique and become a better instructor in the future.

Good luck!

FFF
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