Getting an FAA PPL+IFR licence

[Poeli]

Hi all,

Does anyone know what the minimum requirement is to begin a FAA IFR course? I know you certainly need the PPL, but do you need additional hours?

Also, are there any FAA schools that provide a package of those two licences (PPL and IFR after each other)? Anyone know good FAA (US based) schools?
Yes I'm from Europe, but my family is looking to buy an airplane and register it with an N...
What I also wanted to ask, are there any updates on the EASA law that no FAA holder can fly in Europe anymore?

[IO540]

This (http://www.peter2000.co.uk/aviation/faa-pplir/index.html) and this (http://www.peter2000.co.uk/aviation/jaa-ir/) may be of interest.

I don't recall the min hours post-PPL to commence FAA IR training, but it will be in the FAR/AIM under instrument rating requirements or some similar heading.

[Poeli]

Thank you very much, we certainly have some stuff to think/read about!

[proudprivate]

There are no minimum requirements to start training for the FAA IR, apart from having (assuming you are a Belgian national that is not a permanent resident of the US) a TSA clearance.

I would suggest your reading 14 CFR part 61 (part C) on eligibility and part 61 §65 on instrument rating requirements to answer your question in detail. By the way, you should also know this stuff when you prepare for your oral exam(s).

Several FAA training providers are available in Belgium with planes based at a variety of airports. You could ask around at your local airfield. The advantage is that you will be more familiar with the airspace and peculiarities of flying in Belgium, France, Germany etc... if you have gotten at least a part of your education there [note to moderator : I have no monetary interest in this].

For US flight schools, if you are starting ab initio, there is also the M1 VISA requirement, which limits you to accredited SEVIS schools (see other threads in this forum). I'm sure the combination PPL + IFR ab initio is possible, but I would advise against it. It's hard work, and sometimes theoretical concepts about the instrument rating are better understood after having done some serious VFR cross country first. I prefer flight schools in remote places because
- they are cheaper
- they airports tend to be less busy


The latest update on the EASA draft proposal is that the Transport Committee of the EU Parliament is going to debate about whether they are going to veto it or not.

no FAA holder can fly in Europe anymore

is a bit of an oversimplification of what it says in the EASA proposal. For the registration of your family aircraft, I would pay special attention in the documentation to make sure that whenever the word "operator" is specified, that it refers to an non-EU resident (company).

I hope this gets you on the way. Enjoy the ride and fly safely !

[IO540]

An interesting suggestion concerning a non EU operator. Probably a good advice.

The only gotcha I see is that under UK tax rules if you have a business (a limited company) and you also control another limited company (even one which does not do any trade) then your main business ends up getting only half size lower rate corporation tax bands.

I guess that, come the time, some fairly predictable commercial services will surface ;)

I would also add that doing an IR right after doing a PPL (if no previous flight training) is going to be an awful lot of hard work. You need to be a very competent and accurate VFR pilot before commencing an IR, in general.

[Poeli]

Thank you for the inputs! I guess the smartest thing to do then is to postpone IFR training untill we have more expierence with VFR flying

[proudprivate]

Poeli,

I have sent you a PM with extra info on FAA flight training.


About postponing IFR-training :

I guess it depends on the time you want to invest. If you are looking to go for a 90-day programme, the obviously it is doable (together with the CPL and the Multi-Engine rating at some US Schools).

But you are referring to PPL+IR in the family aircraft, then the safest bet is to improve step by step. I started my instrument rating when I had 100 hours TT and I recall an instructor yelling at me for mismanaging my power settings during afternoon thermals.

That being said, doing the instrument rating is definitely the right thing to do. It will make you a better and safer pilot, which is one of the reasons why the N-reg scene in Europe has a lot better accident statistics than the OO-reg scene (or the F-reg scene, or the D-reg scene). It also protects you from the so called "Killing Zone", because you spent a lot of time in Dual Instruction during the most dangerous period of your flying, when you have 100-200 hours (when you start to get cocky about your flying skills, showing them off to everyone willing to see them, when in reality you are insuffiently aware of things that could go wrong or capable of handling specific emergencies, avoiding distractions etc...).

But the reward for investing the time in dual instruction is a multiple of that, with the freedom to fly across the world with the skills to do it safely.

[englishal]

The only real requirement which might scupper some people is that you need to have 50 hours of PIC cross country time - cross country time is defined at from one airport to another with a straight line distance of 50nm or more. So no Compton Abbas to Old Sarum does not count. This is before the FLIGHT TEST though, not before you start training.

You can get away from this by training under part 141 but that is designed as integrated training from zero to ATP really, and there are disadvantages with 141. 99.9999% of us who did the FAA IR from Euroland did it under Pt 61.

I did my IR at about 120 hrs TT and incorporated a lot of the X/C time which I didn't have into the training.

[Poeli]

Thank you all. I now see that it would be wiser to take the PPL first and gain some expierence.