Should I sacrifice my braces to attempt to become a pilot in the RAF?
Avoid imitations
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Join the Navy instead. The most commonly heard expression is "Brace yourself...."
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I was holding at RMB Chivenor after IOT before JEFTS and had reason to visit the RN dentist for a filling. He proceeded with the drilling stuff with no aneasthetic at all. I sat there, mouth agape, feeling sure he knew what he was doing and would get a needle out eventually, but no. The whole bloody thing with no drugs. Since it was a Marine base I figured this was SOP (Marines don't need drugs I'm sure!) and grimmaced as he got on with it. Looking back I wish I'd chinned the bugger!
I oddly used to enjoy going to my local Dentist, she was a young attractive buxom wench and used to rest her boobs on my forehead while she went about her business..... Whether she doped me up beforehand I couldn't tell you..
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If I had the braces out, I would have to pay thousands of pounds to have them put back in, since I am now over 18 and the NHS doesn't cover it.
My options are: 1)braces taken out, attempt to join, don't get braces back on
2) keep braces in, attempt to join in a year (whilst I'm at uni)
but risk there not be vacancies and having to redo the
aptitude.
Going to dentist tomorrow to see what he thinks!
Just out of curiosity, what is the ratio of people that pass OASC? :L
My options are: 1)braces taken out, attempt to join, don't get braces back on
2) keep braces in, attempt to join in a year (whilst I'm at uni)
but risk there not be vacancies and having to redo the
aptitude.
Going to dentist tomorrow to see what he thinks!
Just out of curiosity, what is the ratio of people that pass OASC? :L
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having been an RAF A2 QHI and a dentist... don't upset the recruiter, but maybe politely ask why? most ortho should be all wrapped up by the time you are anywhere near something fast and pointy. good looking teeth means you could go rotary as well
Lets see keep the braces and you will have straight teeth and probably pick up girls.........
ditch them become a Hot Shot pilot and do you really care about Girls as you swoop around the sky or at 500 feet just under Mach 1.
Always get new teeth implanted but in 15 years time would you want to be thinking I should have ditched the braces.
ditch them become a Hot Shot pilot and do you really care about Girls as you swoop around the sky or at 500 feet just under Mach 1.
Always get new teeth implanted but in 15 years time would you want to be thinking I should have ditched the braces.
Oh, I wish I’d looked after me teeth,
And spotted the dangers beneath
All the toffees I chewed,
And the sweet sticky food.
Oh, I wish I’d looked after me teeth.
I wish I’d been that much more willin’
When I had more tooth there than fillin’
To give up gobstoppers,
From respect to me choppers,
And to buy something else with me shillin’.
When I think of the lollies I licked
And the liquorice allsorts I picked,
Sherbet dabs, big and little,
All that hard peanut brittle,
My conscience gets horribly pricked.
My mother, she told me no end,
‘If you got a tooth, you got a friend.’
I was young then, and careless,
My toothbrush was hairless,
I never had much time to spend.
Oh I showed them the toothpaste all right,
I flashed it about late at night,
But up-and-down brushin’
And pokin’ and fussin’
Didn’t seem worth the time – I could bite!
If I’d known I was paving the way
To cavities, caps and decay,
The murder of fillin’s,
Injections and drillin’s,
I’d have thrown all me sherbet away.
So I lie in the old dentist’s chair,
And I gaze up his nose in despair,
And his drill it do whine
In these molars of mine.
‘Two amalgam,’ he’ll say, ‘for in there.’
How I laughed at my mother’s false teeth,
As they foamed in the waters beneath.
But now comes the reckonin’
It’s methey are beckonin’
Oh, I wish I’d looked after me teeth.
Pam Ayres -
I remember her when she was a young WAAF at Seletar in '67. She had nice teeth too!
And spotted the dangers beneath
All the toffees I chewed,
And the sweet sticky food.
Oh, I wish I’d looked after me teeth.
I wish I’d been that much more willin’
When I had more tooth there than fillin’
To give up gobstoppers,
From respect to me choppers,
And to buy something else with me shillin’.
When I think of the lollies I licked
And the liquorice allsorts I picked,
Sherbet dabs, big and little,
All that hard peanut brittle,
My conscience gets horribly pricked.
My mother, she told me no end,
‘If you got a tooth, you got a friend.’
I was young then, and careless,
My toothbrush was hairless,
I never had much time to spend.
Oh I showed them the toothpaste all right,
I flashed it about late at night,
But up-and-down brushin’
And pokin’ and fussin’
Didn’t seem worth the time – I could bite!
If I’d known I was paving the way
To cavities, caps and decay,
The murder of fillin’s,
Injections and drillin’s,
I’d have thrown all me sherbet away.
So I lie in the old dentist’s chair,
And I gaze up his nose in despair,
And his drill it do whine
In these molars of mine.
‘Two amalgam,’ he’ll say, ‘for in there.’
How I laughed at my mother’s false teeth,
As they foamed in the waters beneath.
But now comes the reckonin’
It’s methey are beckonin’
Oh, I wish I’d looked after me teeth.
Pam Ayres -
I remember her when she was a young WAAF at Seletar in '67. She had nice teeth too!
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I still remember the sign on the ceiling in the dental section at Odiham, it was above the chair where they gassed you to knock you out.... It read "W*nking makes you blind"....
I wonder when the fun police caught up with that one and it dissapeared.
I wonder when the fun police caught up with that one and it dissapeared.
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It seems the rules ref braces are not unique to joining the RAF
Jacko - check this American advice out and see if you could apply the same caveat for yourself when joining. Get your answers lined up from your dentist with time lines etc.
source Answering Medical History Questions | Military.com
Jacko - check this American advice out and see if you could apply the same caveat for yourself when joining. Get your answers lined up from your dentist with time lines etc.
source Answering Medical History Questions | Military.com
Braces (If you wear or are planning on obtaining braces for your teeth, have the orthodontist submit a letter stating that braces will be removed before active duty date; release form and sample format can be found in the Recruiter's Medical Guide.)
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racedo wrote;
You may be misunderstanding this thread - the OP wants to become a pilot.
Lets see keep the braces and you will have straight teeth and probably pick
up girls.........
up girls.........
Jacko, recruitment ought to be a regular (ie open at least once a year) thing now that the system has caught up with itself. Waiting until you're at university will make you a better candidate and make it more likely to get through. Since the RAF is recruiting fewer Pilots than it has done previously, why give it anything less than your best shot? When I went through IOT just 3 years ago Pilots were already ~75% graduate entry, and that other ~25% was made up of re-entrants and direct entrants. By not going in with a degree you're giving yourself; nothing to fall back on should you for whatever reason fail training, worse pay and promotion prospects once in, a shot at a far smaller proportion of entrants.
Why make it harder for yourself? Go to university, join the UAS, get the experience, use the UAS to get a bursary, learn how to fly with them, get a degree and then join up. And oh, btw, your teeth will be fixed by then too.
Why make it harder for yourself? Go to university, join the UAS, get the experience, use the UAS to get a bursary, learn how to fly with them, get a degree and then join up. And oh, btw, your teeth will be fixed by then too.
Keep the braces and come back next year. They are highly unlikely to close the door after only one year - they would rather have a steady stream of recruits rather than one big pulse. Of course this goes wrong on a periodic cycle and results in a crunch, but we have only just had one of those. Even our manpower planners won't let things slip in only 2 years.... and there is no such thing as a hold pool or order of application; you won't be penalised for failing to apply at your earliest opportunity. Getting health issues (even minor ones) sorted is a very good reason to defer application.
Edited to add - nothing more than idle speculation here, but it seems reasonable to assume that there are 3 years' worth of pilot candidates out there waiting to apply for this first recruitment window in a while. Instinctively, that suggests that the acceptance standard will be particularly high this year (for the fixed number of places). That's not to say you wouldn't make the grade - but it might well be easier in a year or two once the bow-wave of "top-drawer" candidates have all found their way into the system, and you could then compete in a more "normal" field of applicants. That might have benefits a couple of years further on at role disposal, as well...
The key thing is you have age on your side and can afford to play these factors off against each other, a luxury not available to those exiting university. I would agree entirely with BV's points below, and note also that the sponsorship on offer is piffling and that the UAS flying training does not count towards EFT. Much as it pains me to say it as a graduate, but these days the 100% committed career pilot is best off joining with 3 good A-levels and getting the hell on with it, extenuating circumstances such as orthodontal work notwithstanding.
Edited to add - nothing more than idle speculation here, but it seems reasonable to assume that there are 3 years' worth of pilot candidates out there waiting to apply for this first recruitment window in a while. Instinctively, that suggests that the acceptance standard will be particularly high this year (for the fixed number of places). That's not to say you wouldn't make the grade - but it might well be easier in a year or two once the bow-wave of "top-drawer" candidates have all found their way into the system, and you could then compete in a more "normal" field of applicants. That might have benefits a couple of years further on at role disposal, as well...
The key thing is you have age on your side and can afford to play these factors off against each other, a luxury not available to those exiting university. I would agree entirely with BV's points below, and note also that the sponsorship on offer is piffling and that the UAS flying training does not count towards EFT. Much as it pains me to say it as a graduate, but these days the 100% committed career pilot is best off joining with 3 good A-levels and getting the hell on with it, extenuating circumstances such as orthodontal work notwithstanding.
Last edited by Easy Street; 21st Mar 2014 at 14:47.
Should I sacrifice my braces to attempt to become a pilot in the RAF?
Muppet.
Please allow me to address a small snippet of misinformation in your post. You suggest that 18 year old DEs have poorer promotion prospects. This is not quite true. You will of course soak up 6 years of initially poor wages (a good thing in the eyes of the bean counters) but your overall promotion chances are potentially better, not worse. Once you get to the stage that Sqn Ldr is a possibility you will be comparably younger than the graduates and therefore a brighter prospect for high command later on. This does obviously depend on your own maturity etc but the RAF gets slightly more than a pound of flesh with regards to RoS from younger guys and that is good in their eyes. Just in case you think I'm bigging myself up it is quite the opposite. I was a graduate DE after a four year degree. I was CR on the Jaguar at 28.5 years old. By the time I was considered to be in the promotion bracket I was 34 (it's lucky that promotion was never my bag). Our young friend Jacko and his ilk would be around 30 and therefore a brighter long term prospect than the likes of me. If you don't believe me I can cite many examples.
BV
Please allow me to address a small snippet of misinformation in your post. You suggest that 18 year old DEs have poorer promotion prospects. This is not quite true. You will of course soak up 6 years of initially poor wages (a good thing in the eyes of the bean counters) but your overall promotion chances are potentially better, not worse. Once you get to the stage that Sqn Ldr is a possibility you will be comparably younger than the graduates and therefore a brighter prospect for high command later on. This does obviously depend on your own maturity etc but the RAF gets slightly more than a pound of flesh with regards to RoS from younger guys and that is good in their eyes. Just in case you think I'm bigging myself up it is quite the opposite. I was a graduate DE after a four year degree. I was CR on the Jaguar at 28.5 years old. By the time I was considered to be in the promotion bracket I was 34 (it's lucky that promotion was never my bag). Our young friend Jacko and his ilk would be around 30 and therefore a brighter long term prospect than the likes of me. If you don't believe me I can cite many examples.
BV
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Alternatively.......
It is my understanding (please correct me if I am wrong) that a significant number of pilots are unsuccessful in their first attempt at the aircrew selection assessment. Often, second or even third attempts may be required, each a year apart. This, when combined with a decision to delay for a year before starting the process , and the relatively narrow age acceptance window the OP might want to consider whether the risk is worth the delay.
(When questioned regarding other alternatives to being an RAF pilot when he was beginning to approach the upper height limits, a close acquaintance fervently stated that he would cut his feet off first.
)
"You have to want to fly so bad that you dream about it, talk about it, work very, very hard to get it, give up other things that are not directly relevant to it, take every opportunity to experience it. Anything less will be quickly identified as an indication of lack of commitment".
Good luck
Imagegear
(When questioned regarding other alternatives to being an RAF pilot when he was beginning to approach the upper height limits, a close acquaintance fervently stated that he would cut his feet off first.
)"You have to want to fly so bad that you dream about it, talk about it, work very, very hard to get it, give up other things that are not directly relevant to it, take every opportunity to experience it. Anything less will be quickly identified as an indication of lack of commitment".
Good luck
Imagegear
Don't knock the lad. At least he has a clear view of what he wants to achieve. Over on Arrse, a Sandhurst-bound cadet is worrying about what sort of underwear he will be wearing.
This is a very odd thread! I have known people who in order to get a chance to become a military pilot have sacrificed much more than a set of straight teeth! The decisions ahead my young friend will be far more important than this and you will not be able to rely on help from a forum. The answer to your question lies within YOU. If you have doubts on this you have not thought out the big picture.
If you ever have an aircraft emergency, you can always bite your way out of the canopy (follow the zig-zaggy lines on the plexiglass).
Beware of lightning strikes on your face. St Elmos fire is harmless and will help an aircraft formate on your wing even in thick cloud.
Next time you are at AOC, impress the DS with your ability to eat an apple through a tennis-racket. Now that the new Cold War has started you will be a national asset.
No one can accuse you of being a 'blunty' with those gnashers'. I assume you look not unlike a young Hannibal Lector only with the ability to name all the stations equipped with Bloodhound?
Flug
Beware of lightning strikes on your face. St Elmos fire is harmless and will help an aircraft formate on your wing even in thick cloud.
Next time you are at AOC, impress the DS with your ability to eat an apple through a tennis-racket. Now that the new Cold War has started you will be a national asset.
No one can accuse you of being a 'blunty' with those gnashers'. I assume you look not unlike a young Hannibal Lector only with the ability to name all the stations equipped with Bloodhound?
Flug
Quite a change from my day!