Average hours to first solo
 

As a former ppl holder who went solo around the 21 hour mark [as a part time student] I am keen to find out what the industry average might be, if indeed such a statistic exists. Or are there simply too many variables to make this a meaningful statistic?

thanks, shanwen
:ok:

I would say the average is 15 hours with a standard deviation of 5 hours. Which basically means that most, but not all, do it after 10 to 20 hours.

This question has been asked before a number of times here. A lot of people posted their numbers plus any factors (prior gliding experience for instance) that may have influenced it. A search plus some statistical analysis might help narrow my guesstimates down.

But as others have said: once you've got that PPL, nobody cares anymore.

Well, I went solo after 7 hrs 50 mins.

I had a great instructor ( ex RAF ) who really put me at my ease.
On my very first flight he sat there with his arms crossed during my takeoff. No doubt he had his feet on the rudder without me noticing it, but he talked me through it and up we went.

I'll never forget that first dual flight. He made me feel relaxed and I trusted him totaly.

I did not expect to solo so soon but the fact that he trusted me and I trusted him resulted in a first solo that I will never forget.

John Hill, great pilot & instructor. Thanks John :)

9hrs ish...

Has little relevance though as there are so many variables that can affect how long it takes. Just enjoy yrself and dont worry to much about stats like that.:ok:

DPT

It was 8 hours for me (in a Tiger Moth at Perth).

Coldair,
My instructor was not ex RAF but he got his rating from an ex RAF guy.
Same thing. He had me land on my air experience flight. He had me hooked. I soloed at 9.45.
He was brilliant in the air but the briefings were minimal.
He was a part time PPL instructor.
DO.

7 hrs 40 mins but it is not very relevant as weather comes into play. Ie you maybe ready at 7 hrs then hit a bad period of weather. What do you do? sit on your back side going rusty? No you carry on gaining experience and keeping current until the conditions are good for you.

15 hrs is probably a good bench mark but not that relevant. There could be an arguement that you are sent solo when you are ready to do your solo cross countries and attach the lot together.

When I started flying I had a wife and young baby and no money. My ambition was to fly an aircraft on my own and then to drop the lot. 20 odd years later 4000 hrs and an ATP I often wonder what went wrong with that initial ambition :)

The more time and experience you build up the better as you have to be safer than aiming for a minimum hour to solo record.

Pace

Too many variables to make much of the first solo stats, really. Age, lesson frequency, instructor. Plus I suspect people may well solo later these days, as instructors perhaps are more cautious.

Went solo at 10hrs 15, was great at the time. Looking back I do wonder whether it's too soon. I was a non flyer previously. You wouldn't let someone drive a car alone after 10hrs instruction.

I was very lucky,
I did 3.8 over two years.. did nothing over four years (no money) then flew solo after 50 mins so just under 5 hours

What kind of an instructor would let a student with 4 hours flown go solo? A little bit more would be ok.. but 4? :ugh:

one whom is very confident of their students ability and is fully aware of their background in aviation

maybe, but after only 4, 10, 12 hours, how equipped are we to deal with anything which might go wrong? Would be interesting to know the accident stats for students first solo, maybe im getting too cautios in old age

The issue of after how many hours a stude goes solo is irrelevant. I was thirteen hours. I know some who were shorter and others who took longer, many of both groups who are better pilots than me.

In my experience, once you have your PPL and a few hours behind you, there is no correlation between hours before first solo and qualities as a pilot.

To those who are fretting about this issue - it is a complete and utter nonsense.

It is what is best for you. Even if you do not appreciate it, much of what you are learning whilst circuit bashing P/UT with a FI beside you, will be of benefit later.

The Wombat

48 hours fixed wing, 30-ish rotary (wasn't counting precisely by then).

There you are, now I've really messed up all those averages for you!

I also hope that makes a welcome interlude in yet another thread which looks set to go something like this: "I went solo in 5 hours"..."well, I did it in 3 hours, and I had bad weather too, and a broken leg"..."I did it in 2 hours way back when we flew open cockpit taildraggers and were also getting shot at on downwind"... "I did it in 0.7689 hours"....etc, etc, etc.

'Solo oneupmanship', I think they call it. They do now anyway. :)

Figures I've seen indicate about 10 hours as a base then add 1 hour per year of age from about 21 upwards.

ie if you're 40 its 10 + 19 = 29 hrs

Us poor old ****ers just don't learn so fast - and forget even quicker :uhoh:. Of course, if you only fly every 3 weeks or have a rubbish instructor or bad weather or ..........

I do agree, I suppose it could be said that at about 5 hours I knew how to fly, takeoff and land the can but it wasn't for another 4 hours till I went solo. Under 4 hours and you lack general practice even if you can fly it. But congratulations anyway your the first I have heard to do it in so few hours.

Since it's only an issue for boys, it's called w!lly-waving :ok:

As Astir says it depends on age. My driving instructor reckoned the number of hours required to pass your test, was about the same as your age.

As Coldair remarked, its more a reflection on how good your instructor is. I was bashing around the circuit seemingly unable to land the aircraft. Then I had a different instructor, one hours instruction, problem solved.

For willy waving purposes, I will not get mine out, 22 hours (aged 41).

willy-waving
 

Come on guys. The Wright brothers went solo on their first flight. Try and beat that.

(Granted: they didn't do circuits, flaps, carb heat, radio, landing clearances and all the other things that make our lives so complicated today.)

Yakker

As most of us here have the mental age of around seven :) seven hours to solo sounds about right.

Pace

frequency and cost
 

airborne_artist probably made the most important point here :

Lesson frequency is of paramount importance. If lessons are once a month, or even less, the one spends at least a third of the next lesson catching up on what has been forgotten since. If lessons are much more frequent, say once a week, or even more, then much more reinforcement of acquired skills can occur.

In many, especially the young, lesson frequency is solely dependant on what can be afforded ! So, as always, finance comes into it !

My own first solo was 26 years ago, but I'll keep the hours to myself !

:ok:

"Figures I've seen indicate about 10 hours as a base then add 1 hour per year of age from about 21 upwards."

I was 62 years old when I did my solo,using above 41 plus 10=51 hours to solo

Well I did it in 19 hrs so I must be much better than average:}

It really is a load of old b****cks,you go when the instructor says so.

When I was learning there was a fixation around 10 hrs to solo,and it made my life more than a bit miserable thinking I was nowhere near ready.

It could be useful for the student to be told by the instructor on day one that it is not a race,that going solo at x hours does not make you a better pilot,and that the world is full of flash bas****s trying to be one up.
Lister:).

Lister, I tell my students something similar, very early on. The difference it makes is precisely...nil. :{ Most pilots are competitive high achievers, and even if something isn't a competition, they'll somehow make it into one.

1977, RAF Manston ATC gliding school
6-weekend course
Kirby Cadet Mk III
40 launches to first solo
average flight time 3 minutes
total pre-solo time 2 hours
They sure don't teach 'em like that any more.
Not sure I was ever taught to turn right, though ??
(My solo glider, XN246, is suspended from the ceiling of Southampton air museum, I believe in testament to my achievement in bringing it back in one piece !)

Including a few trial lessons, and the first stint (17 hours) until money ran out, I solo'd at 25 hours and was jolly happy with this! There was also a 3 year gap between the first 17 hours and the next 8 to solo, so maybe I could claim 8?

It could have been a couple of hours lower but the day they said I was ready to solo I did not have a spare pair of glasses with me so was stopped on a technicality!

I then completed the PPL course at 59 hours, again I was jolly happy!

Lady Whirls,
It may be for some but are you sure that there isn't a measure on insecurity here. I would suggest that most folks coming to pilot training are probably very proficient at other things in life, such as driving a car. Then suddenly after a long break from learning, they are thrown into a new situation where they think they are doing something badly & start to worry that they've lost the ability to take on new skills. In these cases it would be reasonable to seek reassurance by asking "Am I as good as everyone else?".

Of course we'll always have those who say "Solo? Piece of duff. I was so good at the taxi on my first lesson, the instructor hopped out at the hold point and let me take it from there" but their words will probably float past and be totally ignored. It's the guys who say "Actually, it took be about 15/20/25 hours" that will be taken into mind with the recipient mentally saying "Phew...at least it's not just me"

Batninth
 

Exactly,I've sailed around bits of Europe with my wife,I've raced cars in an amateur way and run a successful farming oriented business.
I'm not at all special, just someone who enjoys mechanical things,but I was sure I was behind the plot when I passed 10 hrs without solo.
The instructor was excellent,and we are still good friends,but it would have helped me a lot if he had told me that there is no exact time target for solo.
He didn't imply there was,but I thought there was!
Lister:)

You really can't blame instructors for not being mind-readers, and not understanding about students' massive and unnecessary feelings of insecurity. Most of us have this extremely strange idea that people are learning to fly....for fun.

It,s the landings that count not the hours, flying the average civilian airfield you will get about 5 to 6 landings per hour, instructing as I do at a military airfield we can do the 6 landings in about half that time.

The number of student landings are about the same, it just takes us a lot less flying time to send someone solo.

The attitude of ones instructor makes a difference. I soloed in 40 ish hours but my instructor wanted to make sure my autorotations were OK and I'd done a couple of engine off landings. However, after that I completed the PPL in a relatively short time of about another 25 hours.

It's no real indication of your progress!

Cheers

Whirls

Hold on! Two Lady Whirls? This is getting so confusing....:hmm:

Lady Whirls 1(*) said:
& then Lady Whirls 2 said:
Both are absolutely correct, and with the benefit of hindsight I guess a lot of us can look back and agree with that but at the time it feels much different. I suspect here that learning styles may come in to play as well, some people may take it all in at the beginning of their lessons and keep it in mind. But a lot of us need it repeating later on.

Personally I started with all the good intentions, but got lost in the mist of "I must land this thing properly or else it stops me going solo" and went downhill from there.

Partly it was a gentle chat on the clubhouse veranda with my instructor whilst watching the sun sink slowly into the evening that helped me to get it back in perspective after about 10 hours of instruction, but also (echoing Lady Whirls 1) when on final an exasperated voice next to me said "You're doing this for fun, just have fun".

Frankly it was the fun message that fixed it for me, I'd forgotten that I was doing it to have fun, and after that I used that as my mantra.

I'd say that reminding folks down the line, when their mouths are dry & they're trying desparately not to mess up again, that it is fun could be a huge boost.

(*) Numbering of Lady Whirls does not imply anything. I just worked it out on the fact that if I were flying from Ooop North, I would pass the good Whirlybird first before I got to the good Whirlygig - which would be embarassing if I thought I was heading for Northumbria.

batninth,

It's very simple really. My good friend Whirlygig and I worked out long ago how not to confuse our poor colleagues on Rotorheads...

Whirlybird = Whirly

Whirlygig = Whirls

That said, we cope with all the other variations too. :)

And theres me thinking you were one and same,well to be honest I didn't notice.
Sorry:)

Went solo at about 20hrs. Passed PPL skills test at 43hrs. Just goes to show, first solo doesn't mean a right lot in the grand scheme of things.

Went solo after 6hrs in a Piper SuperCub. Never flown before or even sat in a plane - apart from scheduled airlines.

Instructor was the don, ex military, but not from Miramar lol
Certainly the best five grand I've ever spent.

:):)

Dad was in the Glider Pilot Regiment. Brother built & flew superb tissue & balsa models. (Background in aviation.) I play jazz piano, trumpet & drums to a professional standard. I can sail. I love driving and drive an 'interesting' classic sports car. (Coordination, spatial awareness, talented polymath etc.)

I went solo in 17 hours, and 26 years later I'm still trying to complete the PPL.....beat that!! :}

I did mine after 8 hrs. I had some previous sailplane experience, but no license in the sailplane.

Right on Shunter It's getting PPL that counts.:ok:

Re
 

35 hours and counting. I am hoping it will be under 40.