How To Spend Hour Building
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How To Spend Hour Building
Hi All,
Just passed all the ATPL exams and I'm now looking to start my Hour Building, as I'm pretty inexperienced and got just about 90hrs(ish) total I was wondering what would be the best way to utilise the time.
I know to most this would be pretty common sense but rather than just burn holes in the sky and quickly get the time in the bag, I would rather try and re-enforce what I've done at PPL level and to make my life a little easier when I start the CPL side of things.
Are there any CPL manuals out there that give the exact requirements of how sharp we have to be with our skills etc, I've asked a few friends of mine and they said basically it's the PPL on steroids
but I would like to know the exact requirements and start putting that in to practise while I've got s
loads of time to make up.
Cheers
SB001
Just passed all the ATPL exams and I'm now looking to start my Hour Building, as I'm pretty inexperienced and got just about 90hrs(ish) total I was wondering what would be the best way to utilise the time.
I know to most this would be pretty common sense but rather than just burn holes in the sky and quickly get the time in the bag, I would rather try and re-enforce what I've done at PPL level and to make my life a little easier when I start the CPL side of things.
Are there any CPL manuals out there that give the exact requirements of how sharp we have to be with our skills etc, I've asked a few friends of mine and they said basically it's the PPL on steroids
but I would like to know the exact requirements and start putting that in to practise while I've got s loads of time to make up.Cheers
SB001
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When i get round to doing mine, i m going to fly to all of the aerodromes that give you free landing vouchers that you get in magazines eg flyer, Pilot. Might as well save the money on landing fees and they usually have interesting places to go to.
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I'd say use the time for something FUN. Go farm stripping in the westcountry for a weekend, fly over to the Scilly Isles, Scottish islands, Jersey, France etc. Do stuff you haven't done before. Meet interesting people with interesting aircraft at interesting airfields.
Stay within your capabilities of course, but shoehorning a plane in and out of short grass strips in the middle of nowhere is where the fun is and usually where there's no such thing as a landing fee (unless you insist on wearing a high-viz, then you pay double for looking like a spanner). Anyone can land on a mile of concrete. Get out of your comfort zone, away from London/Manchester and the horrible swathes of controlled airspace.
Stay within your capabilities of course, but shoehorning a plane in and out of short grass strips in the middle of nowhere is where the fun is and usually where there's no such thing as a landing fee (unless you insist on wearing a high-viz, then you pay double for looking like a spanner). Anyone can land on a mile of concrete. Get out of your comfort zone, away from London/Manchester and the horrible swathes of controlled airspace.
I wholeheartedly agree with Shunter because General Aviation is so expensive in the UK that this is likely to be your only opportunity for 30 years to fly for pure fun! Go for a tour of the country. Do a cross-channel trip. Go to the USA and fly there. Join a Flying Group and do all the fly-outs. Take your family and friends on flights.
But if you insist on being conscientious, have a look at the link to the CPL course provided by BHenderson and see whether there's anything in the course that you can practise in the type of aircraft in which you will be doing your hour-building. IMHO there won't be much point perfecting your CPL Airwork or Instrument flying in a 1982 vintage C152 when your CPL will be on an Arrow with wobbly prop and retractable undercarriage...
What you can practise is navigation, including tracking a few beacons using the ADF and VOR. Don't do it on every flight, but occasionally try it. I toured Kent on one flight, tracking all the coastal beacons. It got boring...
But generally speaking the key flying skill for the CPL is accuracy. Accord every approach and landing the respect and care it deserves, fly the numbers when climbing and descending, and try to fly straight and level when you're trying to fly straight and level! Oh please adopt correct Radio Phraseology!
But if you insist on being conscientious, have a look at the link to the CPL course provided by BHenderson and see whether there's anything in the course that you can practise in the type of aircraft in which you will be doing your hour-building. IMHO there won't be much point perfecting your CPL Airwork or Instrument flying in a 1982 vintage C152 when your CPL will be on an Arrow with wobbly prop and retractable undercarriage...
What you can practise is navigation, including tracking a few beacons using the ADF and VOR. Don't do it on every flight, but occasionally try it. I toured Kent on one flight, tracking all the coastal beacons. It got boring...
But generally speaking the key flying skill for the CPL is accuracy. Accord every approach and landing the respect and care it deserves, fly the numbers when climbing and descending, and try to fly straight and level when you're trying to fly straight and level! Oh please adopt correct Radio Phraseology!
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for CPL info look In LASOR's, its annoying and badly written but it tells you what you need to know about your CPL. you can download it from the CAA website!!
Also for hours building the US is great, I did 103 hours there last summer in around six weeks. A good friend of mine spent his time there too as its much cheaper and the flying is fun. He leased an A/C (Cessna 172sp) between him and his friend and they just flew where ever they wanted. Started in florida and ended up visiting around 20 of the states around the East US including a flight at 1,000ft up the Hudson River in New York!!
If I was doing my hours building again I think I would do similar to Mike, I covered a lot of ground during my 103 hours and had some relly fun flights!!
Basic figures to remember for your CPL tollerences are;
Height +/- 100ft
Heading +/- 10 deg
Speed +/- 10 knots
work to these whilst your hour building and also keep using VOR's and NDB's (good luck in US as they have none I believe). My advice is to head to larger airports, test your skills and keep accurate. Most people relax whilst doing hours building but your paying for every second you fly and when you get to flying multi engines on your IR you'll be paying £400 an hour so make it easiers on yourself by having good habbits before you start!!
good luck
Also for hours building the US is great, I did 103 hours there last summer in around six weeks. A good friend of mine spent his time there too as its much cheaper and the flying is fun. He leased an A/C (Cessna 172sp) between him and his friend and they just flew where ever they wanted. Started in florida and ended up visiting around 20 of the states around the East US including a flight at 1,000ft up the Hudson River in New York!!
If I was doing my hours building again I think I would do similar to Mike, I covered a lot of ground during my 103 hours and had some relly fun flights!!
Basic figures to remember for your CPL tollerences are;
Height +/- 100ft
Heading +/- 10 deg
Speed +/- 10 knots
work to these whilst your hour building and also keep using VOR's and NDB's (good luck in US as they have none I believe). My advice is to head to larger airports, test your skills and keep accurate. Most people relax whilst doing hours building but your paying for every second you fly and when you get to flying multi engines on your IR you'll be paying £400 an hour so make it easiers on yourself by having good habbits before you start!!
good luck
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Cheers everyone, thanks for your thoughts and experiences etc, I would love to goto the U.S but because of work I can't get the time off as I will need all of my annual leave for the CPL training etc.
Plus my I've not done much Instrument flying, just tracking the odd VOR cross cut etc, I've got RANT and it seems ok but I want something else and I've been looking at ELITE CORE, anyone recommend this software for Instrument training ?
SB001
Plus my I've not done much Instrument flying, just tracking the odd VOR cross cut etc, I've got RANT and it seems ok but I want something else and I've been looking at ELITE CORE, anyone recommend this software for Instrument training ?
SB001
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Basic figures to remember for your CPL tollerences are;
Height +/- 100ft
Heading +/- 10 deg
Speed +/- 10 knots
work to these whilst your hour building
Height +/- 100ft
Heading +/- 10 deg
Speed +/- 10 knots
work to these whilst your hour building
And, apart from not starting a sentence with "and", don't think about a twin costing you £400 an hour. If it *does*, consider it as costing you £6.67p per minute (including taxiing and run up)....or if you really want to scare yourself, that's 11pence a second.
Plus landing fees.
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Even better, if you're in smooth air, try for +-0 feet, hdg bang on, and perhaps a little bit for airspeed if you're doing steep turns 
Then again, you'd have to be a fortune teller to accomplish the aforementioned at 1'000 feet on a sunny Florida day!
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Then again, you'd have to be a fortune teller to accomplish the aforementioned at 1'000 feet on a sunny Florida day!
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FWIW, I'm with the go-places crowd. On the technical side, the CPL is nothing more than a PPL on a more expensive aeroplane, and the IR is about following a needle around. How much do you need to practise those skills?
