Hi guys. Just a quick question:

Where to do time building (around 40 hours) and WHY????. Maintenance... facilities... money... instructors...

- Daytona aviation acamedy (Daytona)
- Air America flight center (Daytona)
- Sunrise aviation (Ormond beach)

I'm from Spain, and as everybody, i guess, i'm worried about the hours recognized by the EASA legislation. I want to do time building with a mate of mine, flying as safety pilot. Any experience with any of these schools in which they gave you a certificate of hours that was valid in europe??

Thank's a lot guys!!!!

here is my opinion about air america in daytona. totally unprofessional.

I was going to do 100hrs of time building and we established on cessna 152 for 100hrs. After that i booked a place in daytona (not refundable) a month ago. When i checked with them 1 week prior, they said they already sold their 152 and i will not be able to do time building with that. They did not bother to let me know beforehand, maybe if i did not sent a mail 1 week prior i might have a huge problem.

Since i cannot refund the place i booked, i started searching somewhere close and found Deland Aviation. And luckly they offered me a better price on 152 and i finished 100hrs in 2 weeks. They have their own maintenance hangar so no worries there. Good instructors, good facility with a great simulator. I can definetly recommend that place. Bob is the owner, great guy.

Chandler Air Service is a good outfit but you want to go to Phoenix in the summer?? Last summer I saw temperatures reach 47C.

Do you mind to share your thoughts about visa issues etc? PM, if you don´t want to share it on public. Thank you so much!

5 years ago now, but friends have been there more recently and have had similarly good experiences.

Very high quality of instruction. If you have the money, do some aeros or tail wheel flying with them as they are second to none in that area.

No visa is required unless you plan on acquiring a full FAA license or new rating.

What jwscud said (actually he gave me a lot of advice when I went out there 3 years ago). Thoroughly enjoyed but I did struggle with the heat. Up to around 45°c some days and it just got unbearable. Done some practice aero's in the Pitts which was awesome.

Going flying as early as possible (preflighting in the dark, taking off at dawn) may help with the heat :cool:

I'm also heading out to CAS in April for a month.

Have heard some good feedback and the support from the team there so far has been excellent.

Would definitely advise getting the foreign licence verification process started if you haven't already. I commenced that in December and still haven't had confirmation. Can take up to 3 months as per the CAA and FAA websites.

Was there in April/May 2014. Great experience! Flying is second to none and CAS are top notch. I'd go back in heart beat. In two weeks got to San Diego, Vegas (over the Dam too), Grand Canyon, Sedona and down to Tucson and the Mexican border. Chandler airport is super busy. Coming in one day I had landing traffic parallel to me on other runway to my left and heli doing circuits off a taxiway to my right. You have to be on the ball...

Apart from the flying Phoenix is amazing. Super organised, friendly and just nice place to hang out. Did a off road drive one day (Tortilla Flat) which was only a half hour drive from Chandler. Would love to have had an extra week to check out the night life.

You won't regret it...

PF,

What was the costing like for the amount of flying you did??

I had some quotes in the region of ,$8000 - $9000 for between 60-80 hours..

I did 60 hours at $88 an hour = $5280 (minus 10% for having cash on account)
Car rental = $200 for 2 weeks
House rental from CAS = $350
Food = $400
Flights €700 return

Exchange rate has worsened since so will cost a bit more. I remember working it out at about €100 per hour for what I did. But personally I saw it as a holiday as much as any training that I did so you can reduce it for what you'd value flying across the Grand Canyon P1, which for me is a lot.

Great memories...

What aircraft were you on?

Cherokee.. 40 years old and not a bother out of her...

Have a chat with Westwind Aviation at Deer Valley (just north of Sky Harbour). Having relatives in Phoenix, I chose to go out there for hour building with a mate and Westwind were nothing but professional, straight up, helpful with brilliant staff and especially rates on aircraft (we paid $99 per hour wet if I remember rightly) that were reliable and well maintained. Infact, they even made sure that any routine work was carried out overnight so that out flying programme wasn't affected. I took N54715, a C172 which is no spring chicken but served me very well. It was owned by one of the in house engineers so was extremely well looked after. My mate took another, much newer C172 out which was very up to date in terms of equipment.

Can't recommend Phoenix highly enough, especially Deer Valley. Those 4 weeks gave us very fond memories and in fact 6 years on both of us that went out there are now flying big Boeings but would give our right nut for another lads trip with a couple of 172's around the West Coast.

Good luck and enjoy!

PS just a few quick tips...

- Fly over to North Las Vegas and do a night out.

- Lake Havasu has cheap fuel and a nice town for lunch

- LAX VFR Corridor from San Diego up to Santa Barbara is amazing

- Just to the south west of Sky Harbour is some high ground. The other side of that high ground is heading towards Luke Airforce Base and you'll be talking to Luke Approach. Go and fly around for a bit just west of the high ground and you'll find a few F15's will come and play with you!

Sorry for rabbiting on but it's the best lads trip I've ever done.
Loads of flying, loads of beer and loads of fun!

This has been done to death.

You cannot county any safety pilot or time with safety pilot towards EASA requirements.

It wouldn't be recognised anyway.

Stop trying to get around the system!

Well three days now until my hour building trip out to Chandler.

2 Whites 2 Reds your post was very motivational and I've decided to cover some of the same things in my trip. Sadly I've not managed to drag anyone else out with me so I'll be heading out solo!

However, looking forward to a month of flying and I will report back with any pertinent information.

I would look for rental options in Oregon or Illinois during summer. Canada might be an option too.

"Did a off road drive one day (Tortilla Flat) which was only a half hour drive from Chandler."


Jeepers - what were you driving !?! Half an hour?


Flying in the Phoenix area can be very good but no one here seems to have mentioned sheer density of traffic or heat stress (other than to say that heat doesn't usually bother you Pilot Lad and to start early in the day); the Phoenix training and transition areas are some of the busiest you will find anywhere in the world in terms of volume of traffic, with plenty of mixed types (they are F16's '2 whites 2 reds', and F-35's now, also flown by low houred pilots, albeit Airforce), lots of English as a second language over the airwaves (and that's not just the locals), and historically, a number of mid-air collisions (google for more details of recent accidents) between training aircraft; a particularly nasty one involving a Chandler based Cherokee not too long ago.


Heat (and it's getting hot now) is a big deal in Phoenix. Density altitude can become limiting but the biggest safety factor in my experience is tiredness: fatigue and dehydration - leading to distraction and reduced awareness in the cockpit with a resultant degradation in lookout. Keep hydrated with plenty of water, avoid downing copious amounts of beer every night and p a c e yourself but above all else - LOOKOUT and try to keep safe.

Yeah definitely I wouldn't go to Phoenix between April and October. I can't stand heat, not that kind of. Luckily there are some good options up in the North.

@ReverseBucket: Didn't take long at all to get to. Obviously it was longer than half an hour but I'm just talking about the drive to where it got scenic.

It's exactly a year to the day I started flying in Chandler. What I'd do to go back...

The heat can be bad (even in April/May). I found once you got up the air it was fine. The hardest thing about the temperature was that it would be so quite cold at 10/11,000ft and 35/40 degrees on the ground. You'd have to wear a jumper starting out and leave the door hanging open on taxi to be in any way comfortable.

Rbucket is right about the traffic. There are countless training schools there (a lot of em foreign). Lufthansa even have their own private airfield. I saw everything from fighter jets to USAF 137s (I think) doing circuits. When doing transition over Sky Harbor you'd have commercials landing/taking off under you with A320s/B737s on the approach at same height.

Still, as cautious as you have to be, it was by far the best flying I've done to date. The ATC in the States is second to none.

Btw, Payson has a great cafe!