B/C/D class endorsement - suggestions for a training plan?

[tu16]

Having got an SP license - I want to add this endorsement. Any suggestions for an optimal curriculum here? How much time ground and flying work to be expected? Any preferrable sequence in training? Any experiences in teaching/getting this endorsement?

Your feedback is greatly appreciated!

[3Dreaming]

I did one for a fellow this past Fall. He was a Sport Pilot student getting ready to fly his airplane at a towered airport. Time will depend on your location. We did 1-1.5 hours of ground, and then had to fly 60 mile to his airport to do the training flight training. The flight training could be done in less than an hour if you are located near a towered airport. If you study the applicable regulations from part 91, Radio phraseolgy from the airplane flying handbook, and listen to audioof flying in and out of airports you will have a good head start. Another thing to remember is this does not have to be done in a Light Sport aircraft. You could drive to your nearest towered airport with a flight school and do it there. Tom

[ibgarrett]

In my particular case, I did a couple of training flights with some ground rehearsal ahead of time going into the different air spaces. It really isn't too bad, although if you're ever nervous about it you can always add onto the calls "student pilot" and the ATC should slow down a bit.

I would definitely recommend going out and doing some touch n' goes, full stops and so on once you get the endorsement on your own. If you don't it is easy to forget or get flustered during the information they read back.

The last thing to remember is that the folks at ATC are there for you, because with out you being in the air (or us all being in the air) and needing to communicate with them, they wouldn't have a job.

Brian

[bryancobb]

Having got an SP license - I want to add this endorsement. Any suggestions for an optimal curriculum here? How much time ground and flying work to be expected? Any preferrable sequence in training? Any experiences in teaching/getting this endorsement?

Your feedback is greatly appreciated!

TU16,
Congrats again on your rating. Hopefully you've been out exercising those privileges you earned.

Pertaining to the "towered" endorsement, you are asking about a syllabus etc. As you know geting the entry in your logbook is not going to be very difficult.

What you really need, more than a line of words in your logbook, is some experience in the airspace you want to operate in. The more you get, the better, even if you are not the pilot.

Find a friend at the airport who don't mind you riding along on a flight into and out of a controlled field, preferably to a full stop. Watch the pilot get clearances to get in and out, to taxi, to get fuel. Ask him to show you how to get progressive taxi instructions and watch how it works. Pay attention to how he handles an "taxi-into-position-and-hold" clearance.
Having the yoke in your hand really doesn't help much! BEING THERE over and over DOES!

As a licensed pilot, you can request a facility tour from the FAA. You can go up into the tower and observe for as long as you wish. All of this this is adding to your EXPERIENCE which is the ONLY thing that will get you comfortable operating there.

Then when you decide to go yourself, do it on a Sunday morning when traffic is light, until you get confident.

On websites like AVWEB.COM you can print the instrument appoach procedure which has 2 things that are valuable to you as a Sport Pilot:
1) All pertinent radio frequencies
2) A highly detailed map of the airport with all runways and taxiways properly marked.

[EppyGA]

Listen to liveatc.net for awhile.

[ArionAv8or]

Listen to liveatc.net for awhile.

I did that too just to become familiar with the pattern of the conversations.

I personally did Class D one day with all my take off and landings to get really comfortable with the calls and did the "B" and "C" the next day. While doing my "B" transition I landed at Peter O' Knight which is a cool little airport. You can do it all together if you like but I chose to split it up since I knew my instructor would make me transition the airspace it gave me another excuse to fly a second day.

[bryancobb]

Listen to liveatc.net for awhile.

While doing my "B" transition I landed at Peter O' Knight which is a cool little airport. .

That's where I got my Private License back in 1986.
Love those approaches over water, and flying over The Sunshine Skyway bridge.

[3Dreaming]

Listen to liveatc.net for awhile.

I did that too just to become familiar with the pattern of the conversations.

I personally did Class D one day with all my take off and landings to get really comfortable with the calls and did the "B" and "C" the next day. While doing my "B" transition I landed at Peter O' Knight which is a cool little airport. You can do it all together if you like but I chose to split it up since I knew my instructor would make me transition the airspace it gave me another excuse to fly a second day.

You don't have to do flight training in all 3 types of airspace. You do the ground training to cover that. All that is required of the flight training is 3 take offs and landing to a full stop at an airport with an operating control tower. The ground training should cover al 3 airspaces. remember to make sure the instructor logs the ground training otherwise you didn't meet the requirements. Personally I would like to see the student enter and leave the airspace as well. It doesn't have to be in that order. Also doing more training than is required is not a bad thing. I think the student should be comfortable with the tower operations. Tom

[bryancobb]

You don't have to do flight training in all 3 types of airspace. You do the ground training to cover that. All that is required of the flight training is 3 take offs and landing to a full stop at an airport with an operating control tower. The ground training should cover al 3 airspaces. remember to make sure the instructor logs the ground training otherwise you didn't meet the requirements. Personally I would like to see the student enter and leave the airspace as well. It doesn't have to be in that order. Also doing more training than is required is not a bad thing. I think the student should be comfortable with the tower operations. Tom

Tom,
Like I said, getting the entry in your logbook will be simple. The name of the game is the trainee getting enough EXPERIENCE and UNDERSTANDING to feel very comfortable going in and out.
Bryan

[drseti]

Pay attention to how he handles an "taxi-into-position-and-hold" clearance.

For those who didn't catch this, the FAA officially changed the terminology a few months ago. What used to be called "position and hold" is now "line up and wait." I speculate that the reason for the change was pilots confusing "position and hold" with a "hold short" clearance. At any rate, the pilot/controller glossary in the 2011 FAR/AIM now reflects this change.

[drseti]

You don't have to do flight training in all 3 types of airspace. You do the ground training to cover that.

This is true as far as the FARs are concerned. As a matter of flight school policy, I don't let my Sport Pilots rent the plane to go into D, C, or B unless they have logged dual instruction in that particular airspace. As has been stated elsewhere in this thread, more training never hurts (except in the wallet).

[3Dreaming]

You don't have to do flight training in all 3 types of airspace. You do the ground training to cover that.

This is true as far as the FARs are concerned. As a matter of flight school policy, I don't let my Sport Pilots rent the plane to go into D, C, or B unless they have logged dual instruction in that particular airspace. As has been stated elsewhere in this thread, more training never hurts (except in the wallet).

I'm the one who said extra training doesn't hurt. After being around the rental business for almost 30 years if you have that much control over what people do with your airplanes after they leave the airport you are lucky. I have found people do stupid things while flying rented airplanes, and always fail to tell what they did. I also know it almost always gets back to the owner sometime. I have a customer and his wife who go places to eat quite often. One day I was quizzing them about where they were going, and as they walked off the wife says "It is none of his business where we are going.". I was not meant to hear that, but I did. I told her since it is my airplane that you are renting I think I do have the right to know where you are going, so I know where to start looking if you don't come back. Tom

[drseti]

I told her since it is my airplane that you are renting I think I do have the right to know where you are going, so I know where to start looking if you don't come back.

An excellent response, Tom!

[designrs]

Come on Tom, don't hold back. Please amuse us.
Top 10 stupid things people have done in rental airplanes?

[ibgarrett]

Oh - this should be good...

::::pulling up a chair to wait and watch:::::