Typical Training Time

[JimmyD]

I'm looking at going for my SP ticket in the spring of the coming year. I've been contacting flight schools for information and it seems there is a broad spread on flight hours to complete the program.

One said that typically students take more than 20 but less than 30 hours to pass the check ride. Another told me to expect at least 50 hours, because he's never had a fixed-wing SP student pass a check ride with less than 50 hours of flight time.

I know that there are a LOT of variables between individual students. What would be a typical time for an average person? Between 20 & 30 seems reasonable to me, but a minimum of 50 sounds odd.

[Dave C]

I took 39 hours to get to my SP checkride. That is one datapoint for you. It is well known that people often take much more than the minimum hours to gain the required proficiency to pass the checkride. I think this number varies widely based on the individual.

[Dave C]

I did take a little over a year to complete. That wasn't helpful. You don't want to be having to relearn things because of big gaps between lessons. If you can fly a couple times a week or more that would be ideal.

I don't think that completing in 30 hrs is out of the question.

[nub_pilot]

I will provide you my feedback, but I have not pass my check ride yet.
Started in 2019 and with 2 plane incidents in separate planes and a bunch of setbacks with weather. starting in July 2020, scheduled lessons 3 times a week, but typically only ended up getting one lesson every 2 weeks. at the age of 50 this month and have 37.3 total hours, haven't solo'd yet even though instructor says I'm so close. we have refocuses on the duel XC, then it will be solo, and solo XC. my age may have played a large roll in my ability to grasp the landing picture and alignment.

So this is my story.
Jeremy

[drseti]

I've been running my SP flight training program since January 2009 (just under 13 years now), and put through enough students to give you a baseline. The minimum hours requirement in my curriculum is 30 (the FAA 20 hour requirement us achievable, but only if you start out already knowing how to fly!) Nobody has yet completed in my 30 hour minimum - my best students make it in 34 or 35, with most pushing 40. (FWIW, those of my SP graduates who continue on for the PP upgrade typically complete that in another 15 or 16 hours.) I think doing SP first is a cost-effective stepping stone, especially considering that the national average for zero to PP is now about 70 hours.

[3Dreaming]

As an instructor I will tell you that there are several different factors that will effect the number of hours that it will take to complete your training. First is the airplane. When the FAA came up with the 20 hour minimum they were envisioning people learning in two seat ultralight type aircraft, none of these modern LSA were even approved here in the states when the rules went into effect. With the modern LSA aircraft that are often used for training they are not all created the same. I have about 1000 hours in Flight Design CT aircraft, with quite a bit of training given. They are a great airplane, but not an easy airplane to learn to fly in, but if you learn to fly in one you will be well trained for moving to other aircraft. The lowest hour total in a CT that I had a student ready for the checkride was 35, but I also had on with 120. A simple airplane will shorten the time needed to learn to fly. It will take less time to learn in something simple like a J3 Cub compared to a full glass panel whiz bang airplane.

The next factor is the student. Engineers and doctors tend to take longer, because they over think everything. There are many things involved that require doing not thinking. The quicker you realize this the better you will be. Next is age. Using 35 as a base you can almost add 10 hours of additional training for every decade past 35. Of course there are exceptions to this rule. Students that have already passed the FAA knowledge test tend to do better with training, so start studying before you start flying.

One last thought is on landings. If possible find an airplane that is easier to land if possible. Landings are a great frustration to pilots, and here is why. Almost everything you will learn in an airplane can be practiced for extended hours at a time. There is what I call the critical part of landing. It is the time from when you stop your normal glide, and start slowing the airplane down while judging you height above the runway to arrive at the minimum airspeed right as you are ready to touch the runway. You are doing this while holding your position in relation to the runway centerline, adjusting for changing wind speed, and also trying to get the axis of the airplane aligned parallel with the runway. This whole process only last around 20-30 seconds for each landing, and is the hardest part about learning to fly. 6 landings only equals 3 minutes of critical landing practice. Flying an airplane that is easier to land will make the process of learning landings take less time.

[nub_pilot]

As an instructor I will tell you that there are several different factors that will effect the number of hours that it will take to complete your training. First is the airplane. When the FAA came up with the 20 hour minimum they were envisioning people learning in two seat ultralight type aircraft, none of these modern LSA were even approved here in the states when the rules went into effect. With the modern LSA aircraft that are often used for training they are not all created the same. I have about 1000 hours in Flight Design CT aircraft, with quite a bit of training given. They are a great airplane, but not an easy airplane to learn to fly in, but if you learn to fly in one you will be well trained for moving to other aircraft. The lowest hour total in a CT that I had a student ready for the checkride was 35, but I also had on with 120. A simple airplane will shorten the time needed to learn to fly. It will take less time to learn in something simple like a J3 Cub compared to a full glass panel whiz bang airplane.

The next factor is the student. Engineers and doctors tend to take longer, because they over think everything. There are many things involved that require doing not thinking. The quicker you realize this the better you will be. Next is age. Using 35 as a base you can almost add 10 hours of additional training for every decade past 35. Of course there are exceptions to this rule. Students that have already passed the FAA knowledge test tend to do better with training, so start studying before you start flying.

One last thought is on landings. If possible find an airplane that is easier to land if possible. Landings are a great frustration to pilots, and here is why. Almost everything you will learn in an airplane can be practiced for extended hours at a time. There is what I call the critical part of landing. It is the time from when you stop your normal glide, and start slowing the airplane down while judging you height above the runway to arrive at the minimum airspeed right as you are ready to touch the runway. You are doing this while holding your position in relation to the runway centerline, adjusting for changing wind speed, and also trying to get the axis of the airplane aligned parallel with the runway. This whole process only last around 20-30 seconds for each landing, and is the hardest part about learning to fly. 6 landings only equals 3 minutes of critical landing practice. Flying an airplane that is easier to land will make the process of learning landings take less time.

Completely agree on the landing sight picture...that was the hardest for me and took about 40ish landing for it finally click with me. Still have a bunch of issues with crosswind, but it is seeming to all come together. additionally that 20-30 seconds of time take the most out of my and wears me down. after about 6-7 circuits I almost feel wiped out and typically done with the lesson even though its only been just over an hour.

[JimParker256]

I would add that one of the most inefficient ways to learn to fly is to try to fly one hour per week with your instructor... Inevitably, many of those sessions will wind up cancelled for various reasons: instructor or student availability, airplane maintenance, weather, etc. Thus the plan to fly once a week turns into once a month, and you may find that you've forgotten most of what you learned on the previous flight by the time you get to fly again... It can be especially painful when (not if, but WHEN) you have a stretch of really bad landings and just can't seem to get the hang of it.

The way the military did it (back when I was going through it - about a million years ago) is to schedule a 1.5 hour flight lesson, and plan to fly six days every week, knowing that a couple of those days could get scrubbed for weather reasons. As a result, they have an excellent track record for getting people through flight training "on schedule" and "on budget." You're in the air almost every day, so those "dry spells" just don't last as long.

Of course, that means that you need to be able to pay for all that time, which could be an issue for some. But it would be far better to save up your money for a year, then fly 50-60 hours in 1-2 months than it would be to pay for a few hours every month for a year or more. To that end, many flight schools offer a discount when you purchase "block time" (usually a 10-hour minimum), and some even offer an "accelerated training" deal that includes 40 hours of training at a slightly better rate, with priority scheduling to fly two 1-hour sessions every day, plus ground school. If I were doing it today, I'd save up my money and my vacation time, and spend both going somewhere I could get one of these accelerated ratings. Spending a month immersed in flight training would keep it moving right along!

One local flight school near me offers an "accelerated Sport Pilot training" at a discounted rate over their hourly training rates, and claims that 80% of their students get the Sport Pilot certificate within the 40 hours included in their "deal." (It sounds plausible to me, but I have no real way to verify their claims, so take it with a grain of salt...)

Good luck with your training!

[drseti]

One local flight school near me offers an "accelerated Sport Pilot training" at a discounted rate over their hourly training rates, and claims that 80% of their students get the Sport Pilot certificate within the 40 hours included in their "deal."

I don't doubt the feasibility of that, Jim. But of course, in most accelerated training, long-term retention is an issue. (They're called "crash courses" for a reason. )

[JimParker256]

don't doubt the feasibility of that, Jim. But of course, in most accelerated training, long-term retention is an issue. (They're called "crash courses" for a reason. )

I hesitate to argue with Dr Paul, whose expertise far exceeds mine, but it's been working for the military for years and years. There are plenty of stories about folks who trained through the supervised solo, following the "pay as you go" model, then either quit altogether, or had a long enough layoff before resuming their training that they basically forgot how to fly... And there are plenty more who earn their PPLs and then fly a few more flights with their wife or girlfriend, only to stop flying completely within a year or so. I mentored one guy who did exactly that. He moved to a new city, and always "meant to go to the airport" but never did. Five years later, he would effectively be "starting over" if he wanted to fly again. I think that particular problem has little to do with the method of obtaining the rating...

[rcpilot]

.......The next factor is the student. Engineers and doctors tend to take longer, because they over think everything. There are many things involved that require doing not thinking. The quicker you realize this the better you will be. Next is age. Using 35 as a base you can almost add 10 hours of additional training for every decade past 35. Of course there are exceptions to this rule. Students that have already passed the FAA knowledge test tend to do better with training, so start studying before you start flying..............

Well, that explains it. As a 55 yo doctor(I'm a podiatrist in my spare time) I had a little over 60 hours before my check ride. Of course there were some mitigating circumstances like my near fatal motorcycle accident 6 weeks into my training. Because of that and a few other things it was about 7 months before I got back to my training.

[mctnh]

I know I’m responding to an old thread, but wanted to give hope to older individuals who want to learn how to fly. I started my lessons at age 61 and within three months had my sport pilot license with 35 hours in the air at time of my check ride. I am a retired college professor with a PhD. I don’t know if that helped or hurt me. I am an analytical sort, but I tend to pick up things quicker than most people. … although still take more typical times to master.

That being said, I think the secret to my success was being able to space my lessons out enough so new info could sink in … yet there was never a large gap of time between my training flights. I completed my ground school online with Gleim about 17 hours into my training. I was a hang glider pilot before, and I had fooled around with flight sims in the past. Those did help a little.