Just wondering how long others need in order to feel comfortable to fly a new type of airplane.
After my training and PPL in a C-152 I have been checked out on a P28A but i took me +/- 10h to feel I was on “top” of the plane… what about other’s experiences ?
From my experience 10 hours is sufficient for pistons, both single and twins. I guess that for turbines and jets it’s closer to 25 hours although I don’t have personal experience – maybe someone else can comment.
It depends a good deal on the aircraft itself and on how much experience you have with these transitions. And it depends on how good you are in preparation of the transition training and in understanding the aircraft with its systems from the documentation. In the Sperling I felt home after an hour, when it comes to flying, but I will never be relaxed in crosswind landings, as I am in the 172. Some aircraft fly so nicely, they are little problematic to the pilot, I think the Bölkow Monsun is one of those aircraft.
There are two aspects.
One is flying it, and I don’t think that needs much more than 10 hours in most cases, if you have a good instructor who is familiar with the type and knows how to teach.
The other is understanding the aircraft systems. For example coming from a steam gauge cockpit to a G1000, a 1 week (5 solid days) course might cover it but only if you are really smart. If you want to be current for IFR ops, it will take longer to learn the buttonology.
However I doubt the PA28 will have a G1000 or anything like it. 10hrs should be plenty. I went from a C152/PA28 to the TB20 in about 5hrs, to fly it “OK”. To be comfortable, that takes longer – maybe 50hrs…
They are very similiar – similiar speed, handling, systems, etc.
I agree 10 hours should be fine.
The larger the transition in speed and handling and the more complicated the avionics the longer it takes.
In GA terms a large transition can mean around 30 hours to be comfortable – for example a PA28 to a Cirrus with nothing in between might be of that order.
It took me about 50hrs to become comfortable in my twin, but that was probably because it was a pretty big leap for me at the time. I was low time and had mainly flown the majority with instructors. Another bizarre thing was I didn’t like to fly high, for some reason. Over 5000ft started to feel uncomfortable. Only when I switched aircraft did that feeling go away. Bizarre.
jfw wrote:
in order to feel comfortable
Define comfortable. There are many levels of being comfortable. Clear blue sky comfortable. Reduced visibility comfortable. Rain & gusty crosswinds comfortable. Circuit session & local flight comfortable…
Light GA aircraft (up to approx. 200 HP, fixed pitch prop) probably 10-20 hours. High performance GA aircraft (up to 300 HP, constant speed prop), probably 30 hrs. Anything heavier or more complex than that, probably up to 50 hours. But it only starts to feel like putting on a glove when you get to around 500 hrs.
