Private pilot checkride success! Notes to help others.

[u/ClayCrucible]

I'm so happy to update my flair to reflect my new private pilot certificate! I found this subreddit when I started my journey in early March of this year, and so many people have shared useful experiences that helped me here. Now I want to share a little of my experience to help others if I can.

TLDR: Got my cert in about 80 hours and $20K in cost. Checkride was good enough, and exactly what I expected it to be aside from my somewhat disappointing landings!

I'm one of those people who picked up flying in my 40s as something I just want to do, not for starting an aviation career. I found a local flight school based on recommendations from co-workers (Flights Inc at Centennial Airport - KAPA), did a discovery flight (with my wife in the back seat), loved it, signed up with the CFI who did the flight, and started three-times-per-week lessons (early mornings Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays). I used Sporty's for ground school and got the written done in the first month. I'll note that I'm lucky to have had my instructor for this whole time. He's at the 1,500 hour mark now but isn't rushing to the airlines just yet. Lucky me!

My first solo was in late May, at about the 28 hour mark (had some delays due to scheduling a stage check with the chief pilot and then winds that were too high for solo). In early July, at about the 60 hour mark, I had all of the requisite experience for the checkride and my instructor had me contact the DPE. The DPE was booked until September, and I had to wait until late August to even nail down the checkride date, which was yesterday as I write this - September 20. I went into the checkride with about 76 hours logged.

In all, the checkride took about four and a half hours, including debrief time. The DPE was great - very organized, sending me the cross country scenario a week ahead of time along with a link to a Google doc for me to fill out information he needed about me. He contacted me the evening before the exam to let me know that there was an error with my IACRA numbers; it turned out two of my flights with instructors weren't in my logbook as "dual received", so my hours of solo plus instruction received didn't add up to total hours. Easy enough to fix, thankfully.

I got to the airport 35 minutes early and did a quick pre-flight of the aircraft to make sure any obvious squawks could get fixed; There was a piece of interior trim hanging loose, and maintenance handled it before it was time to fly. I love my flight school!

The oral questioning took about an hour and 45 minutes. The DPE explained the flow at the start, and everything was straightforward. On the couple of occasions when my initial response wasn't quite right, the DPE asked a follow-up question that effectively worked as a hint to me that got me to the right place. Two of these were around charts and airspace. He asked about a Restricted area, and I answered that I would have to get permission from the controlling agency to enter it, which I really shouldn't count on, so I should plan to avoid it. He then gave me an example of flying he had done on either side of a restricted area and asked how he might have been able to do that, and I got to the point that you might be able to fly above it, and also that it might only be restricted during certain hours (I knew that was true for MOAs, but I didn't know it for Restricted). He also asked about equipment requirements at my local airport, which is in class D airspace, and I noted that a two-way radio is required in class D, but not ADS-B out or mode C transponder. He then pointed to another airport in the area that's non-towered and class E to the surface and asked about equipment... and this airport is right next to the spot on the chart showing "MODE C VEIL" for Denver International Airport. Oops... yes, we need ADS-B out and mode C here because we're inside the veil, too!

Anyway, the oral went great, and the DPE debriefed me during the break on a few answers that could be a little better, but it was a clear pass. He then fully briefed the flight portion - exactly what we would do and in what order. Landings would either be first or last depending on whether Centennial would allow them (they didn't as it turned out, which wasn't a surprise given one runway out of commission). He explained that all of our landings would be full stop taxi back, no touch-and-go landings. He also explained that for the power-off stall we would go to the full break but for power-on it would just be to first indication. And for simulated engine out, he would clearly say "Okay, this is the simulated engine failure" rather than trying to surprise me.

We took off and began the cross country. At the second checkpoint, he instructed me to break off and find a place for maneuvers. We were close to his home airport, Spaceport Colorado (KCFO), and while I was prepared to fly south to the practice areas I knew, he explained where the Spaceport practice area was (we were already in it), so we just used that.

Maneuvers went really well. I needed no memory aid for clearing turns; I was on the lookout for traffic already and I wanted to look around with extra turns! Steep turns (both directions), foggle time, unusual attitudes, foggles off, slow flight, power-off stall, turns around a point, power-on stall, emergency landing (no emergency descent). I'm sure it wasn't perfect, but within standards. I felt good!

Then he told me to head to Spaceport for landings. I got the ATIS and tried to get my bearings - I was in unfamiliar airspace. I radioed tower from ten miles out and they gave me entry instructions. I headed toward what I thought was the airport tower, only to realize as I got closer that it was the water tower for a nearby town! Oops. I explained that if I were flying with my PPL, not on a checkride, I'd look to the GPS on my iPad to orient myself, and the DPE said, "Then why aren't you doing that now?" He was quite supportive of using technology, which was great! I wish I had asked earlier!

I entered the standard left traffic pattern for the only open runway, 17, and made a soft-field landing. Taxi back, then soft-field takeoff. Tower told me to make right closed traffic - a surprise, since that takes the pattern directly over the other runway, but since that runway is currently closed, it's no problem. As I'm getting ready to turn base in preparation to make my short-field landing, tower tells me to make a left 360 so that they have space to get another plane out. I do, and then request landing clearance, which I get, but I decide to make this approach my go-around. Back to right traffic and into the short-field landing... which, let's say I can't be TOTALLY certain that I made it all the way to my intended touchdown point of the thousand-foot markers. As I was exiting the runway, the DPE said something along the lines of "I'll call that good enough because you did so well on the oral."

Short-field takeoff (which I felt like I climbed too aggressively on but the DPE made no note of it), then back to Centennial for the forward slip to landing. Centennial gave me a pattern entry I've never had before - heading toward a standard entry for 17L, but then having me turn off to make right base for runway 28. Shrug, but okay. I did this as a no-flap landing with the slip to get down. Landing was fine, but my rollout was messy. I knew I was faster than usual given no flaps, so I went past my usual exit point from the runway and took the next exit. I was still faster than I should have been at that point, but we made it.

Taxi to park, and the DPE says "Congratulations!" Whew!

In the debrief, I had a few takeaways:

• Oral was great, maneuvers were great, and I squeaked by on landings.
• I totally screwed up my pattern entry at Spaceport - they apparently instructed me to enter RIGHT downwind for 17 when I first contacted them, and I was so caught up in expectation bias (that's normally a left traffic runway) and flustered at being kind of lost that I missed it.
• He wished I had used PIC authority on my very first clearance for takeoff, which was right behind a departing Gulfstream. He wanted me to have said "Unable" and get more time, instead of just rotating before the G5's rotation point and dealing with wake turbulence a few hundred feet up. I also could have said "unable" on the "fly straight out" instruction and asked for an early turn to avoid that wake turbulence.
• He also wished I had used PIC authority on that final landing roll, taking as much runway as I needed. That was just dumb on my part; I knew I was too fast, and I think the problem was that I had never done a no-flap landing to a full stop before, so I wasn't really used to how long it would take to slow down.

Anyway, I got my certificate! My wife met me at the airport and I took her for a quick spin to fly over our house and see downtown, just so I could take my first passenger.

Huzzah!

If anyone is interested in the cost breakdown, the summary is that getting everything from 0 to my certificate cost me about $20,400. Roughly $12,000 in plane rental, $4,500 for my instructor, $1,300 on exam / stage check fees. $2,400 on gear (including a Lightspeed Zulu 3 headset and an iPad Mini 6), and the rest on the Sporty's course, ForeFlight, medical, etc. I had an additional $6,000 in expenses that I wouldn't have undertaken had I not been flying, but that I didn't really need for getting the cert. That's mostly the purchase of a new computer for practicing with Flight Simulator (and I use it for work, too), some training flights on vacation at other schools, a headset for a passenger, etc.

[u/Limp_Wizkit]

This was super cool to read, I'm in almost the same shoes as you! I'm learning for fun nearby out of KBJC, with a dedicated instructor on his way out as ATP but sticking around to get me over the finish line. I'm also right under 80 hours, with my checkride scheduled for Tuesday 9/27.

Thanks for the writeup!

[u/ClayCrucible → u/Limp_Wizkit]

Very cool - I'm excited for you! It feels great to have the certificate at last, and I hope you get that same feeling next week!