Quote:
Originally Posted by onewhippedpuppy
Tim, you don't suggest the books as a substitute for ground school, do you? That's more the role of the CDs, to take the place of the ground school. Also, you can get an A&P without actual experience?
I hope to do the ground school/study portion of it via CD or book as time permits, so I can use spare time during the day for actual flight instruction.
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Matt, I had no formal ground school. I read books (can't remember which ones exactly) and my instructor would go over various stuff prior to and after flights.
The Gleim books are best studied just prior to taking the tests. They typically have all of the possible questions that could be on the FAA tests. IIRC, there were several hundred possible questions but the testing facility randomly pulls a test with maybe a hundred questions. If you go thru the whole Gleim book, you will have seen every question. I went thru and answered every question in the book, then went back and marked all the ones I missed. I then went back and re-tested myself on the ones I missed and then took the test.
I got my AP by using my prior experience building experimental aircraft and by assisting my IA with maintenance on my airplanes. One needs to prove 30 months worth of practical experience and have an IA write a letter confirming it. Once the feds sign off on this, you can then study the books, take the written tests and finally take an oral and practical test administered by someone who is authorized to do so by the feds. I luckily had a local guy who runs a highschool two yr program that administered my oral/practical test. He assumed I would fail as at that time he despised most experimental aircraft guys. He flat out told me after the test that I did better than most of the kids he has taught for two years in his accredited A&P school. (I guess it all came down to a college educated 30 something engineer who needed an A&P ticket real bad vs an 18 yr old kid who may have struggled in regular highschool
)
A few years later (about four years ago), I got my IA rating which means I now can do annual inspections (makes owning my own airplane less painful to the wallet). I went to the Baker school in Nashville Tennessee for their 4 day course to get my IA rating and scored a perfect 100% (only a handful per year score a perfect 100....I must admit, I got lucky
). I typically do about 6 annuals every year to maintain my rating and it makes for a nice side business. I have a 172 in my shop right now that is getting an annual inspection that is owned by a friend of mine.
For a somewhat recent college student who is involved in engineering such as yourself, I must say that the tests are pretty straight forward and do not require anything more than a few evenings of cramming with a Gleim's book.
Even though I pretty much aced every FAA test I ever took, I in no way consider myself an expert on either flying or fixing
. That said, once you have the rating, real world experience DEFINITELY is more important than any test scores. I have turned down many jobs that I know I have no business touching and I don't pretend to be the worlds greatest pilot with my measely 700 or so hours of mainly fair weather flying.
