Is anyone a pilot or in the aviation business?

[Danold]

While I was going to college at Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronuatics(PIA) I decided to do something I always wanted to do, become a pilot. So, I took some classes at Allegheny Community College and started my training at Pittsburgh Flight Training Center(PFTC) at Allegheny County Airport. Well I graduated from PIA in June but didnt have enough time to finish my training :(. I have about 40hrs of flight time in and 3hrs of that is solo flight.

I graduated from PIA an earned my Airframe & Powerplant license to become an airplane mechanic, and thats just what I'm gonna do. I landed a job in Brunswick, GA working on 727s, Airbuses, and other large aircraft. There is a small flight school on the airport I'm going to and if I can still afford it (nothing about aviation is cheap), I will finish it up and become a Private Pilot.

So, does anybody have a pilots license, is an A&P mechanic, or an air traffic controller?

Here are some vids from my first solo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpaVjJsR__E
Flying around Allegheny County Airport.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGUCyTPpDyM
Some steep turns south of the airport.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yL0FvvPE4w
Flying slow also south of the airport. That highway is PA 43 Turnpike.

I highly recommend taking lessons or finding a pilot that would take you up, its worth every minute.

[Red Rider]

Yep, another pilot here. Congratulations on the first solo! Did your instructor cut the back of your shirt off?

[Danold]

No they didn't. I guess the school quit doing that when a student decided that it was sexual harassment....

Anywho, How many hours do you have and what plane did you take your training in?

[Vealmonkey]

I spent some time years ago working at an FBO. Mainly refueling and helping the Chief Mechanic and ferrying people back and forth. Neat job. You meet all kinds of People. Wrestlers. Oliver North. Celebrities with their private planes. My Dad was a pilot and that is sort of how I got the job. He started fllying with sailplanes and his first properller driven plane was a Piper Tri Pacer. He went through a whole series of planes the largest of which was a Piper Malibu with the Turbo Prop conversion. He sold that and went and flew for a guy who sold food to prisons. The guy had a learjet and a cessena citation jet. I liked the citation jet better than the learjet. You had to be careful refeuling the learjets and the old MU2, they would tip over if you refueled them wrong. LOL The neatest planes I was associated with, were the DC-3s. Providence Boston Airlilnes was still flying the DC-3s back in the late 80s and had some based in Melbourne Florida. You needed a 10 foot step ladder to refuel them as you had to climb up on the wing. They had an old screw gascap that you just walked out on the wing and unscrewed to fill em up. After you grounded them of course. The DC-3s and the old Constellation were the neatest planes to fly in. I got to fly in a B-25 Mitchell as well. When I was a kid growing up, we would fly in whatever plane my dad had at the time and go somewhere to breakfast and fly home and clean the plane, and that pretty much was took up all day sunday. We also flew out to Frederick, MD several times to watch the unlimited air races when they still had them out there. But this was years ago. No more Air Races in Frederick for ages. My dad also had his instructors rating for years and I had gone through my ground school and was getting my flight time in, but didn't have enough time to solo. My dad had a citabria at the time, so that is what my flight time was in. Cloth covered tail dragger. My dad was bent that I never finished my license and still holds it against me to this day. But then there was a big family falling out at the time that factored into all of it as well. The second or third time I landed the Citabria it was in a stiff little cross wind and I ground looped it! LOL Didn't drag the wingtips or anything but it was a thriller. And it happened so fast that you didn't hardly have time to react, full opposite rudder and throttle and brake. Yee Haw!

[Red Rider]

No they didn't. I guess the school quit doing that when a student decided that it was sexual harassment....Yet another example of a tradition being lost forever to our politically correct society these days. What a shame! For a female, I can see how the cutting of the shirt might be construed as sexual harassment, but not for a guy. As a CFI, if I had a female student who was about to solo, I would have given her a few weeks notice to have an old shirt handy, just in case I decided she was ready to solo. Then, on the day of her first solo, she changes into the old shirt, solos, changes back into her original attire, and we cut up the old shirt so it can be hung on FBO's wall. Hopefully you cut your own shirt then, and commemorated it with some artwork, the date, tail number, your name, & your CFI's name.


Anywho, How many hours do you have and what plane did you take your training in?I have 10,743 hrs. total time & have been flying since 1/92. I did all my Private Pilot training in Cessna 152's. Do whatever you need to in order to finish your training and get that license. There's so much more fun yet to be had.

[okieRrider]

I am an a&p and have a radial engine shop here in oklahoma. We rebuild the continental, lycomings and curtiss wrights. Fun business to be in. I'm not a pilot as of yet, just to much other crap goin on. I do have though 4 airplanes a Stearman thats in project form, cessna 150 thats a flyer, fairchild 24 and taylorcraft L2B thats in project form too.

[Danold]

Vealmonkey, thats what ya gotta love about that job. Your always doing something different. Flying in a B-25 would be the shiz. I have only seen one and the roar of that thing just makes those little hairs stand up.

Okie, those old radials are impressive. I really was hoping to work on some while in school but all we ever did was learn how to time the mags. Do you sell any rebuilt engines or do you just overhaul them for customers? The price of aircraft engines is unbelievable! If I could my hands on one I would relocate the scavenge pump in it and make one wicked ceiling fan for the shop LOL...