co-pilot question

mattp1803

mattp1803

Well-Known Member
I posted this question on another board that doesn't have near as much volume or traffic, so I thought I would post it here to see if I get any responses.

I have a legitimate/hypothetical question in regards to being a co-pilot for an owner with a private jet. If the airplane is being operated under part 91, is there any requirements for the co-pilot other than having his or her commercial/multi/instrument ticket? Obviously you would have to meet the insurance requirements on the aircraft, but is the co-pilot required to be typed or would that only be if you were the captain/PIC? And hypothetically, lets say the aircraft is a Gulfstream G550. Thanks in advance!
 
mattp1803 said:
I posted this question on another board that doesn't have near as much volume or traffic, so I thought I would post it here to see if I get any responses.

I have a legitimate/hypothetical question in regards to being a co-pilot for an owner with a private jet. If the airplane is being operated under part 91, is there any requirements for the co-pilot other than having his or her commercial/multi/instrument ticket? Obviously you would have to meet the insurance requirements on the aircraft, but is the co-pilot required to be typed or would that only be if you were the captain/PIC? And hypothetically, lets say the aircraft is a Gulfstream G550. Thanks in advance!
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Part 91 there is no other requirement. Having said that anyone that can buy a 60+ million dollar jet should send his FO to school. I would question any PIC that would fly a G-V with just a seat warmer.
 
Gonzo said:
Part 91 there is no other requirement. Having said that anyone that can buy a 60+ million dollar jet should send his FO to school. I would question any PIC that would fly a G-V with just a seat warmer.
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Thanks, that makes sense. When you say school, are you saying send the FO to be typed, or just school to learn initial, systems, etc.
 
I'd say the FO should go to get a full type, but companies don't have to do so, they can send an FO to school for SIC training, they'll train you on systems and do some sim work and have you take a checkride, but the ride I believe has one less approach required than a normal type ride requires.

Also, there are companies that will have an in-house checkairman that would take the FO up and give him a checkride. In that case, the company will (hopefully) train the FO thoroughly on initial, systems, etc. The companies I've worked at as a charter pilot often did this for Lears, although I never heard of it being done on anything larger than a Lear 35, and I'd be very shocked if it happened with Gulfstreams. The last place I was at was trying to get away from this and send people to school mostly due to insurance reasons.

Plus, if you do go to school, hopefully you'd be a competent pilot coming out of it to help the captain, and not just a warm body in the seat that flips switches when told to do so.
 
Number1atNumber2 said:
I'd say the FO should go to get a full type, but companies don't have to do so, they can send an FO to school for SIC training, they'll train you on systems and do some sim work and have you take a checkride, but the ride I believe has one less approach required than a normal type ride requires.

Also, there are companies that will have an in-house checkairman that would take the FO up and give him a checkride. In that case, the company will (hopefully) train the FO thoroughly on initial, systems, etc. The companies I've worked at as a charter pilot often did this for Lears, although I never heard of it being done on anything larger than a Lear 35, and I'd be very shocked if it happened with Gulfstreams. The last place I was at was trying to get away from this and send people to school mostly due to insurance reasons.

Plus, if you do go to school, hopefully you'd be a competent pilot coming out of it to help the captain, and not just a warm body in the seat that flips switches when told to do so.
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Thanks for the feeback! It almost seems that it would be more beneficial to just do the PIC check ride as opposed to the SIC ride, if it's only one additional approach.

I've heard of companies doing exactly what you just described. In this particular instance, it would be a private owner, and not necessarily for a corporation. I would assume you would negotiate in the contract that the owner would send you down to school annually or bi-annually for recurrent training as well.

And I agree whole heartily about the "warm body" comment. One would only hope the PIC would allow the FO to fly the airplane every now and then, to become more and more competent with his or her abilities with the airplane. Other wise, you are useless.
 
Yes! If you're flying with a guy that never wants to give you legs and all you do is sit and flip switches and answer radio calls, you really are not doing anything for your career. In fact, I'd argue you are damaging it. While you are getting flight time, there is only so much you can learn from observing.

Say you get stuck in that role, build up some flight time and then move on to another employer - except now your skills have rusted and you can't fly worth jack. The captin upgrade will probably be hell. I imagine this is where people get into trouble in PIC training. I'd hate to go to school with several hundred hours in the plane but really not have any ability to fly the it.

Make sure you iron out the training details with the employer. As I'm sure you've seen there are more than a few that do things in an....unusual way. ;) But there are plenty of good ones out there too, we just all hear (and bitch) about the bad ones.

One thing you may want to keep in mind, especially if you are a contract guy, is if this is a private owner and this is his one plane, he probably will not be able to afford having a new guy damage his plane, so he may be kinda gun-shy about letting a new FO fly, ESPECIALLY if he didn't send you to sim. I'm not saying it will go down that way, but just keep it in mind.

A personal example: my last employer had several aircraft on their certificate that they manged, and I'd often get paired up with a guy in a nearby hanger that managed and captained the one plane his boss owned. If that plane got heavily damaged, then the Captain was out of a job. So he was very particular about how he operated the plane and how much flying he'd let the FOs do. It generally took FOs awhile to earn his trust to the point where he'd let em fly. Which is fine, I got to the point where we'd alternate every leg, but sometimes you really have to earn a lot of trust beyond just sim training. I doubt the guy would let a contract person fly much.

How much an employer is willing to spend or not spend can tell you a fair amount of how things may go down in the cockpit.
 
Number1atNumber2 said:
Yes! If you're flying with a guy that never wants to give you legs and all you do is sit and flip switches and answer radio calls, you really are not doing anything for your career. In fact, I'd argue you are damaging it. While you are getting flight time, there is only so much you can learn from observing.

Say you get stuck in that role, build up some flight time and then move on to another employer - except now your skills have rusted and you can't fly worth jack. The captin upgrade will probably be hell. I imagine this is where people get into trouble in PIC training. I'd hate to go to school with several hundred hours in the plane but really not have any ability to fly the it.

Make sure you iron out the training details with the employer. As I'm sure you've seen there are more than a few that do things in an....unusual way. ;) But there are plenty of good ones out there too, we just all hear (and bitch) about the bad ones.

One thing you may want to keep in mind, especially if you are a contract guy, is if this is a private owner and this is his one plane, he probably will not be able to afford having a new guy damage his plane, so he may be kinda gun-shy about letting a new FO fly, ESPECIALLY if he didn't send you to sim. I'm not saying it will go down that way, but just keep it in mind.

A personal example: my last employer had several aircraft on their certificate that they manged, and I'd often get paired up with a guy in a nearby hanger that managed and captained the one plane his boss owned. If that plane got heavily damaged, then the Captain was out of a job. So he was very particular about how he operated the plane and how much flying he'd let the FOs do. It generally took FOs awhile to earn his trust to the point where he'd let em fly. Which is fine, I got to the point where we'd alternate every leg, but sometimes you really have to earn a lot of trust beyond just sim training. I doubt the guy would let a contract person fly much.

How much an employer is willing to spend or not spend can tell you a fair amount of how things may go down in the cockpit.
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Thanks again man, I couldn't agree more with everything you said. Your story sounds a lot like mine. I've been able to fly some co-pilot trips on a King Air 200, and the Captain was the same way. He had to earn my trust and friendship before he even thought about me touching the airplane.

Thanks again.
 
mattp1803 said:
Thanks for the feeback! It almost seems that it would be more beneficial to just do the PIC check ride as opposed to the SIC ride, if it's only one additional approach.
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A lot of companies will puposely only SIC type you if you are only going to be the co-pilot because if you were given a PIC type rating then you could use that rating to go get another job somewhere else.
 
In order to fly part 91 as a required SIC you must accomplish the training in 61.55. It's pretty basic stuff. Once completed you can go to the FSDO and pick up your SIC type. As stated above the SIC type is only required for some international flying.
 
Thanks everyone for the responses! Another sort of dumb question... would one have to go to school for initial, before going for the SIC type? Or is it all one big combined thing. Thanks again, and the answers have been much appreciated.
 
Kinda. The place I got my first exposure to Lears did everything in-house except for Type rides. Basically they gave me training on company procedures, systems, and then took a check ride. In my opinion, it was truly half-assed, but I digress. When it came time to send someone to school for captain upgrade, they'd send people to a recurrent ground school, which was a shorter ground school, but the sim training was no different for a guy that did for an initial or recurrent slot.

I asked both other places I've flown Lears at and they said this was not all that uncommon, and initial was more for guys that had zero time in a plane and were getting a type, such as a Lear captain gets switched over to a Hawker.

So to answer your question, it's yes and no. You could get in-house training and get an SIC type without having to go to sim, you'd just have to do the stalls, other airwork, and approaches actually flying the plane. And to do this kind of a checkride, the plane has to be empty, and not everyone is keen on spending the money on flying a jet that's empty, putting cycles on the engines, and do practice landings with a new guy. But companies will do it, after all they either have to spend money on doing it that way, or spend the money at the sim school.

Again though, given the operational costs of doing this with a plane like a Gulfstream, it's probably better do go the full sim route. Replacing things on these planes gets expensive in a hurry. I think the break pads on the Gulfstream are like $10k to replace, so taking up a guy and having him possibly punish the plane's pads and reducing their lifespan is something most owners are not cool with. Although, by the time a person has the flight hours to jump into a Gulfstream, the guy shouold be at a pretty decent skill level. (Hopefully, as there are always high time guys that somehow can't fly for #### and vice versa.)
 
Alot of companies will either opt to send someone through a recurrent to get the SIC on their cert. I've seen a number of guys going through a 135 Initial SIC. Which covers everything, you just have the reduced check at the end instead of the full type. It is pretty much the same and if you can pass the SIC you can pass the PIC.
 
To the OP - you need to read 61.55 - it is the regulation dealing with SIC qualifications and talks about what is required for the SIC Type Rating. Alot of the information you are getting in this thread is incorrect or is geared towards 135 operators. For example, you are NOT required to complete a checkride to be a qualified SIC or get an SIC type rating - the only time a checkride would be required is if you were working for a 135 operator. There is not alot of actual training required - the actual flying requirements for SIC privledges are very minimal. The only thing you MUST do is 3 takeoffs and 3 landings as sole manipulator of the controls and "engine out procedures and engine out manuevering while performing the duties of the PIC". That's it. Obviously to be a competent SIC, you need more training than that but that's all that's required by regulations to be an SIC under part 91. You're not required to do all the approaches, stalls, etc., unless you are training under 135.
 
mattp1803 said:
Thanks for the feeback! It almost seems that it would be more beneficial to just do the PIC check ride as opposed to the SIC ride, if it's only one additional approach.

.
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It's not just one additional approach -- see my post above and check out 61.55. The one additional approach answer applies to 135 operations..... not 91.
 
Jason said:
To the OP - you need to read 61.55 - it is the regulation dealing with SIC qualifications and talks about what is required for the SIC Type Rating. Alot of the information you are getting in this thread is incorrect or is geared towards 135 operators. For example, you are NOT required to complete a checkride to be a qualified SIC or get an SIC type rating - the only time a checkride would be required is if you were working for a 135 operator. There is not alot of actual training required - the actual flying requirements for SIC privledges are very minimal. The only thing you MUST do is 3 takeoffs and 3 landings as sole manipulator of the controls and "engine out procedures and engine out manuevering while performing the duties of the PIC". That's it. Obviously to be a competent SIC, you need more training than that but that's all that's required by regulations to be an SIC under part 91. You're not required to do all the approaches, stalls, etc., unless you are training under 135.
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Thanks, and I appreciate the info!

Jason said:
It's not just one additional approach -- see my post above and check out 61.55. The one additional approach answer applies to 135 operations..... not 91.
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Got it, thanks again. I read all of 61.55, thanks for the help.
 
I was thinking there should be a little more.

I would think you need a high-altitude endorsement, and to really be useful, you would need RVSM training.

--Tim
 
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