#165 10 years working on the private pilot / 83 year old still flying helicopters

Alright, here we go. This is how we do it. Day 165. I just checked to make sure I get it right because I messed this up so many times. Awesome day today. We got an R44 sitting over here. You're gonna learn a little more about that here real quick. Instruments in the background. We got the door open today. We don't normally have that. Jesse here is a professional pilot member and he's got some, some of his background he's gonna share with you. Been working on rating for 10 years. And in the theme of what we've been talking about lately, he's not alone. There are so many of you out there that have been at it for 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years or more. And we have just in the last year we have helped several guys finish their ratings that had over 20 years working on their private. And we have the guy who failed 27 years ago and then became a HOGS member, refreshed his memory, went back with that same Pink slip from 27 years ago and got his private. So I'm gonna do my best today to let Jesse talk. I have this problem of talking too much. So Jesse, just tell our viewers, I guess start off with what you do and why you're here. All right.

Good morning. Thank you for having me on coffee with Kenny. I'm enjoying it. I'm enjoying your videos and happy to be here today. So my name is Jesse Berger, I'm from Chesterfield, Michigan and I'm willing to share my story. Although it takes a little bit of humility to do that. Not too many people want to sit and say, hey, I've been a student pilot for 10 years. You know, the connotation with that is are you some kind of dummy? You haven't finished. And the answer is no. So, you know, part of, part of my story with that time is my first flight was June 1st of 2009. And at that time I was business owner and I had two young boys and a brand new baby girl. And life was busy and it didn't slow down for nearly 10 years. And I think a lot of people can find themselves in that situation where there's just so many other commitments. It's hard to get through the ground school. In the last 10 years I've accumulated 150 flight hours and fairly proficient at flying the machine. But the ground school is a challenge and it's the unsexy part of the business that that has to be attended to and is key to safety and success. And so I think that's, you know, one of the unique things that your product brings. So during that 10 years, interestingly enough, I became early on in 2009, became a financial partner in a flight school which I'll plug here, Magnum Helicopters in Pontiac Waterford. But even having access and owning aircraft, we have four helicopters, doesn't mean that you're going to do good at ground school until you're disciplined and you make it a priority and that you invest in that. So, you know, now is, now is the time where we're going to move into that, to that phase.

I worked for a guy who bought this flight school. He'd sold a big company that he'd operated for many years and he was a student pilot and if I remember right, it was over 30 years and he was a student pilot with airplanes and he bought, was buying up some aviation companies and he happened to buy this helicopter flight school and he was a good guy and I really liked working for him and he, he was super successful and. But we used to tease him all the time, you know, student pilot for 30 some years and I'm not sure, I haven't heard from him in years. I don't know that he ever finished. He may have since I, it's been over 10 years since I've, since I've talked to him, but. So there's a student pilot of 30 some years and he flew often, probably a great pilot. I'm not a fixed wing instructor so I don't know, I never flown with him. But. So there you go. Student pilot for 30 years. You're only a third of the way. Only a third of the way in. That's right. I will mention that you, yesterday you said, well, yeah, one of your ground school members flew with us and he showed me the picture like, ah, hey, that's Caleb. He goes, yeah, this was the helicopter. As soon as he showed me, I was like, boom, there's Caleb. And I'm like, awesome. Caleb has an R22 but apparently went to Magnum to do his instrument training because I think Caleb's R22 probably was not an instrument trainer and probably was having trouble finding an instrument instructor. So your Magnum does instrument instruction? Apparently they do.

So a little bit about Magnum, Magnum helicopters in Pontiac Waterford. There's two primary partners in the flight school part of it, which are Al and Bruce. Great guys. And we have the asset side of the company. We have four helicopters there. We have three R44s, including this one, and we have one R22. We've had two partners that are moving toward retirement. One guy still does some part time training, Chuck Blaylock, who just received a 50 year incident free flying certificate award from the FAA. And so we're real proud of Chuck in his early 80s now and still flying and still teaching. And I think that's a testament to whether you're 48, whether you're, you know, early 80s, if your health's there, your mind's there, you can still do this. So, you know, some people think, oh gosh, you know, I'm getting up there, you know, maybe I can't finish this. You and I both know there's so many people that start flight school and never finish and that dream dies with some disappointment. But I don't think there's. It doesn't have to go that way.

80, 83 people. Do you hear that? 83. And gets an award from the FAA for 50 years of, of safe flying. So 83. I mean I've been saying it and we talk about it all the time. And when, when he told me that yesterday, I'm like, yes, another guy in his 80s still flying. That's awesome.

I had a great time here yesterday. Flew down, had good weather, getting here and Kenny and I took the instrument out, enjoyed the nstrom. Never flown an Enstrom, great machine. Enjoyed that time and you know, I'd share with you, hey, I'm here as a paying customer. I signed up for a private pilot or professional pilot and I'm going to be utilizing that resource. And so I think for those that are thinking of coming here to visit, great airport to come to. We had dinner in town last night, nice time with your daughter Gloria. And it's a good, if you got a couple days or a day to fly here and enjoy this, I highly recommend it.

I've been having a blast with the visitors that have been coming in lately. I've had a blast with Jesse, had a blast with Ray last week, maybe to Mark. Tomorrow we're doing Mark's add on checkride that you've been hearing me talk about ADD on guy. I'm going to ask if he wants to get on camera tomorrow. His check rides tomorrow. It's so much fun having people come in and I know that a lot of our viewers are saying, man, I really enjoy having other people coming in, right? Because you hear me talk all the time. So it's really nice to have people come. The Hogs hangar is awesome. You can come stay all night. So I've made this offer in the past, if you want to stop in and you know, go fly the instrument or show off your aircraft or plug your flight school or just come in and talk about helicopters. We can hang here. You with us overnight. Stop by and visit, Join us for a coffee with Kenny.

Good, good accommodations. I stayed at the Hampton in town. Nice, clean, good place to be. So, yeah, this is. This is a nice little mini vacation.

The fuel guys here, I'm gonna plug Warsaw Airport. These guys run their fuel like they're dispatching police and fire. Oh, my God, it's amazing. And I have to. Next time I'm in the FBI, I'm gonna say something to the manager about. I've been here a month and a half, two months, and every time we get fuel, man, you call. And I always say, you know, no hurry. We're taking our time. You know, trying to stay in the slow, smooth, methodical. I talked about yesterday. And these guys are, man, they're here on Johnny, on the spot every time.

Jim. Guy's name's Jim. When I landed and met him, very courteous, asked if I need anything.

Yep.

So good place to come.

Absolutely. All right, so next I want to talk about Jesse. He said he's got 150 hours. It's all in R44. He already mentioned we went out in the instrument for an hour. Yesterday. I showed him something that I'll show a student one time and then I'll never do it again. Because it's not a habit. We don't fly without our hands on the controls in a helicopter, with the exception of. I want to show people for that first time how I can take my hands off the controls and fly it only with the trim. Now, during ETL and hover, I have to stay on them, and at the end of the approach, I have to be on them. But the continuing the takeoff, making the turns, even the descent, and lining up for final. I was doing this yesterday, you know, quick trim. What did that feel like to you, coming from an R44, what did that feel like? When I was taking my hands off the controls and putting my arms like.

This, I would have never guessed it's possible. I didn't know that until I saw it firsthand. It was interesting. So using the trmm, my first flight in an Enstrom, it's not a hydraulically controlled flight controls. And so using the TRMM took the workload away from the muscles on the arm. And so learning that, it really didn't take long. I felt like. I felt I flew smoothly after just a little bit of instruction. But you were able to Control the helicopter literally for a while in a pattern. No hands, no feet. And so I've told friends and family that have asked me about the helicopter. Like, what's it like to fly it? Well, it's different than airplane. Helicopters are dynamically unstable, whereas an aircraft is dynamically stable. The whole BB in a bowl.

Right.

Helicopters kind of the BB on top of the bowl versus BB in the bowl with an airplane. And I would have not guessed that's possible. So that is a pretty cool characteristic of an Enstrom.

It is. And again, I caution people, right. I do it for instructional purposes only one time, but we had a great flight. And he did pick it up. Most people, it takes usually people two or three hours before you can really get him using a trim. But you picked it up in that hour. You caught on to how the pressure relieved your arm, and you picked up on that. And in our own discussion, you talked about the, the correlator, which I, I mentioned to him that, you know, the correlator, everybody worries when they go from a governor helicopter to, oh, my gosh, I gotta operate the throttle, the instrument. Even though that's a 1983 model, the Correlator is that good. And yesterday I did manipulate the throttle for Jesse, but I would let him know what I was doing so he'd know. I'd say, okay, I'm gonna add just a tiny bit of throttle or I'm gonna go off just a little bit. But you saw the correlator, how good it is. How did that feel to you?

Pick up. You pick up and it raised up. Raised up the power. Another difference that I noticed in the NSTROM was, you know, in the auto rotation. We did a couple auto rotations. A lot of inertia in that three blade rotor system. It really, it really floated down, felt. It felt heavy. Really. We weren't worried about RPM much. It operated a little bit below, you know, the green and the rpm. So, you know, that that's a unique characteristic to that, that rotor system.

Yep. Heavy inertia, man, it's just, it's really hard to beat. And I, you know, we, I talk almost daily about R44s and instrums and how much I like all helicopters and everybody. Every helicopter's got its pro and con.

Exactly.

They all do. Yeah. But man, for people that want to have fun and just a private owner.

Well, it'd be nice if we had enough money just to have one of every flavor. Right. I would, you know, we could just have, we could just line up five or six of my. I know what to pick. You know, we could have a 206 and MD 500. I mean, but unfortunately, we have not hit the lotto, so.

I've said that for years, man. If, you know, if money was no object, we can all dream, right? Yeah, sure. I would have. You know, I'd get a cab. I'd get a Switzer. I'd have an R22 and R44. I'd have an instrument. Love to have a Jet Ranger 480 instrument. The turbine instrument. Love to have one of those. God, I mean, the list is endless. On if money was no object, right? And we could dream. Heck, yeah. I'd have a little bit of everything, man. I would. Well, we're gonna kind of start trying to wrap things up because we. We're both talkers, and we knew we're like, we gotta try to keep this short today. I do want to mention we're gonna help him get this private done, and that's what I've been doing for years. One of the guys here at Warsaw Airport, when I hangered here years ago, used to call me the finisher. And, you know, we can laugh and joke about it, but that's just for. Somehow I became the ground guy just out of. It just happened. I didn't set out to be the ground guy. Never set out to do that. I just. Even when I was young in my career, I just did what it took to help people get to ground school. And something Jesse said yesterday, this is almost a good title for today's video, is, he goes, you take the really boring part and at least make it a little bit sexy, because ground school is not sexy. It's not. It's. It's tough. It's hard. It's a pain in the butt, but you have to have it. You have to have the ground school. You can never solo. You can't get the license. You can't be safe. You can't go do anything. So most of you know my story. I became the ground guy. It's just what happened. And here we are. And so I want to make sure Jesse continues down that path. And he's been plugging ground school for me, and I appreciate that very much. I know you've already been in there because you made a comment about some of the videos and some of the things that you learned going through. So what the heck? Give us a. Give us a ground school plug. While we're. While we're talking about it, I'm really.

Enjoying the Videos, they bring, you know, they bring it to life. Great topics, organized format. I think when you reduce the, the time of the videos that help the viewer with attention span, it's hard to sit through an hour video, but you've made them in smaller chunks and I'm able to get through those, those people that are a little add, you can do this. And so, you know, I hope to be back here. I plan to be back here to visit again later this year to celebrate finishing private pilot and start working on my commercial. You know, my, my two partners, you know, Al and Bruce particularly Al is probably like, dude, 10 years, you know, and I want to get my commercial so that I can engage in that in that part of the business and do some work. And heck, you get paid to do it and love doing it just like you are. So I'm excited about that.

Well, this morning when I picked you up in the Jeep and I said to you, he said, oh, you know, it's kind of humiliating being 10 years. And to me it's not even. I don't look down on him at all and I don't look down at anybody. And the conversation the Jeep was, I'm like, man, you've only been at it 10 years and I've already mentioned it. But so many of you, so many people run into those life struggles or they failed a checkride or they ran out of money or they had a baby or, God, the list is endless. And I think the audience of people that are still working and still want to finish is huge. So there's no shame in working on it for 10 years. With all the people that we've helped at 20 years plus, there's no shame in working on it for 10 years. There's nothing to be embarrassed about. It's cool that you're here and I appreciate you coming down. And we've had a fun two days because we're both talkers, right? And so we're like competing to talk. You know, we're running over top of each other, but that's okay, right?

We're enjoying this. And, you know, thank you for having me here. I've enjoyed the visit. I've enjoyed coffee with Kenny, glad to be part of the school.

Well, you're committed now. You have to come back after you finish. Regardless of where you do and what you fly and what you do, you'll have to come back down and do a recap, whether it's, you know, in two months or the end of summer or whenever you get it done. But now You've got a world of people that's just watched you. So now that's right, some accountability, isn't it? So now right now you have to get it in gear and get the ground done and do the whatever polishing you might need or whatever you got to do to get the 8710 ready to go. And go take this checkride and get it done. I am going to mention you all know it. Top 10 checkride tips. That's like the big seller right now because this is the most recent that I did with Taz Chrisman. 2018 Flight Instructor of the year. We're so proud of this guy. I'm jealous. I mean what this guy does flying for the military and then and he has a family and then every evening and weekend he's flying in an airplane or a helicopter or aerobatics and what he can do is just freaking amazing. So cheers to Dan and thank you Dan for helping me write this. We bought these for you. We ship them. I showed the video yesterday, boxes up there in Heather's office. By the way, she's doing better today. Might go pick her up this afternoon. And then I got helicopter checkride, same deal. I put this out five years ago. Now both of these Amazon number one bestsellers. We ship you either one of those for just shipping and handling. And Heather will send you a nice email after you, you purchase the book. We'll put the link down below for that. I'll put a link down below for helicopter land ground School. It's helicopterground.com. you can go there and take a 24 hour test flight. So there you go. So many questions come in. Well you know they ask and questions are great. You can ask all the questions you want but you can also just go in for the 24 hour test flight and you can see the entire course. Let's use Private Pilot for example. Over 120 videos, you can go in and check it out and see exactly what's in there. You can see the written test practice, you can see all the videos, you can see every piece of content that's in there to make an informed decision. And then we have a 30 day money back guarantee on top of that. I don't know what else to tell you. Besides it's one of the best policies in the industry and that's been in place for seven years. Over seven years now. March will be celebrating eight years.

Congratulations.

Oh, I just heard something beep. We'll wrap it up because I may have just lost the camera. I don't know. Hopefully it's not the audio on one of them. Actually, I'm going to look real quick, just make sure. All right, well, we're going to wrap it up. Anything else you want to let the viewers know before we go?

Just great being here. Thank you very much, Kenny.

Awesome. Thank you, man. It's been fun. And members come see us. Make sure you give us some heads up. We are here.

Yeah. Plan ahead.

Plan ahead because call a couple weeks out.

Make your plans. Weather. Weather is a factor, but yep.

If you want to come last minute, we may not be here. So just please reach out before you want to come up and visit and just give us a heads up and we'll. We'll set a date. So like subscribe, put your comments down below and we'll see you in day 166. Coffee with Kenny. Oh, splashing coffee everywhere. Thanks again, man. This has been fun.

Makes it real.

Hell yeah. Love it. I love it. Love it, love it, love it. First thing I'm going to do is just check.