#92 HELICOPTER COMMERCIAL PILOT | requirements for initial and add on

Daughter wanted me to get to the back of the shirt. Can I do that? Forward. Awesome. Day 92 Coffee with Kenny. My daughter just got back from Florida on her trip, so she brought me back a cool coffee cup and a new Daytona Beach T shirt.

Heck yeah.

So today we're going to cover requirements for the commercial helicopter add on. Since we've made a week of add on videos and of course more to come. Just good content having a HOGS member in town working on us add on. So this is great content for us.

So we're going to cover the requirements.

And I'm also going to cover the five hours that you need for instrument during the commercial. This comes up a lot from people and they want to know does this, what does this entail and can this be done by a CFI or does it have to be a double I? So we'll get to that in a minute. Speaking of trips, I'm excited. You know, Taz and I authored Top 10 Checkride Tips, number one Amazon bestseller. That's down below. We're going to go to Oregon to precision helicopters to fly the Cabri, or Cabri, however you say it. I have a HOGS member that flies for NYPD that just invited me out to see NYPD aviation unit. I'm excited about that. And then I have another HOGS member who flies for California Highway Patrol and he wants to talk about some stuff. So I'm going to give him a call and that should be interesting. Love, love California. You know, we grew up being, or I grew up being inspired by, you know, all the television shows with helicopters in them and all the cop shows with helicopters. So, so that's cool. And you know our operations manager, Brian Rutledge, flies helicopters in California for law enforcement. Did you know that? 30 year aviator, 30 year police officer who is our operations manager who makes sure we keep good, detailed, oriented content for all of you. Over the years, I've been invited to so many cool places and I worked so hard for so many years building helicopter land ground school. I never got out to meet members. I never, you know, got out to go to any of these places. And it's kind of a bummer because I've had a lot of really good invitations. And last night Gloria and I were talking once she got home and I said, you know what, we gotta do some of this. Oh yeah. We also got coming up in June, Taz and I are gonna do book signing in Las Vegas.

So you'll have to come visit, hang.

Out, we'll get you the details as soon as we get the date. Taz is a super busy guy flying for the Air Force and then doing his civilian flying and then having his family life. Busy guy waiting on a date from Taz for our book signing in Las Vegas. That's going to be fun. So a lot of cool trips and I think most of these are going to have to be a part of Coffee with Kenny. Oh yeah, we got a member who's going to stop by his R66 on his way to Michigan so there'll be a coffee with Kenny. We already agreed. We met at Heli Expo and had a good talk and I said well how about if I swing by when I go through there in my R66? I said good content for a coffee with Kenny. Video hogsmember stopping with his R66. That'll be cool. So lots of fun stuff coming up. Alright, let's get to the requirements.

Hello, I'm Kenny Keller, creator of Helicopter Online Ground School and I want to cover the question we get a lot of about how many hours does it take to become a commercial helicopter pilot? And we're going to cover for initial pilot and we're also going to cover for add on pilot. So the FAR AIM tells us a person who applies for a commercial pilot certificate with a rotorcraft category and helicopter class rating must log at least 150 hours of flight time as a pilot that consists of at least 100 hours in powered aircraft of which 50 hours must be in helicopters 100 hours of pilot in command flight time which includes at least 35 hours in helicopters and 10 hours in cross country flight in helicopters. It then tells us 20 hours of training on the areas of operation listed in 61127b3 of this part that includes at least five hours on the control and maneuvering of a helicopter solely by reference to instruments using a view limiting device 12 hour cross country flight and helicopter in daytime conditions that consists of a total straight line distance of more than 50 nautical miles from the original of departure 12 hour cross country flight in a helicopter in nighttime conditions that consists of a total straight line distance of more than 50 nautical miles from the original point of departure 3 hours in the helicopter with an authorized instructor within 2 calendar months of the test 10 hours of solo flight time in a helicopter during that 10 hours of solo time one cross country flight with landings at a minimum of three points with one segment consisting of a straight line distance at least 50 nautical miles from the original point of departure and five hours in night VFR conditions with 10 takeoffs and landings with each landing involving a flight and traffic pattern. So whether you're doing an initial commercial or an add on commercial from a fixed wing commercial, you still have to do the same requirements. If you're doing an initial and you're just going to do all your training in a helicopter, then it's not really that hard to figure out. You just go through what we just read and you have to have the required dual, the required solo and the total time and the total pic time. Now when it comes to commercial add on, this is where people really want to know, okay, well what do I really have to have minimum to do the commercial add on, you're going to have to have the 35 hours pilot in command. In helicopters, you're going to have to have the 20 hours duel. So you're going to have at least 55 hours of flight time to do your add on. Because there's a clause in there on the 10 hours of solo time when you're doing the commercial. During that 10 hours of what they call solo, you can actually have an authorized instructor on board. Meaning you can't take up your friends and your family when you're doing this 10 hours of solo, but you can have an authorized instructor on board. So that may be just clear as mud for you, but if it is feeling like that, don't worry about it. Because every time I go to do an add on rating with somebody, we sit down, I kind of have it, you know, in my head, but I start to sit down, open up the far aim manual and go through it step by step with the person so we can go through, talk about it and make sure we know what exactly it is that we have to do and we have to cover. So I wanted to make this just kind of an in general video to.

Give you an idea.

If you're off the street, it's going to take 150 total hours. Some could be in airplanes, some can be in helicopters. So, so you have to really go through the reg to figure out what can be what. Same thing with the add on 150 total time. And the other key is the 35 hours pilot in command and the 50 hours in helicopters. So I hope that helps just a little bit. Please give us a like and a share. If you'd like to learn about our helicopter online ground school, there's a link in the description box down below this video. You can go to that link or you can Simply go to helicopterground.com in your browser. We offer online Ground school memberships for private commercial certified flight instructor. We have specific sections on the Robinson R22, the Robinson R4 and Enstrom helicopters and we also provide flight training in the Robinson R44 and also the Enstrom F28F which you can also find more about on our website@helopterground.com so please give us a like and a share and we'll see you in the next video.

Okay, hope that helps you out with your requirements. Know that you as a pilot need to know these requirements. You need to go to the far AIM and know these requirements yourself. You need to work through the far AIM and all the requirements by yourself. You need to work through them with your instructor and you need to be familiar with those because on any check ride the examiner can say what did you have to do for this rating? Where do you look that up in the Faraim? So you need to be familiar with the regulations, what it is you need and not need to do. We gave it to you today so that you can give a quick glance because I get this question all the time and I've been getting a lot of them. Of course since we've been doing add on week, lots of people asking me questions about doing add ons so that helps hopefully. Please comment down below about your additional ratings and we'll go on to the the five hours my examiner told me specifically. Here's what he said. He goes I'm going to tell you how I interpret this. The five hours that you need, they want you to have five hours in a helicopter. This can be from a certified flight instructor. Doesn't have to be a double eye. This is the 5 hours required for the commercial. And he said what we want to make sure is a person going for a commercial license is going to be out flying in a commercial environment. They want them to have that five hours of minimum training on what to do. If you go double IMC inadvertent, you fly into the clouds by accident. At least with that five hours, hopefully you'll have the skills to go to the instruments, claim an emergency call for help and get vector somewhere, get out of the clouds. That's what that five hours is about. So the five hours of flying for instruments for the commercial, according to my examiner, can be done by a cfi. It doesn't have to be a double eye. Now of course the CFI needs the basic skills which he should have or she should have on what to do if you go inadvertent. Hopefully that clears that up for a lot of you thanks for joining. Day 92 gave you a view from the upper deck today. Man, as this gets green it's gonna be so much more fun. Love being outside anyway but man day 92 put your comments down below. Please subscribe to the channel. You can go below this video to the link to get top 10 checkride tips. We bought the books for you. We send them to you for shipping and handling. You can go down below to grab the private pilot membership for just $49 a month. Included with that is a $49 or I'm sorry, included with that is a 24 hour test flight. Check it out for 24 hours if you want to keep it, do nothing. Just keep it and then go month to month. Keep as long as you like. Cancel anytime in that 24 hour test flight if you decide it's not right for you. We part as friends. Simply remove your credit card from within side the site or if you sign up with PayPal, go into PayPal and that subscription and you'll be billed nothing and you're welcome back anytime. We part as friends. Great deal. I'm telling you. All right, my daughter just got home from a week being gone for spring break, so I want to get in and hang out with her today. Spend some good quality time with my daughter. Subscribe, click the bell, give us a thumbs up and put your comments down below and we will see you in day 93. Yo, don't let the Gators get you. And P.S. in case you're still hanging around, Speaking of alligators, I helped a buddy of mine take his Jet Ranger once from Cleveland to Key west and we're flying in the southern part of Florida. And you got to put into your flight planning. There's some big open areas in Florida that are really, whatever you want to call it, marshy and wet. And if you had to make an emergency landing, alligators might be a concern for you. So something to think about flying in those areas. What happens? You have to land in the middle of nowhere and you're surrounded by alligators.