Helicopter Training Study Materials Member Requested Video

I'm Kenny Keller, the creator of Helicopter Online Ground School. Welcome to the welcome tab. The welcome video. Real quick, I'm going to talk through some of the changes I've made here recently to the site and here very shortly I'm going to go through a list of what I think is the things you're going to need for private pilot, commercial pilot, certified flight instructor things at a minimum. I get this question a lot from people, whether they're brand new or maybe been flying a while. Well, what do I really need? What are the minimum books? So I'm going to cover that here in just a minute. So this is the introduction video on the welcome tab below here. Below this video you can read about our recent member checkride success. For those of you that are new or existing members, feedback is below. For recent checkrides. We have a new tab for live events. We're kicking this up. I've done live events in the past. A lot of you have seen them and typical with live events, you know, there's lots of technical issues and in the past I had somewhat slow Internet speed. I've used some different software and hopefully the ones that we're getting ready to do now are going to be the best live events that we've ever had. So go to the Live Events tab to check out dates and times. Give me your feedback. We'll get these rolling and see how they go. So there are several sections underneath the checkride preparation tab. We have the original modules 1 through 10, which is random checkride preparation based on my notebook. A lot of people still love the original modules 1 through 10. It's random training through my notebook where I just go through and cover things that you're going to need to know. New people like it, but a lot of add on guys, people doing add on ratings or somebody that's been studying for a while and they just kind of want questions or things thrown at them to kind of test their knowledge and see where they're at. So you can go to the welcome video that explains that more in detail in the modules 1 through 10. And we went live March 1, 2012 with that. And over time some people would say, well hey, you know, I'd like something more structured. So we built then the practical test standards that is also underneath the Checkride tab. So the practical test standards is going through the pts. FAA pts. Practical Test Standards step by step. So for those of you wanting something more in a step by step fashion, you can work through the practical Test standards. There's a new welcome video on that section to help explain that a little more in detail how that works. Underneath the checkride preparation tab, there's also commercial pilot section. We have four new videos or five new videos that we've added to the commercial pilot section. So for those of you working on your commercial, you can go to that section to get some direction on where to go and how to study. Then we have the aircraft specific modules that we're working on and continuing to build on. And we have certified flight instructor section that I'm updating and working on as well. So lots of new changes. I'm really excited about everything that's going on. This new software is killer. The new live events are going to be awesome. Bear with me as we get those going. But the thing I have learned over time, a lot of the things that I do now, I have learned through live events, watching other people that do this sort of thing. And even the gurus occasionally have technical problems. So that's all part of it. So now let's get to some of the resources. Gonna kind of give you a disclaimer. These are the things that I use. At minimum, there are tons of resources out there. You're welcome to use anything that you want. I'm not saying you have to use what I use, but for the people that have asked repeatedly, what do I like? What do I use? Going to show you Far AIM manual. This is a must. Every single one of you need an updated FAR AIM manual. I like to use both the hard copy and I also have a copy on my iPad and my iPhone, which is really nice. There's times where I really want to look through a book. There's times where you want to look something up and you're out on the road and you don't have your big FAR AIM book with you. Boom. You can look it up on the iPad or the iPhone, your smartphone. That is awesome. So the FAR AIM is a requirement. You got to have a FAR aim. Real quick. I want to give you some tips. A lot of people don't understand that there's a suggested study list in the very beginning of the FAR AIM manual for whatever rating you're working for. They're telling you the areas that you need to focus on. Very, very handy thing to use. And I can tell you that most things that you're going to use is going to come from Part 43 maintenance Part 61 certification pilots and stripe for flight instructors or pilots and instructors part 67 medical standards and certification, part 91 general operating and flight rules and 49 CFR, NTSB 830, accident reporting. Those are the main sections. Not saying you'll never go to another section, but when you're looking stuff up, remember go to those areas first. If you're, if you're confused. I always take students and I take their marker and I highlight those. Most everything you're going to look up is going to be in those sections. For the private level Jeppesen Private Pilot Manual I've had this book since the late 90s and I love this book. I still reference this book today. It's kind of expensive. But you know what, this thing has been a resource for my private, my commercial, my cfi and I still use this today. If I'm making a presentation on something. This is one of the key resources that I will grab if I want to look up something especially for review. And the cool thing in this book, anywhere there's a brown highlight that's a written test question that that's going to possibly come up on your written test. I love that book. Again, this is my personal opinion. What I use, what I like E6B flight computer. I am still using my handy dandy cardboard 8 or 10 or $12 E6B flight computer. There's a steel version or a metal version that's a little more money works just the same way. And of course there's fancy electronic flight computers out there that you can use now as far as examiners go and checkrides go. Just so you know, this is September 2015 and I recently posed this on a recent question with our examiner and I said, you know, as of now, what are you doing as far as electronic devices for checkrides? And he said as of now he's still using all the hard copy of everything. He said they will in the future start allowing different things. And he said they haven't had a lot of guidance yet on what they can and can't use. Not saying there aren't some examiners out there that are going to let you use your iPad or let you use your electronic E6B and for those cases that's great. You know, technology is awesome and the electronic version saves us carrying around mounds of books. But for right now I'm still recommending hard copy of everything. And the very cheap model cardboard E6B works just fine. You're gonna need a simple plotter for doing your cross country planning. You know these are cheap. This one is one that's fixed and you move it. There's others you can get with the dial on them. Either one's fine. You can use either one. They both work. Again, I always like the cheap version of everything. Something that's, that's very simple. Either one of those is going to work, but you need to have one of those for working your cross country planning Helicopter Flying Handbook. This is a must. You must have that. I am still referencing my Rotorcraft Flying Handbook which is still a good book. You can still use it, but the FAA is updated to the Helicopter Flying Handbook. So I have the physical copy of the Rotorcraft Flying Handbook. I do use the PDF copy of the Helicopter Flying Handbook. If I'm looking something up for a new presentation, I want to make sure that I have the wording correct or I want to see if something's changed from, from this version of the book. I do go to that PDF file of the Helicopter Flying Handbook and I use that when I'm really checking to see what that they say on the latest for definitions and different things. But the, the books are two very similar. But the Helicopter Flying Back Handbook would be the updated version. So at this point if you're working on a rating, I would most definitely get the Helicopter Flying Handbook. ASA Witten Test Prep Manuals. I see I didn't spell written correctly but that's okay. This presentation is going along good and I'm not stopping now. So I personally like the ASA pre test prep manuals. I haven't done a rating in a long time, but I know a lot of students are still using the ASA manuals. And the reason I like these was when I was studying from all my written tests they give you a separate workbook with the year diagram so you can open up the one book, have the book with all the images and other books so you can have them open together and be working through. Oh, go to Figures 56. I can look over here, Figure 56. Some written test prep manuals. Put them all together in the same book so you're constantly moving from the front of the book to the back of the book, front of the book to the back of the book. So I like the ASA written test prep manuals. You can use whatever you want. I've also used webexams.com I think that's still a valid website where you can go on and test yourself for free. But that's what I used, the ASA written test prep manuals. And I know a lot of guys and girls are still using those. That's what I recommend there Pilot's Operating Handbook. This is a must as well. I can remember back when I got started and my instructor saying, just spend the 50 bucks and get your own manual. And when you're scrounging for money, you know, it's hard to do, it's hard to sometimes give up that extra 50 bucks. But I think it's well worth the time and effort. This is a 480 manual. I have a whole stack of manuals in my book case over there. I have a manual for pretty much everything that I fly. And if I don't fly well, I'm going to use the 40, for example. A little over a year ago I went, did some flight training, or not flight training, but I did some flight testing for the avionics equipment in the 480. The Aspen avionics, they were doing the testing for the STC, hadn't flown a 480 for a while. What I do before I went, I got my copy out and I went through limitations, emergencies, normal procedures. I went through them on my own prior to arriving to fly the 480. So my opinion, spend the money and get your own pilot's operating handbook for the aircraft that you're going to be flying, whatever that is. Next up, get a study notebook. And I'm telling you, you need to get a notebook. I just recently had instructor tell me, yeah, I have. This guy's been coming in and he won't write anything down. You know, he says he can just remember it all. You know, if you're one of those people that can remember everything, great, but more power to you. I know I sure can't. You know, you've probably heard the story about my notebook. Here it is, that beat up old notebook. I still sometimes go grab my notebook because I know exactly where things are. I still use my own notebook to this day. All these years later. You need to have a notebook where you can jot things down. You're doing ground with your instructor or you're studying at home and you have a question, you need to have your own notebook to put down your own thoughts, your own questions, the way you want to possibly explain things or, you know, you want to make it in a manner that's meaningful to you. That's what I did with my notebook. This was never intended to become a published notebook. It was never intended to build a whole entire training section on. It was built for my own personal use. And you know, I still remember this day when I went down to the local hardware and picked this thing up after being frustrated from my first failure and having all this stuff scattered everywhere. That's what I did other books. I'm sure there's tons of things out there, but you need to ask yourself, is it an FAA publication? The other one? That's a must that I, that I hinted on early pts. I don't care what rating you're working on. Private commercial CFI Instrument ii, you need to have a pts. You need to be working through it. And I harp and harp and harp on it. And you'll hear this in my training, but it's true the same. We'll use this 480example. I went up to do this training, this flight testing, and I meet this guy up there who's an older gentleman, and he was a flight examiner for many years. And he says, well, what do you do full time for a living? And I told him about my online ground school. And then I had now based it on the practical test standards. And this guy just. It was really neat to see his reaction. He said, kenny, do you realize as an examiner how frustrated we get when people don't use the pts? And I said, yeah, I have a pretty good idea. And he said, I had one guy show up for a CFI checkride one time and he said, this guy had never looked at a pts. And he said, I almost wouldn't give him the check ride because he never used one. And he goes, I was pretty appalled that, you know, this guy never used a pts. And he said, I went ahead with the checkride. He goes, and the guy still did do, did really well. He goes, and I passed him because he knew the information. He said, but I cannot, cannot imagine somebody prepping for a checkride and not using the pts. So PTS is a must. So I mentioned FAA publication. The thing that I would say as people ask, well, what about this book and what about that book? Is it an FAA publication? I don't want to badmouth any books because, you know, books are wonderful and books are a great thing. But when it comes to a helicopter checkride and doing helicopter training, it only makes sense that we want to use the FAA publications because that's who governs the test that we're taking. So to me, I don't really want to use anything that's not an FAA publication. I'm going to bring up army manual. I'm sure the army manuals are great. If I'm in a checkride and I'm trying to relay a concept to an examiner and I'm telling him something, he says, well, where'd you get that at? Oh, that's from the army manual. Is it Valid maybe, possibly. You know, I don't want to dive into it. I'm just using that as exact. As an example, I'm personally not going to use the army manual. I'm going to use the FAA publications. So I hope that helps. Those are the bare minimum things that I think a person should have. Again, you're more than welcome to use anything that you want. These are my opinions. I'm sure there's some new technology out there that blows away all my resources, but I know from talking to people, you know, I do some. I do one on one ground with people around the country and they'll be at home and they'll pull up the. They'll show me what they have, you know, so I know they're still using a lot of them, the same things that I'm using. So again, electronic versions are cool. We know more and more through time. You know, the FAA is going to allow more of that to go on. But as far as checkrides, right now in my area with my examiner, he says we're still using the hard copies and, you know, in the future we'll start, you know, changing that up. But as of right now, he's still requiring all the hard copies. So hope that helps. Check out the Live Events tab. Check around the site, look at the other new videos, see the things we're adding. I'm so excited over the way things are working out. I continually change my setup here and it's all for the better. Getting faster, getting smarter. Still come to work every day. Loving what I do. Thank you to members that have taken a chance on me. Thank you to all the members that sent in their checkride testimonials. That's incredible. Thank you to the test flight customers. You have any questions at all, put them in the box below and we'll see you in the next video.