"What is the Best Way to Reinstate Helicopter CFI Expired License?"

A short YouTube conversation (Kenny Keller with Jay and chat contributions) answering how to reinstate an expired helicopter Certified Flight Instructor (CFI) certificate. Kenny states that if a CFI has lapsed (missed the 24‑month renewal window) the only reinstatement path is a reinstatement checkride (oral + flight). He reviews options to stay current before expiration (16‑hour online course, instructor refresher course, showing recent successful student passes, or continuing evaluation duties) and advises thorough review of private pilot fundamentals before a reinstatement checkride. Chat notes a new rule (effective Dec 1, 2024) adding a 3‑month grace period after expiry. A recommended private pilot study guide (Brian Rutledge) is mentioned.
Questions this video answers
Take a reinstatement checkride (oral exam plus flight test) with an FAA examiner.
Complete a 16‑hour online course, attend a 16‑hour instructor refresher course, document a minimum number of recent students who passed on their first attempt, or demonstrate ongoing pilot evaluation duties (e.g., as a 135/EMS evaluator).
A new rule effective December 1, 2024 gives pilots an additional three months after CFI expiry.
Chapters
This is coming from Ronald Gilson. He wants to know what is the best way to reinstate a helicopter CFI that is expired.
Aha. There's only one way, and this is a great question actually, because I have to get mine done for the end of the month. I have enough activity in the last two years, 24 months, that I can easily go to the FSDO and renew my CFI. However, I gotta go clear to Chicago and I don't know, I want to deal with it or not. So I'm debating here last minute, am I going to do a 16 hour online course or am I going to go to the FSDO and I have an answer for you. Twice in my 24 years of teaching, I have let my CFI lapse. The only way to reinstate your CFI is to go take a checkride. And the way I've done it, both times that I let it lapse, I had to schedule with our local examiner, the one I've been using for 24 years. You schedule the date with the examiner, you go over with the aircraft, you meet the examiner and you have to sit down and do an oral test. And you have to go out and do a flight test. It's called a reinstatement checkride. There's no other way to do it. There's no way. There's no other way, you know, shortcut or hey, call somebody or get a favor. You can't do it. And once it's expired, the only thing you can do is take a checkride. And I give you a little tip on that. The reinstatement checkride for me, the first one he did years ago, I thought was fairly easy. But the one he did for me four years ago, I'll be honest, transparency here, right? Like, I'm like, ah, you know, heck, we've been doing checkrides together for 20 years. It's going to be piece of cake. I'm just going to go in, answer a couple questions, go fly a maneuver or two. He'll sign me off. I'll tell you what, even though we're friends and been doing checkrides forever, I think my, my oral was about two hours, like way more than I expected. And then we went out, did a full one hour flight together for my reinstatement checkride. So for your reinstatement checkride, don't overlook going back and studying all the private pilot stuff, everything that we learned and then, you know, you have to teach as a private pilot, go back and review it. Brian Rutledge put This together for us. He made this shortly after I went and did my CFI renewal. And once he made this and I went through it, I was like, holy cow, I wish I would have had this before I went to my CFI check or reinstatement because I would have went through this thing. Because Brian has found 400 phenomenal questions. Even though this is a private pilot study guide, it's what a private pilot's got to know. Right. And that's the stuff that we got to teach. So a little plug there for the study guide. We'll make sure, after the videos below are done, we'll make sure we put that link down below. But refresh your knowledge before you go for that reinstatement check ride. Lindsey has her hand up.
I do. It's a question about what you're talking about with reinstatement. Is that kind of like your driver's license where every seven years it expires or is it every four, 24 months, every two years?
Yep. We have one license is my commercial pilot's license. So that license doesn't expire. I gotta do flight reviews to keep that stay current with my certified flight instructor rating. That's another license with every 24 months. Before the 24 months is up, I, I have to either I can go to the FISDO and show that I've had at least a minimum of four or five students have passed on their first attempt in the previous, previous 24 months. I can go online and do a 16 hour online course. There are places that put on instructor refresher courses like a 16 hour course over a weekend, you can go do that. If you are in a position where you regularly evaluate pilots like you're working. Example would be your 135 Czech airmen in an EMS operation. And you continue you on a, on a continual basis, you go evaluate pilots, you can off that activity, you can go reinstate your cfi. So those are the main ways right off the top of my head, of how you can renew it. But you have to renew it before the end of that 24th month. If you miss it, you're out.
Jay just added in chat, he said new Rule as of December 1st this year we have pilots have an additional three months after expires.
Really? See, I knew he put out some stuff on the CFI stuff and I guess I should have watched Jay's video. Jay, are you serious? Are you telling me I got three more months? Is that what he's just said? Yeah.
New Rule as of December 1, 2024 you have an additional three months after expires.
Well, hell, I didn't know that. Jay, you need to keep checking in on these videos, man, so you can keep me abreast. I know you're the guy who is always on top of the latest, new, newest stuff that comes out and I appreciate you joining our our chat today. And let me tell you who Jay is. Jay is from. I'll plug his channel for him. Jay is from helicopter training videos. And over the years I've been on YouTube 14 years. Jay's been on there as long as me or longer approximately the same time. He's right around 50,000 subscribers. And for years I've known helicopter training videos and I know they're on YouTube. I've watched a lot of them. I always knew that, you know, he was a knowledgeable guy and made some good content. And this past summer he was in the area to visit some family and he called up or emailed us and said, hey, I want to swing by. And we made it happen. And he came by and spent an afternoon with us here with me and Lindsey and we had great conversations talking about helicopter training and all kinds of stuff. Right. And so Jay, you know, fellow helicopter video maker in the chat. So go. You can go. If you haven't checked out Jay's videos, you should helicopter training videos on YouTube.
He's very worth the watch.
Absolutely. So thanks Jay. Thanks for tuning in and keep somebody's got to watch over me and keep me in line. So glad you're there. And our clone is located@askhogs.com you can go below and click on the link to go check it out. 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you can ask training related questions. Flight and ground. 14 years of my contents loaded in this thing. Blogs, podcasts, videos, paid content, free content. There's over 6 million words piped into my clone. It's amazing. Go down below ask hogs.com the clone is free to everyone and the clone is also inside of our HOG site on every video, every page. So you can be in viewing videos and you can always ask the clone a question while you're at it so you can get an immediate answer first. Right here is free free PDF private pilot 101 helicopter training blueprint. That's why we created this. And let me cover what's in the first chapter since you ask and you're at the beginning. That's why we created this. The first chapter are questions that we've, we took like the top 10 questions that we get all the time. Like Is learning how to fly a helicopter difficult? How long will it take to become a private pilot? How much will it cost to become a private pilot? What is the best approach to selecting a flight school? What are the key differences between helicopters and fixed wing aircraft? How many tests will I have to take? How many hours for solo on the license? Kenny's recommended training supplies so this is absolutely 100% free. You can go down below, there's a link down below. Or you can type in your browser privateblueprint.com and you can download immediately after you sign up. You'll sign up, enter your name and email and the next page will show you download your book here. That's where you should start because again it's free. Or subscribe to the YouTube channel. Subscribe the channel. You'll get notification when the new video comes out for either the live or the premiere, whichever way we do it. And then we want to also bring up we are updating, starting to update our R22 specific course behind us. Course behind us. Course using the helicopter behind us. Lindsay's in charge of getting in there and updating some images. In the R22 site section of Hogs we have R22 specific section and R44 specific section that come with any of our memberships. So you don't have to buy that specifically. We use private pilot for example monthly membership. It has both the R22 and R44 sections in there. And since we have an R22 available to us and an R44 available to us, we thought why not get the content updated in those courses with some fresh videos, brushed images and also want to mention hogspaysme.com this is passive income. You want to earn some money, particularly if you're a flight instructor. Anybody can use the Hogs affiliate link. You go to hogspayme.com that link is down below. You'll sign up for it. It'll give you access to a dashboard inside that you'll see your link and a link to share with others. So when they sign up, you receive 50% off our online memberships. Private pilot, commercial pilot, instrument pilot, certified flight instructor and or private or professional pilot. That's 2,800 bucks. If you share your link with one of your students and they buy ProPilot, it's lifetime membership for all courses. You will get 1400 dollars shipped to your PayPal account after the 30 days when you feel the pressure to fly but know the right decision is to stay on the ground. Hit the Hogs no go and live toFly Day helicopterground.com.










