Factory Flight courses

[Guest rookie101]

Hey fellas. I got to wondering what companies have factory courses. I know Robinson and Bell have them, but I've never heard of a Sikorsky or a Eurocopter or a Hughes factory course, do they not have one or would going to a factory course there be way too expensive (I imagine it will be expensive no matter what ). I would also be interested about those of you who know a lot about the courses or if you have gone to these courses, please tell us if it was worth it and if you learned anything new. Thanks for the help

 

rookie

[klas]

Hey fellas. I got to wondering what companies have factory courses. I know Robinson and Bell have them, but I've never heard of a Sikorsky or a Eurocopter or a Hughes factory course, do they not have one or would going to a factory course there be way too expensive (I imagine it will be expensive no matter what ). I would also be interested about those of you who know a lot about the courses or if you have gone to these courses, please tell us if it was worth it and if you learned anything new. Thanks for the help.

 

rookie

 

MD has one:

http://www.mdhelicopters.com/page.php?id=training

 

And I checked into EC but that was cost prohibitive for me.

[flingwing206]

Hughes no longer makes helicopters, but both MD and Schweizer offer factory training.

[nickmarine]

Is Factory training any better or just it just look better on the resume?

 

Nick

[DFWFlyer]

Hey fellas. I got to wondering what companies have factory courses. I know Robinson and Bell have them, but I've never heard of a Sikorsky or a Eurocopter or a Hughes factory course, do they not have one or would going to a factory course there be way too expensive (I imagine it will be expensive no matter what ). I would also be interested about those of you who know a lot about the courses or if you have gone to these courses, please tell us if it was worth it and if you learned anything new. Thanks for the help

 

rookie

 

Eurocopter has some flight training (there is a factory just down the street here), but I don't want to speak out of turn about how extensive it is. From the cursory glance I gave it, it appeared to be copter specific transition training.

[rotor91]

Eurocopter has some flight training (there is a factory just down the street here), but I don't want to speak out of turn about how extensive it is. From the cursory glance I gave it, it appeared to be copter specific transition training.

 

http://www.eurocopterusa.com/Training/TrainingHome.asp

 

Not too cheap.....$7740 ground and flight in a AS350B3. They have a pdf of the prices for 06' at the above website.

 

R91

[delorean]

Is Factory training any better or just it just look better on the resume?

 

Nick

 

 

First an foremost, factory school is for INSURANCE. Sometimes its required, sometimes it gets you big discounts.

 

As far as the training itself, it depends on you. If you've been trained by high time instructors and are very familiar with the a/c and its systems, factory school is going to be nothing more than a review. If you're new to that model of helicopter, factory school will be a great transition course for you.

 

I am really amazed at the amount of people on this board who talk about getting to do zero airspeed autos and other essential emergency maneuvers for the first time at factory school. While these are not required by the PTS, they should be demonstrated at least a dozen times throughout training. I had a guy with over 100hrs come to me for a BFR once.......had never done or had a 180 auto demonstrated to him.