EP182 - "What's Time to a Hog?" with DPE Ron Horton (Pt. 1 of 2)
About this episode
Ron Horton discusses checkride pass rates and the current state of flight training in this first part of a two-part conversation.
The crew is joined by Charlotte-based Designated Pilot Examiner Ron Horton — 60 years of flying, Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award, AOPA Regional Instructor of the Year, and the man responsible for both Brian's and Ben's commercial certificates. Ron comes armed with something most DPEs don't bother with: actual data. Over 500 checkrides' worth of it, color-coded spreadsheets and everything. In this first of a two-part conversation, Ron unpacks his checkride pass/fail rates across private, instrument, commercial, CFI, and CFII — and the numbers will either comfort you or send you back to the books. (Spoiler: the instrument rating is harder than you think, and it's increasingly the avionics' fault.) We also dig into the sobering reality that the average student now takes 103 hours to reach their private checkride — up from 81 just five years ago — and what that 36% creep in dual hours says about the state of flight training. Plus: why soloing students at 40 hours dual is, in Ron's words, "staggering," and why the instructors who never ask a DPE what went wrong are the ones who keep sending unprepared students. Mentioned on the show: * DPE Ron Horton…
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