I have a minute here in my crashpad to provide a few answers.
First, I've been with Comair since June, and have been on the line almost 3 months now. I retired from the Marine Corps on 1 June after 22 years, and currently commute back and forth from New Orleans. Since I've been hired (hire dates here are when you show up for ground school) there have been 85 FO's added to the seniority list below me. Not even half of these guys are flying yet. I expect that number to top 100 before the end of the year. Hiring forecasts for next year run in the 300-400 range.
I get 11 days off a month, the rest of the time I'm on reserve. Depending on how they break out, that means I'm in New Orleans 7-8 days a month. I've been getting called out almost every day since I started flying. My reserve window (which I bid and get) is normally the 0400-1800. If they haven't called me by 0700, I normally am not going to fly that day. Most of the time I have trips added to my line well in advance, so for example I knew I was starting a 4 day trip today as of the beginning of the month. As an aside, I bid an early reserve window because it helps me get home when my reserve period ends, and I have to commute into N. KY the day before a reserve period starts, both due to available flights between CVG and New Orleans.
The junior FO holding a continuous duty (CD) line for November is 35 numbers senior to me. Crunching numbers and guessing hard, I think that I should be able to hold a CD line by Spring, maybe April or May. That will mean that I'll still have 11 days off a month, but should be able to consistantly sleep at home in New Orleans about 15 nights a month. The continuous duty trips range from "not bad" to "sux". You report in the evening (around 2030 to 2300) fly out to an overnight, spend anywhere from 3 to 7 hours in a hotel, and fly back to CVG. You get off anywhere from 0700 to 0900. This works for me, as I got used to weird schedules when I was flying in the Corps, and don't usually have a problem napping during the day to make up for lost sleep at night.
Looking out farther than this is a cr*p shoot, as a whole lot can change, but here goes. If we hire anywhere close to predictions next year, I should be able hold a regular line by Dec '03.
Captain upgrade is really hard to predict, because it is really driven by growth and whether we open another domicile or not. The Captains here are pretty young, and nobody is going anywhere as far as mainline hiring, so folks who get hired on in the next few years could stay FO's for a long time. The pat answer you get here is 2-3 years, but it could also be 10 years if Comair stops growing and the majors don't start recalls and hiring.
If you do upgrade to Capt, expect to spend several years on reserve.
This whole Comair thing is working out pretty well for me and my family. I have an O-5 retirement check coming in, and my wife teaches at my kids Catholic school in New Orleans, so between those three sources of income, we can pay the bills. In two years our total net for the month will be the same amount we were bringing in when I was a 22 year LtCol in the Marine Corps. The travel benefits are great (wife's already been to Spain, Switzerland and Argentina), I enjoy the flying and I've liked everybody I've flown with so far. I will caveat that by saying that I got shot at, shat at, and yelled at enough in the Marine Corps to not sweat minor personality quirks, and I feel comfortable with the whole Capt/FO rank structure. Finally, my family was used to me not being around the whole time (TAD and overseas deployments), and my wife's Dad was a fireman out in California, and he spent many days sleeping over at the firehouse and away from home (though not quite so far as me) so she doesn't sweat it. I'm flying today (Thanksgiving) but we did our Thanksgiving dinner last Sunday, and that was fine for us. My wife has also flown up to see me here in Cincytucky a couple times and has met me out on a couple of overnights as well.
Working at an airline (or being in the military or working as a cop or fireman or any other operation that goes 24/7) will disrupt your marriage as much as you let it. If you and your wife need to see each other every day, then you need to find a different line of work. If you live in your domicile, and can hack seeing each other about 1/2 to 2/3's of the month, you don't mind celebrating the odd holiday or birthday a little off actual calendar date, if you can survive the first year pay of about $20K, and you personally can maintain an adequate amount of sleep if you have to get some of it during the day, then you should be all right.
I enjoy it here and it has been everything I thought it would be. As a final note, unlike some folks who might come here and feel that they were getting stopped short of their ultimate goal to be a major airline pilot, I came here with the feeling that I would probably make this airline my second career. I'm 44 and since most of my military flying was in helicopters, no major airline would have ever looked at me until I had put in several years at a place like Comair, even if they were hiring which they aren't and won't be for a while. The prospect of spending the last 10-12 years of my flying career as an FO on reserve (no matter how well paid) doesn't appeal to me. Then again, the $$$'s aren't a big concern to me either. Your mileage may vary.
Good luck.
