What would you do?

[Rxflyer]

Find a place that does tailwheel training and do some low-and-slow fun stuff.

Or blow it some helo dual.

The floatplane idea is a good one, too !

 

[landlover]

float plane is what i would do.

 

[TWA]

I wouldn't blow it on helo time, that's not enough money to even solo. I'd spend it on a float or ski add on, or both. That way there's actually something to show for it in the end. I think there's a guy in MI that does floats in the summer and skis in the winter with his cub.

 

[DrProc]

Thanks for all the ideas, most of them are inline with what I am doing with it. I am using it to get recurrent in seaplanes (I got the rating 9 years ago and haven't flown one since) and doing some tailwheel flying.

 

[skyaddict]

I'd get single engine added to my multi-ATP / SE commercial and simultaneously renew all my instructor ratings, by doing a "combo" SE ATP/CFII ride. But *only* because I was silly enough to let my CFI lapse a couple years ago (missed taking my online grad certificate down to the FSDO by one day because I was finishing up initial sims at post-furlough job at the time).

Otherwise I would do the seaplane ratings for certain.

 

[avbug]

I don't see the distinction between career advancement, and not.

If you're flying a Citation but spend a few dollars on a checkout in a Seneca, you're still adding to the same logbook, still enhancing your own skill.

As you've chosen to get some seaplane training and conventional gear exeperience, you're doing nothing more than investing in yourself. It may not be a type rating, but training in one area always enhances another. Flying a glider may not teach you about flying the ILS...but then again it might; you're concentating on flying the wing, and it carries over to all else that you do.

Flying a seaplane requires one to manage energy in a different way when water taxiing, much the same way one manages a taxi on ice or on snow, or a taxi in a large airplane that can't be stopped in an instant. It carries over. Stable approaches to glassy water are very much like a low visibility transition past minimums into the TDZ, and the stick and rudder meat and potatos of flying are never wasted.

Even as a kid, I saw every hour flown as if it were an hour of college...it was one step closer to getting the job and the life of flying that I wanted...which is what every hour of college would have done. I didn't see one as enhancing this or that; it's all the same. Learning caligraphy enhances one's ability to concentrate, to learn, to pay attention to detail, to express, and in turn enhances one's ability to perform a preflight, time a magneto, and yes, fly an ILS.

I'd have suggested a few other things but it's most important that you've recognized what you want, and gone after it. Absolutely nothing wrong with that, and a wise investment, I'd say. I'd probably have said go add on a gyoplane rating, or tack on a glider CFI...but sounds like you've made a good choice. Have fun. Time spent in flight will not be deducted from your lifespan.

 

[The_Russian]

Flying a glider may not teach you about flying the ILS...but then again it might; you're concentating on flying the wing, and it carries over to all else that you do.

Brings to mind the Gimli Glider incident with Air Canada. One of the crew members happened to be a glider instructor on the side.

 

[VNugget]

I may be biased, but tailwheel/acro

 

[slacker]

Buy a sweet computer and start your own virtual airline. That would be bad@ss!

 

[DrProc]

I don't see the distinction between career advancement, and not.

If you're flying a Citation but spend a few dollars on a checkout in a Seneca, you're still adding to the same logbook, still enhancing your own skill.

As you've chosen to get some seaplane training and conventional gear exeperience, you're doing nothing more than investing in yourself. It may not be a type rating, but training in one area always enhances another. Flying a glider may not teach you about flying the ILS...but then again it might; you're concentating on flying the wing, and it carries over to all else that you do.

Flying a seaplane requires one to manage energy in a different way when water taxiing, much the same way one manages a taxi on ice or on snow, or a taxi in a large airplane that can't be stopped in an instant. It carries over. Stable approaches to glassy water are very much like a low visibility transition past minimums into the TDZ, and the stick and rudder meat and potatos of flying are never wasted.

Even as a kid, I saw every hour flown as if it were an hour of college...it was one step closer to getting the job and the life of flying that I wanted...which is what every hour of college would have done. I didn't see one as enhancing this or that; it's all the same. Learning caligraphy enhances one's ability to concentrate, to learn, to pay attention to detail, to express, and in turn enhances one's ability to perform a preflight, time a magneto, and yes, fly an ILS.

I'd have suggested a few other things but it's most important that you've recognized what you want, and gone after it. Absolutely nothing wrong with that, and a wise investment, I'd say. I'd probably have said go add on a gyoplane rating, or tack on a glider CFI...but sounds like you've made a good choice. Have fun. Time spent in flight will not be deducted from your lifespan.

I completely agree with you Avbug, I was just trying to prevent the following response or ones like it, "Add four thousand of your own bucks and get a 737 type rating and apply to SWA."