Initial Pilot Training and Future Pilot Training

[Blue]

On 2/8/2025 at 3:34 PM, reloder said:

All of this seems so unnecessary. What was wrong with the old T-41/T-37/T-38 way of doing things?

 

On 2/8/2025 at 4:25 PM, Clark Griswold said:

Nothing, it’s just the leadership of the AF thinks they can min run this enterprise and get away with it
We can not have the AF we say want with the resources Congress allocates, missions we are legally required to OT&E for with the way we operate now
Something has to give or more money and the freedom to execute that money in the best way possible for the needs of the AF vs the needs of X defense prime or Congressmen or pilot hating shoe clerk

What @Clark Griswold said.  Air Force trainer aircraft acquisition has been the next-to-last priority, for a long time.  When the AF went to replace those aircraft, they didn't care enough to put the proper resources behind it.  Leading to today's inevitable state of affairs.

Also, my hazy recollection - folks can correct as necessary.

The T-41 had worked well for a long time, until McPeak became CSAF in the early 90s, and decided people needed to train in something aerobatic.  The AF procured the T-3 Firefly, which was pulled from service after three fatal accidents.  After that, the Air Force vacillated between several different solutions: sending people straight to T-37s with no prior flight time provided, paying for people to get a certain amount of hours at a private school of their choice, sending people to get their hours at a school designated by the AF, and probably other options over time that I don't recall.

The T-37 had worked well for a long time, besides being old and outdated.  The Air Force tried replacing in in the early 80s in a competition eventually won by Fairchild Republic's T-46 Eaglet.  They went over budget, and the program was cancelled.  Just goes to show you - even during the height of the Reagan era military buildup, the Air Force didn't care enough to get a new trainer built.  The AF tried again in the early 90s with the JPATS program, and ended up with the T-6, which were delivered between 2000 - 2009 or thereabouts.  And, based on this thread, the Air Force can't seem to keep them flying, for whatever obscene reason.

The T-38 had worked for a long time, but was old, outdated, and wearing out.  In the early 90s, the Air Force began procuring the T-1 Jayhawk, and split pilot training into a track for T-38s and T-1s, with part of the reasoning being to extend the life of the existing T-38 aircraft.  In the early 2000s, the AF began the T-X program with a stated goal of replacing the T-38.  That program proceeded in fits and starts, but generally really sucked hind tit when it came to funding over the years, with some years having no funding at all.  Finally, in 2016, the AF released a formal Request for Proposal, and in 2018 selected Boeing's T-7.   And Boeing has basically been Boeing, and fucked it all up.

Edited February 13 by Blue

[Flev]

End of the line for T-1's at Pensacola. What a time to be alive.

https://www.pnj.com/story/news/local/pensacola/2025/02/14/air-force-training-unit-at-nas-pensacola-begins-sendoff-of-jayhawk/78393747007/

[LookieRookie]

On 2/12/2025 at 11:21 AM, boba1024 said:

they have already sent three or four IPT classes of students to civilian flight schools. This seems to be official now. Not sure why they still need to confirm the idea works when it’s being fully implemented. 

I should have put confirm in quotation marks. The bobs need SGTOs to make fake data to show have a “data driven” decision.

just like that cuck Wills did with 2.5

[Clark Griswold]

4 minutes ago, LookieRookie said:

I should have put confirm in quotation marks. The bobs need SGTOs to make fake data to show have a “data driven” decision.

just like that cuck Wills did with 2.5

Is there any data released about the demographics of the SGTOs?

X percent were CFIs, ATPs, etc…

[LookieRookie]

Just now, Clark Griswold said:

Is there any data released about the demographics of the SGTOs?

X percent were CFIs, ATPs, etc…

I’m sure there is. I haven’t looked enough because I don’t work in A5/8

[Clark Griswold]

I’m sure there is. I haven’t looked enough because I don’t work in A5/8

Gotcha, I imagine they have it and meet any legal requirements to disclose it but unless it would be very supportive to their agenda they don’t advertise it, not really a spear thrown as we all try to accentuate the positives and the negatives we put at the end of the slide deck.

Another question / idea from the cheap seats but I wonder if the services could actually work together in the whole of military training pilot training (including USCG) and divide it up to specialize, have reciprocal support and allow each other to specialize in the aspect of a multi phase training curriculum they most care about?
I’m imagining the Army running a basic fixed wing training program, the USAF running an intermediate program, USN running a multi engine program, the advanced phase (fighter, bomber, carrier track) being kept wholly in house, etc… thoughts?


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[Swizzle]

58 minutes ago, Clark Griswold said:

Is there any data released about the demographics of the SGTOs?

X percent were CFIs, ATPs, etc…

They were cherry picked beyond belief. 

[Clark Griswold]

They were cherry picked beyond belief. 

Gotcha


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[RASH]

I’m sure there is. I haven’t looked enough because I don’t work in A5/8

Not that A5/8 have looked either…


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[SurelySerious]

Not that A5/8 have looked either…


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If you don’t look for the outcome you don’t want, it’s a lot harder to find it.

[Clark Griswold]

So flying with a USN Reserve dude (T-45 IP) and found out the Navy has figured it out with contract IPs for their T-45 program, namely money will fix manning issues with respect to that.

Did the T-6 contract IP thing ever get anywhere?  If not was it not enough money or crappy work rules / contract or both?

Edited February 19 by Clark Griswold

[boba1024]

2 hours ago, Clark Griswold said:

So flying with a USN Reserve dude (T-45 IP) and found out the Navy has figured it out with contract IPs for their T-45 program, namely money will fix manning issues with respect to that.

Did the T-6 contract IP thing ever get anywhere?  If not was it not enough money or crappy work rules / contract or both?

I could be wrong but don’t think IP manning is an issue in the T-6 world. The issue is maintenance. Vance is still on the legacy syllabus and producing pilots without any delays while students at Columbus is experiencing a 6 months (and counting) delay between academics and flight line. If Columbus had a healthy T-6 fleet, the IPT SGTO class wouldn’t cause such a long delay for legacy students. This IPT thing is not going to produce more pilots every year unless the MX issue is fixed first, at least not at Columbus

[Pooter]

On 2/8/2025 at 6:15 PM, WheelsOff said:

I’ve been out of the AETC IP game a few years now. Sad to read it’s only gotten worse. But for those who are new around here and don’t know the history…it began when Kwast and Wills forcefully gang-banged the UPT enterprise into a training program that has set us on a course to become a 3rd-rate Air Force for decades to come. 

Don’t know what Kwast is doing in his retirement, but Wills was just appointed senior VP at HTX Labs, which—you guessed it—oversees VR training/tech for military training applications. 

The VR and pilot training next stuff wasn't originally a problem in and of itself. If you added VR sims to the legacy UPT syllabus us old hats are familiar with, you would end up with a better product. Full stop. I'm all for trying to modernize sims/chairflying and I'm all for auditing the syllabus to make sure we aren't wasting time on things that don't matter operationally, like fingertip takeoffs and landings or serially hooking kids on ELPs. The problem arose when the brass started using the VR and PTN/UPT 2.5 syllabus cuts to mask the fact that they can't generate aircraft. That's when all the newfangled VR and syllabi basically became a trojan horse to cut hours while keeping slides green. 

[coppy]

23 minutes ago, boba1024 said:

I could be wrong but don’t think IP manning is an issue in the T-6 world. The issue is maintenance. Vance is still on the legacy syllabus and producing pilots without any delays while students at Columbus is experiencing a 6 months (and counting) delay between academics and flight line. If Columbus had a healthy T-6 fleet, the IPT SGTO class wouldn’t cause such a long delay for legacy students. This IPT thing is not going to produce more pilots every year unless the MX issue is fixed first, at least not at Columbus

It definitely seems like MX has a large piece to play in the Columbus issues, at least according to what I've been hearing. The only thing I may disagree with is you saying the IPT thing won't produce more pilots. If IPT really does reduce T-6 hours from 90ish to 50-60 per student, that will certainly allow more T-6's to get back on the flightline due to the reduction of hours. However, that assumes that manpower is the bottleneck and not parts, which I don't know since I am not there. Also, I am pretty sure that T-6 MX is contracted, so if parts is not the issue, some serious research should be put into whether or not that contract is sufficient.

BLOB: the trainer fleet has been abused and not enough has been done to remedy it. 

[Clark Griswold]

8 hours ago, boba1024 said:

I could be wrong but don’t think IP manning is an issue in the T-6 world. The issue is maintenance. Vance is still on the legacy syllabus and producing pilots without any delays while students at Columbus is experiencing a 6 months (and counting) delay between academics and flight line. If Columbus had a healthy T-6 fleet, the IPT SGTO class wouldn’t cause such a long delay for legacy students. This IPT thing is not going to produce more pilots every year unless the MX issue is fixed first, at least not at Columbus

Roger that

If only an updated version of the T-6 existed that exceeded requirements and was available with a better availability rate

https://defense.txtav.com/en/t-6c

[SurelySerious]

Roger that
If only an updated version of the T-6 existed that exceeded requirements and was available with a better availability rate
https://defense.txtav.com/en/t-6c

What if.

[wikz]

On 2/3/2025 at 7:48 AM, Clark Griswold said:

Pot stirring 

Concur with Gonky’s opinion that it is not a solution to the problems facing pilot training but agree with both that pre-UPT flying training is worthwhile if executed well.  Big point brought up I think was interesting was the culture of military flight training, stress-high standards-fast pace, that would be missing if most is contracted away.

As a student being on that end of the whip was no fun but more than a few years later the value is more apparent.  

so from what I'm hearing, UPT is using a civilian flight school for IPT flying to compensate for the dying t-6 fleet or just to save more money and acquire additional hours, then advancing studs to fly the t-6. how is this going to work if students already have certs from part 141 or 61 schools? do they just skip the whole program?

also is IPT not included in the mass score? 

Edited Sunday at 11:09 PM by wikz

[Clark Griswold]

so from what I'm hearing, UPT is using a civilian flight school for IPT flying to compensate for the dying t-6 fleet or just to save more money and acquire additional hours, then advancing studs to fly the t-6. how is this going to work if students already have certs from part 141 or 61 schools? do they just skip the whole program?
also is IPT not included in the mass score? 

Not sure
@hindsight2020 is IPT just pass/fail or graded on a scale? Included is n MASS then?


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[viper154]

4 hours ago, wikz said:

so from what I'm hearing, UPT is using a civilian flight school for IPT flying to compensate for the dying t-6 fleet or just to save more money and acquire additional hours, then advancing studs to fly the t-6. how is this going to work if students already have certs from part 141 or 61 schools? do they just skip the whole program?

also is IPT not included in the mass score? 

 

1 hour ago, Clark Griswold said:

Not sure
@hindsight2020 is IPT just pass/fail or graded on a scale? Included is n MASS then?


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IPT is currently pass/fail from what I’m tracking, no idea how it’s graded out side of the FAA checkrides, or if you get silly award for being “at the top” but no part is counted towards mass, as UPT IPs have no access or insights to their performance before starting UPT. The mass is purely based off T-6 performance.  For the moment the program is to get kids more time in a plane since the T-1 is dead and the sim only T-1 program was garbage. Having a civilian rating means absolutely nothing for the moment, it’s not unheard of for ATP rated regional folks getting guard/reserve slots, they go through the same military training as everyone else. (There was a exception for a bit that allowed multi/inst rated folks to go straight to the T-1, I would expect that exception to die as the T-1 fades away) 
 

T-6 is about halfway through its service life, it ain’t dead, some issues with contracting/procuring parts, said issues seem to have been/are being addressed. 
 

Last I heard the long term future for T-6/or a successor was undecided, reading between the lines I think the goal is IPT straight to a T-7 for everyone.  I wouldn’t put money on anything at this point given all the thrash with syllabi the last couple years, but for anyone looking to be an AF pilot and start training in the next 5-10 years, I would expect some seat time in a T-6. 
 

Edited Monday at 03:08 AM by viper154

[Lord Ratner]

58 minutes ago, viper154 said:

 

IPT is currently pass/fail from what I’m tracking, no idea how it’s graded out side of the FAA checkrides, or if you get silly award for being “at the top” but no part is counted towards mass, as UPT IPs have no access or insights to their performance before starting UPT. The mass is purely based off T-6 performance.  For the moment the program is to get kids more time in a plane since the T-1 is dead and the sim only T-1 program was garbage. Having a civilian rating means absolutely nothing for the moment, it’s not unheard of for ATP rated regional folks getting guard/reserve slots, they go through the same military training as everyone else. (There was a exception for a bit that allowed multi/inst rated folks to go straight to the T-1, I would expect that exception to die as the T-1 fades away) 
 

T-6 is about halfway through its service life, it ain’t dead, some issues with contracting/procuring parts, said issues seem to have been/are being addressed. 
 

Last I heard the long term future for T-6/or a successor was undecided, reading between the lines I think the goal is IPT straight to a T-7 for everyone.  I wouldn’t put money on anything at this point given all the thrash with syllabi the last couple years, but for anyone looking to be an AF pilot and start training in the next 5-10 years, I would expect some seat time in a T-6. 
 

It's pretty wild being on the outside looking in, as a previous t6 instructor, and seeing that the *Air Force* somehow managed to completely implode the simplest flying program in the entire service. Wild

[Clark Griswold]

IPT is currently pass/fail from what I’m tracking, no idea how it’s graded out side of the FAA checkrides, or if you get silly award for being “at the top” but no part is counted towards mass, as UPT IPs have no access or insights to their performance before starting UPT. The mass is purely based off T-6 performance.  For the moment the program is to get kids more time in a plane since the T-1 is dead and the sim only T-1 program was garbage. Having a civilian rating means absolutely nothing for the moment, it’s not unheard of for ATP rated regional folks getting guard/reserve slots, they go through the same military training as everyone else. (There was a exception for a bit that allowed multi/inst rated folks to go straight to the T-1, I would expect that exception to die as the T-1 fades away) 
 
T-6 is about halfway through its service life, it ain’t dead, some issues with contracting/procuring parts, said issues seem to have been/are being addressed. 
 
Last I heard the long term future for T-6/or a successor was undecided, reading between the lines I think the goal is IPT straight to a T-7 for everyone.  I wouldn’t put money on anything at this point given all the thrash with syllabi the last couple years, but for anyone looking to be an AF pilot and start training in the next 5-10 years, I would expect some seat time in a T-6. 
 

Copy that
More time is better than phoning it in
If the AF wants to go to only one trainer so be it, don’t agree but if so then buy a sizable and diverse civilian training experience to develop them before going to a high performance jet…
Basic, acro, multi, seaplane and STOL by contract with mil oversight during training
0.1% chance for that much pre mil training flying (if the straight to T-7 COA happens) but one must post what one thinks…


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[DirkDiggler]

14 hours ago, viper154 said:

Last I heard the long term future for T-6/or a successor was undecided, reading between the lines I think the goal is IPT straight to a T-7 for everyone.  I wouldn’t put money on anything at this point given all the thrash with syllabi the last couple years, but for anyone looking to be an AF pilot and start training in the next 5-10 years, I would expect some seat time in a T-6. 
 

This is the Bobs' long term vision, at least for now.  There's some concern about students being able to handle going from a Diamond or Piper twin straight to a much higher performance jet.  Expect in the next few years for a couple UPT SGTOs to go to Italy and fly the M346 to see whether students can handle the transition.

[Clark Griswold]

How is it that the AF so broke that it can’t afford a one for one swap out of existing iron or a new version of UPT incorporating some civ time that seems feasible to produce a graduate generally deemed to have an equivalent amount of training that UPT historically has been given?
What math are the Bobs throwing out there for all of this?


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[Longhorn15]

The silver lining is in 5 years when the AF completely reverses course there should be a good market for secondhand Diamond twins!

[pbar]

On 2/14/2025 at 5:04 PM, Flev said:

End of the line for T-1's at Pensacola. What a time to be alive.

https://www.pnj.com/story/news/local/pensacola/2025/02/14/air-force-training-unit-at-nas-pensacola-begins-sendoff-of-jayhawk/78393747007/

 

Lucky CSOs are flying in Navy T-6s else the AF would probably go to 100% sim for UCT and then off to the FTUs...