Depends on your school and at which instructional stage. When you
transition from one instructor to another, both you and the CFI have a
learning curve to deal with and he, especially, will require more than a few
hours to size you up. That means more money out of your pocket and perhaps a
bit of frustration. Good for the school's wallet, bad for yours. Understand,
too, that instructors depend upon your prior log book endorsements in order
to evaluate your progress and size you up. During your pre-solo hours when
your log book endorsement section is blank, the new instructor won't
necessarily know where you're at so he'll want to spend time reviewing your
maneuvering skills and basic knowledge. If your school follows a published
curriculum like Cessna's or Jeppesen's, and follows it religiously, then
your progress will be tracked and recorded, and the transition time from one
instructor to another will be less. If the school is slap-dash about the
curriculum like my prior school was, and/or is staffed by young
time-builders who don't care --also like my prior school--, you'll find that
your time to solo will be unnecessarily elongated. That first solo is a
big deal for instructor and student alike. For the instructor, its a risk he
may regret for the rest of his professional career. Its a risk for you,
too, but the instructor is more likely than you to be around to regret it.
Its also a key benchmark for all us students and it affects our confidence
and bragging rights. You'll much prefer announcing that you soloed after
ten hours as opposed to forty or more.

Also, CFIs have egos, especially the young, inexperienced ones, and they
talk among themselves. If your CFI-switch comes across as a snub, the
snubbed one might be embarrassed and might bad-mouth your skills to the new
guy in retaliation. Then you'll spend even more time and money.

After solo, when you start racking up those sign-offs, the transition to a
new CFI is easier but will still cost you money.

I'd recommend that if you want to change CFIs, change schools as well and
wait until after your first solo. Go for the grayhairs, because the young
ones might not be interested in your progress as much as they're interested
in planting their butts in that right seat building time on their way to the
big-show.



"GEG" wrote in message
...
Hi everyone,

I'm a student with about 10 flights under my belt.
I had an instructor for the first 4 that I really liked.
I departed for a while, then had a new instructor that
I also really like - but for COMPLETELY different reasons,
and I can consider him "acceptable", but not great.
I wish I could combine them both.
I do some teaching at my old University as a guest, and like
to balance the conceptual view, preparation, but also have
students work and struggle just a little bit in order
to make them think through situations and get a better grasp.
(I mean struggle with ground school issues, not while in the air.)
(I like this approach for me, anyway . . . hee hee.)

There are 2 other instructors at my school that I like as people
and as personality, and a friend of mine uses one of those guys.

I'm curious to know if it's a bad idea to "try" another
instructor for a flight, just to see.
Who knows, maybe he's really good.

On the flip side, if it's at the same school, will I create an
adversarial or acrimonious situation by "cheating" on my instructor -
who I'm actually quite fine with?

Thanks!

Gary