So the company I work for has hired five pilots out of the 160th in the past three months and four of them could not pass their 135.293, .299 check ride what's up with that?

And the one out of five that passed the 135.293, .299 check ride failed his instrument 135.297 check ride?

Those 160th guys sure talk a lot of shhyytt but I'm not impressed.

couldnt agree more; the venerable R-22 is considerably more challenging to learn, to fly, and to master...which is why I'll always put my skill set as a bed wetter Robbie pajama boy up against any TF-160 sissy!

The thing is those R22 pilots are passing their check rides.  

Nothing was ever said about the R22 Pilots it's just a simple statement that the 160th Pilots are not what they say they are, they are failing.   Yes the 160th guys have much better equipment to learning but obviously their attitude and training process sucks.

My company hired a couple of those guys. Neither made it 6 months.

At HAI several years ago, I was listening to some guy saying that he feels the ex-military pilots as a whole are not as good as the purely civilian pilots.  He said it is due to a different way of thinking...   that they are harder on equipment because they aren't in an environment where parts or maintenance is ever an economic factor, and that they are not good on checkrides because FAA and 135 rules are not the environment they were ever accountable to.

Also, ego.

Makes you wonder why it's military pilots that operate Air Force and Marine 1. Also intercepting all the superior robbie pilots violating TFRs.

those aircraft are piloted by military pilots are that they are military aircraft.

Military is not a civilian environment nor is Civilian a Military environment.  160th or any other military outfit does not fly Part 135, 133, or 137.  Makes me wonder about your 135 training program, they are supposed to cover all the bases, looks like they are not.  YOUR company did the training...Oops no they did not, they thought these guys could get it by osmosis in their sleep or rubbing elbows with their Robbie professional counterparts.  So it looks like YOU also failed to impart your superior knowlege.  In other words you failed too.

reasonable.

The 160th has a reputation for being skilled airmen, and frearless. In the two cases I mentioned that was certainly the case. But when you take flight/jobs and bend or break the rules to "get the job done" or fly like you are dodging enemy fire on a daily basis you wont last long... in my company anyway. It shows poor risk management.

mindset pretty much spells one equation for outward personal behavior.

From a civilian perspective military pilots are somewhat irrationally pumped up to believe themselves to be the best of the best of the best for the sake of confidence and cooperative unit 'mindset' prior to going to battle.  I know, what a stretch, but it is something like that, esprit de corps, etc.  But, it is not something any military pilot will ever walk away from, it will be with the individual forever.

The challenge for military pilots moving in to civilian flying is how to learn a NEW mindset, and operate effectively with it.  That is far harder than simply being a civilian trained pilot.  Some military pilots take to civil flying like fish to water, some are a bit amphibious about it, so to speak, and some are downright ornery.  I've seen exmilitary pilots literally fired for on the job behavior both with respect to how they flew and how they treated their civilian counterparts.  I never saw a civilian only pilot fired in those respects.

As a check airman the only reallyl demonstrable difference I found betwixt civil only and exmilitary pilots transitioning to civil flying is the latter tended to be much more picky about details civil pilots rarely brought up. 

Double edged sword, good for some purposes, PITA for others.

Big deal is this:  If you have exmilitary pilots help them gain the effecttive civil mindset, whatever that may be for your operations. 

You owe it to them!!  Solve the problem, don't just sit around criticizing like our congressional people do.

Somewhere I missed that today was the National Besmirch Military Pilot days! Too many non -military better than thou people sitting on their butts today with nothing to do I guess!

How about the next Super Bowl we have the Robbie demonstration team fly over rather than the Nightstalkers or Blue Angels. It should be a hit!

Ok, how about the Robbies deliver the pace car

and if college and high school ball becomes a 'paid' activity like has been proferred college ball, I'll stop watching that too.

Fed up with it all, especially the politization (Sp?) of it.  Sick of all the victim groups in the US.

Just simply hit my limit.

true.

If so they probably really don't want to be there, but it's the only job they can come up with.  That should tell them and others something.

Guys with civil training initially probably simply want to fly in the civil market - easy cultural/personal interface after training.  

Military to civil?  Truthfully no one cares if we had been in the military before.  Is what it is, deal with it or go back in the military.

I've known some civilian people who could not adapt to the military after they enlisted.  And I've known some military pilots who could not adapt to civilian aviation after they got out.  Different worlds, man.  We pilots like to rate and compare each other: Mine's bigger than yours.  Or I'm better with it than you are.  Whatever.  I'm sure the 160th guys are very good at what they do.  But being a successful civilian professional pilot requires an additional - and completely different - set of skills.  Many of these skills (e.g. dealing with demanding and "mentally-deficient" customers, nitwit Chief Pilots, DOM's that don't know their anus from a hole in the ground..) are not taught in military flight school.  You'd think they'd be instinctive and/or intuitive, but they're not.  So let's cut the former military pilots some slack.  The good ones will adapt and be great!  The ones who really don't want to be in the civilian sector will eventually weed themselves out.  

civilian and military. Never met a regular army pilot I didn't like. Met a lot (most) of guard pilots that were shi*ty pilots and hard to work with. Civilian pilots are a mixed bag. Silver State pilots generally garbage. In general, the helicopter world has more than its share of d bags. I am a civilian trained pilot, BTW.

Had to work with a guard pilot who was a nightmare.

Also worked with one who was a pleasure to be around and fly with.

All comes down to character, and everyone is different.

How I wish they'd offered a Reading Comprehension course in that high school of yours. Maybe they did, but it was a 12th year course and by that time you'd dropped out? Maybe we should start offering it at the Middle School level. My suggestion: Stick to Tik Tok videos, they're more your speed.

that's many sides. Like yes or no. 

Here are the sides to my coin....

I am prior service, ISR flight crew - but not a pilot while in the military.

Got my pilot license in the civilian world 25 years ago.

I consider myself an "ok" pilot.  Not great.  Good enough not to kill anyone, but my skills are a mere shadow of those held by some of my peers.  After a pilot evaluation once, I asked how I did.  The evaluator said, "Well, we're still alive" - so I have that going for me.

In 25 years I've seen a mixed bag of pilots out there.  My take on just a few that I have worked with:

I used to fly with an ex-Coasty who was a genuinely good and friendly guy, would share any of his knowledge with you, and who was the kind of pilot that I hope to be one day.

I flew with an ex-Nam era pilot who was the same.

I have a few civilian pilot friends who are every bit as competant.

I flew SIC with a former PD pilot who wasn't fit to run a fuel farm, yet somehow had an H-ATP.

At one operation, there was a Chief Pilot, ex-military, who thought GOD had come down and pinned on his wings.  He was a complete A-hole.  I don't know how his flying was, but it would have required an S-64 to carry his ego.

I flew with a foreigner who thought Skymaster was a title.  Like Captain or Lieutenant.  Maybe it was.

Summary:  I don't know....  what was the question?

Years ago as a low time robbie instructor I was given the FAA inspector /  ex 160th pilot who needed to get checked out in the R22 for checkrides etc. I was the low guy on the totem pole and nobody else want to fly with this self acclaimed GOD.

I did one trip around the pattern showing him what we did while he told me how good he was and he was ready to take over. It was pretty funny at first watching him trying to keep the R22 over the one spot.

Next he went to do a vertical take-off like he was in a twin and I lost it. "My helicopter.. we got to stay in ground effect till ETL and then takeoff at 60 kts or so, for you know... the dead man curve". Well the guy didn't say much for the next 30 minutes but was soon able to fly the thing better than me. We became good friends and he taught me alot. We had a lot of respect for each other. Fun times indeed.

Lemme guess.  Their recruiter is a 160th guy. FYI 

I respect the 160th guys.

Hard for me to believe that all these high intensity men-of action would seek a job flying sprained ankles, maybe 100 hrs/yr, but mostly just laying around the base gossiping like old ladies with medical people. Because that's EMS. Ugh.

There is plenty to beef at the 160th for, but not being able to fly isn't usually one of them.  One them is they are as bad as ringknockers, they have connections, they don't need a job at your fly by night outfit.

What fine company has such exacting standards that no one can pass?  What is the normal check ride failure rate?  If you are failing 4 out of 5 of anyone on a 135 ride, I would look at the left seat or back of the sim first.  If you failed 4 out 5 min0rites you would get sued but I guess you can get off discriminating against veterans, good for you male (not man).

What kind of training program do you have?  You guys must be real good.  Usually you do something wrong, the instructor says "no, do it this way",  you do it that way and you pass.  Those who can't do, teach.  Those who can't teach, administrate.  Time for administration for you.

This really isn't a mil vs civ thing.  You guys are just d1x.

using AR-95-1, that APART book thingy and the -10, and your training records.

They didn't join the Army.

But you have joined civilian aviation. Put all that silly and extraneous AR-bullshyt behind you and assimilate. Just do your job, IAW the FAA, and stop being a dik.

So,if you want to conduct a raid...call you? Ok.

But see, that's not the job here. Gotta have the skilz to pay the bilz, and T.O.T. after two weeks of rehearsal ain't it.