Lately there has been some talk around pilot hours on type, especially after the Lion Air and Ethiopian incidents.
When a new type is introduced eg. 787 / A380 how do pilots get their hours up prior to flying revenue flights. Is it mainly sim based (do these hours count) or hours in the sky and just build them up as you go.
There are a number of avenues. Firstly, the pilots won’t just be anyone who bids for the type. The initial cadre will be hand picked from the instructor pilots ranks. In the case of the QF 380s, they all came initially from pilots on the 330, so Airbus time was mandatory for that first group. Some moved from the 747 to the 330 for a year to gather that experience. They were then sent to France, to do conversion training with Airbus. When they came back to Oz, there was still a wait for our aircraft, so they spent a lot of time in the sim. When the first aircraft were ready for delivery, a group of about 20 went back to Toulouse to get 10 hours each in Airbus’s aircraft, with an AB instructor. I’m told that was great fun, taking an empty 380 to various secondary fields around France.
When QF bought 330 and 787, much the same methods were followed, but pilots were also farmed out to some airlines already operating the aircraft to gather some hours.
For pilots like me, converting from the 747, I did about 60 hours of sim time (which is what happened to my hair), and then around 100 hours in the aircraft before being let loose.
The only time that I’ve ever seen a conversion that was as limited as the one being given for the MAX, was when QF got the ex BA 767s. In that case though, the aircraft was virtually identical to the ones we were already operating, with the only coughpit difference involving the engines. Just about everyone had already flown the 747, so the engines (which were the same) were not new to us...we just had to relearn a few limitations. There were some slight differences in the way they flew, but far less than existed between the 200 and 300.