The Pre-Solo Written & Oral Review: What to Gather, What to Expect

A Flight School Friend guide - For student pilots approaching first solo

Before your CFI signs you off to fly an airplane alone, FAR 61.87(b) requires you to pass a pre-solo knowledge test. Unlike the FAA knowledge test, this one is written and administered by your CFI, graded by your CFI, and - this is the part people miss - reviewed with you until every wrong answer is corrected. That review conversation is effectively a mini oral exam, and it's where your instructor decides whether your knowledge is solo-deep or quiz-shallow.

This guide walks through what to gather before you sit down to study, checklists to run before test day, the question territory you should expect, and what your CFI is actually listening for during the review.

Part 1 - What the regulation actually requires

61.87(b) says the test must cover three subject areas:

• Applicable sections of Parts 61 and 91 - the rules that govern you as a student pilot and the flight itself
• Airspace rules and procedures for the airport where the solo will be performed - your field, your chart, your frequencies
• Flight characteristics and operational limitations of the make and model you'll solo in - your specific aircraft's numbers, not "a trainer" in general

Notice what that means: two of the three sections cannot be studied from a generic source. Your airport and your aircraft are the test. That's why the gathering step below matters more than any question bank.

Part 2 - Gather these before you study anything

From the FAR/AIM - sections worth reading in full

Part 3 - Test-day checklists

Part 4 - The question territory

Every school writes its own test, so no bank matches yours exactly. But nearly all pre-solo writtens draw from this territory. Answer these in writing before test day and you'll have covered most of the ground.

Regulations

1. Who may a student pilot carry as a passenger on a solo flight?
2. How long is a solo endorsement valid, and what is it specific to?
3. What are the fuel reserve requirements for day VFR? Night?
4. What visibility does a student pilot need for solo flight, day and night - and what does "visual reference to the surface" prohibit?
5. Two aircraft are converging; two aircraft are on final. Who yields, in each case?
6. What documents must be aboard the aircraft, and which inspections must be current for a rental trainer?
7. As PIC in an emergency, what may you deviate from, and what might you have to do afterward?
8. What are the minimum safe altitudes over congested and non-congested areas?
9. Recite the light gun signals - in flight and on the ground.
10. What preflight information does 91.103 require for a local flight?

Airspace (answer for YOUR field)

11. What class of airspace is your airport in? What are its dimensions, floor to ceiling?
12. What must you establish or receive before entering it? What counts as "established two-way communications"?
13. What are the VFR weather minimums inside it? In the airspace directly above it? In your practice area?
14. What does your airspace become when the tower closes, and how do procedures change?
15. What are the emergency transponder codes, and when would you use each?
16. Describe the hold-short markings and when you may cross them.

Your aircraft

17. Recite every V-speed and what it means operationally - not just the number, but when you fly it.
18. What happens to Va as the aircraft gets lighter, and why does that matter on a solo flight?
19. What is your usable fuel, and how long can you actually fly with legal reserves?
20. What speed do you fly on final, and where does that number come from?
21. Walk through the engine-failure flow. Then the engine-fire flow. What's the critical difference?
22. What is the demonstrated crosswind component - and what is YOUR school's solo crosswind limit?

Local procedures

23. What is the TPA, and what's the pattern direction for each runway?
24. What frequencies do you use, in order, from startup to leaving the pattern?
25. Where are you allowed to go on your solo, per your endorsement - and what weather ends the flight?
26. Lost comms in the pattern at your field: what exactly do you do?

Part 5 - What your CFI is actually looking for in the review

The graded sheet is the entry ticket. The review conversation is the real assessment. Instructors consistently probe for the same things:

Order, not just content, on emergencies. "Pitch for best glide" as your third step is a wrong answer even if it's on your list. CFIs listen for the flow in sequence, because under stress you'll only get the sequence you drilled.

Judgment answers, not recital answers. Expect follow-ups like "OK, the reg says 3 miles - would you launch solo in 4 miles of haze?" The right answer usually involves your personal limits and the school's limits, not the legal floor.

Your numbers, cold. Fumbling for Vy or the TPA signals you'll be fumbling for them at 400 feet on climb-out. The aircraft and airport sections should be automatic.

Knowing what you may NOT do. The solo endorsement is a permission slip with edges. CFIs want to hear you state the edges unprompted: no passengers, the wind limits, where you can go, what weather turns you around.

Honesty over bluffing. "I don't know, but I'd look in Section 3 of the POH" is a passing answer. A confident wrong answer is the one that delays solos - it tells your instructor you'll improvise instead of verify.

The whole point of 61.87(b)'s review requirement is that you walk away with zero known gaps. Treat wrong answers during the review as free instruction, not lost points - your CFI already expects a few, and how you handle correction is itself part of the assessment.

Part 6 - The final self-check: can you...?

The written covers what you know. This covers what you can do. Run it honestly the week of your stage check - every "not yet" is a conversation to have with your CFI before solo day, not after.

Planning. Can you obtain and interpret a weather briefing, read a METAR and TAF without an app decoding it, check NOTAMs for your field, run a weight & balance for you solo (lighter aircraft - different numbers), and pull takeoff/landing distances from the performance charts?

Aircraft. Can you complete a preflight without the checklist prompting you where to look, verify fuel quantity and grade yourself, run the run-up and know what an abnormal mag drop actually looks like, and name the point at which you'd refuse the airplane?

Flight. Can you hold pattern altitude within 100 feet, hold approach speed within 5 knots, fly a stabilized approach and recognize an unstabilized one early, execute a go-around without hesitation, and land consistently enough that your last several were boring?

Communications. Can you copy ATIS in one listen, make every standard call from startup to shutdown without a script, read back instructions correctly, and handle the unexpected - "extend downwind," "number two behind the Cherokee," a frequency you didn't anticipate?

Decision-making. Can you run IMSAFE and PAVE honestly, state your school's solo limits and your own personal minimums unprompted, and name the specific conditions under which you would cancel your own solo?

That last one is the quiet test inside every pre-solo review: instructors aren't only checking whether you can fly the airplane alone - they're checking whether you'll make the no-go call alone.