A Big Thanks to Bob Tait and his team, I passed my IREX exam yesterday with 88%!
I am a private pilot, doing this on my own time.
I was looking to do the PIFR exam, but decided to complete the IREX exam instead. There were two main drivers for me, the fist was that there really isn't any decent study material/guides for the PIFR exam. It was very difficult to get a reliable (up to date) source of truth of what the exam covered. Also the pass rate for the PIFR exam in 2018 was 48% compared to 79.56% in the IREX, further highlighting to me the lack of training material. (ref
www.casa.gov.au/standard-page/australia-wide-pass-rates)
The second reason was i felt the IREX was more comprehensive, and covers everything I would need when doing the private IR rating. It also removes any question of knowledge gaps, and flight school developed round exams, in the future should I choose to add a FPA (such as GNSS, ILS, ETC) to the Private IR rating.
Also, I am now leaning towards doing the full Command IR rating as I can use it internationally, but I can decide later.
I self studied at home using the IREX course Videos, the online E-Text and exam prep. Although I studied over many months on an ad-hoc basis, I did focused study after work and across weekends for 4 weeks solid.
The videos are fantastic, and you really get the 'class room experience'. I really followed along as if I was in the class, doing the exercises as 'home work', and doing the review videos following along.
The quality and up to date references to the AIP, CAR, etc are what saved me for sure.
I had attempted to study using another online theory course, but found the references not up to date quality of questions just not there.
In the Exam I took the CAR, CASAR extracts, along with full (purchased from airservices)
AIP (no supplements),
ERSA,
DAPS,
TACS,
PCA,
Self printed CAAP 234-1(2.1).
Unfortunately I discovered that you can't print your own ERSA and AIP even though they provide it free via PDF! More money out the door!
I sat the exam at Moorabbin Airport, no drama there apart from the noisy hot exam room and all the PC's crashing at the start!
Any questions, please shout out.
Thanks again to the Bob Tait team
Cheers
Dale