Eligibility for an Aviation Mechanic certificate is set out in 14 CFR Part 65, Subpart D, and it comes down to three independent gates. You must be at least 18 years old. You must be able to read, write, speak and understand English. And you must satisfy the experience requirement, either by documenting practical experience or by graduating from an FAA-certificated Part-147 school.

All three have to be met — they do not trade against one another. Exceptional experience does not lower the age gate, and a Part-147 diploma does not remove the English requirement. What the checker above does is walk the same three gates in the same order the FAA does, so you find out which one is actually blocking you rather than guessing.

Meeting these gates makes you eligible to be tested. Certification itself also requires passing the three knowledge tests and the oral and practical exam with a Designated Mechanic Examiner. Eligibility is the door, not the destination.

Under §65.77, the experience route requires 18 months of practical experience with the procedures, practices, materials, tools, machines and equipment generally used in constructing, maintaining or altering airframes or powerplants, appropriate to the rating you are seeking. For both ratings, the requirement is 30 months of practical experience performing the duties appropriate to both concurrently.

The word doing the work in that regulation is practical. Time on the payroll of a maintenance organisation is not the unit of measure — hands-on maintenance is. Sweeping the hangar, driving the tug, and running parts do not accrue eligibility months no matter how many of them you log. Neither does time spent on aircraft systems unrelated to the rating you are pursuing.

Because 30 months of concurrent work is shorter than 18 plus 18, mechanics who intend to hold both ratings are usually better served by seeking work that spans airframe and powerplant tasks from the start rather than specialising first and broadening later. The concurrency is the whole saving.

Whatever route you take, the experience has to be documented and signed. That is what an experience logbook is for, and it is the evidence the FSDO weighs when it decides whether to authorise you to test. Our guide to Form 8610-2 and IACRA covers how that record turns into an application.

Graduates of an FAA-certificated Aviation Maintenance Technician School operating under 14 CFR Part 147 meet the experience requirement through the school's approved curriculum rather than by counting months. The school's certificate of completion and training record serve as the documentation on Form 8610-2, signed by the school official rather than by a supervising mechanic.

Two things are worth checking before enrolling. First, that the school holds current FAA Part-147 certification — a programme calling itself an aviation maintenance course is not automatically an approved AMTS. Second, which ratings the curriculum covers, since a school may be approved for airframe, powerplant, or both.

Part-147 graduates are eligible to test on graduation and do not wait out an additional experience period. The comparison between the two routes — cost, time, and what each does to your first job — is covered in Part-147 versus the experience route.

Being eligible starts a clock rather than ending one. You take the three knowledge tests — General, Airframe and Powerplant — at a PSI testing center, each needing 70 percent to pass. Those results are valid for 24 calendar months, and the oral and practical exam has to happen inside that window.

The oral and practical is conducted by a Designated Mechanic Examiner, who works from the Mechanic ACS and from the ACS codes printed on your knowledge test reports. Whatever you missed on the written, the examiner is required to revisit. That is why the fail report is worth reading carefully rather than filing.

If you are eligible now, the sensible next step is a diagnostic run across the General bank to see where you actually stand — start with free General practice questions, or read the full certification pathway end to end.

How many months of experience do I need for an A&P certificate?

Eighteen months of practical experience for a single rating — Airframe only or Powerplant only — or 30 months of practical experience concurrently covering both, under 14 CFR §65.77. The 30 months is not 18 plus 18: it is a single block of time during which you were performing work appropriate to both ratings, which is why it is shorter than doing them consecutively.

Does time at a Part-147 school count as experience months?

It does not need to. Graduating from an FAA-certificated Aviation Maintenance Technician School under 14 CFR Part 147 satisfies the experience requirement in its own right, through the school's approved curriculum. Your graduation certificate and the school's training record take the place of a supervising mechanic's sign-off, so a Part-147 graduate does not count months at all.

Can I count military maintenance experience?

Often yes, but it is not automatic and it is not decided by this checker. Military experience is evaluated by your local FSDO against the work you actually performed, documented with your service records, DD-214 and job-qualification records. The Joint Service Aviation Maintenance Technician Certification Council programme exists specifically to map military ratings onto FAA requirements. Bring your documentation to the FSDO before you plan a test date.

Does my experience have to be signed off, and by whom?

Yes. Practical experience must be supervised and certified by someone holding the certificate and rating appropriate to the work — normally a certificated A&P mechanic, or a repair station or school official where that applies. The certification is made on FAA Form 8610-2. Unsigned hours in a personal logbook are not, on their own, evidence the FSDO will accept.

Is there an upper age limit or a medical certificate requirement?

No to both. The minimum age is 18 at the time of certification under §65.71(a)(1); there is no maximum. Unlike pilot certification, an FAA mechanic certificate requires no medical certificate at any stage. The only personal requirements are age, English language ability, and the experience or Part-147 gate.

What does the English language requirement actually involve?

Section 65.71(a)(2) requires you to be able to read, write, speak and understand English. There is no separate language exam. In practice it is assessed continuously: the knowledge tests are in English, and the Designated Mechanic Examiner evaluates your English during the oral. The requirement exists because maintenance manuals, Airworthiness Directives and the regulations themselves are English documents that you must be able to work from unaided.

• 14 CFR Part 65, Subpart D — Mechanics (§§65.71–65.95)
• 14 CFR Part 147 — Aviation Maintenance Technician Schools
• FAA — Become an Aviation Mechanic

This checker is a study aid built from the sources above. It is not an FAA determination — your local FSDO decides whether your documentation satisfies §65.77.