RHV VFR Communication Tips

Initial Call to Ground

When making the initial call to ground, the controllers really don’t care about your destination airport; they just care about how you’ll be leaving their airspace. That is, they want to know how you'll be leaving the traffic pattern(s). Some departure requests that work well are: downwind departure, Calaveras departure, right 45 departure, straight-out departure.

The most common call-in points are:

Gets a lot of traffic, so be very careful looking for traffic and listen for other call-ins from the area. There is really no "safe" altitude in this area - people will call in from pretty much any altitude.

When going from RHV to SJC, SJC knows you’re coming and knows your squawk code. After the RHV tower hand you off and you call the SJC tower, just let them know your call sign and altitude.
When coming from SJC to RHV, RHV has little or no information on you. When you’re passed to the RHV tower, let them know that you’re coming from SJC.
When Sierra Approach passes you to RHV, RHV has little or no information on you. Sierra Approach has a tendency to dump planes onto RHV with little warning. So, when you are handed off to RHV, let the RHV tower know your position, altitude, and that you’ve just been passed from Sierra.

When coming from the West, one technique that sometimes helps is to tell Sierra that you’ll maintain certain altitude until crossing the SJC finals and ask for an early frequency change.

When ready for departure, unless the tower is very busy, they like you to call in and let them know that you’re ready to go in sequence. Let them know what number you are in sequence.
When the airport is busy, the tower strongly prefers that instructors handle the communications, rather than a beginning student.
Note that, in general, the tower's last priority is to provide traffic advisories. So be especially careful when coming from or departing to UTC and Calaveras.
In general, keep in mind the size of the RHV airspace - it 's quite small compared to the average Class D. The top of the airspace is 2000’ MSL (or 1867’ AGL vs. a standard 2500' AGL), the maximum extent to the East and South is 3NM (vs. a standard 4NM), and the airspace to the West and North is cut off by SJC's Class C airspace. Thus, the controllers don't have a lot of room to play with in sequencing their traffic.
When pulling off runway 31R or 13L, stop in between taxiways Y and Z. That is, pull forward so as not to block Y. This allows other planes to taxi on either Y or Z.