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The first cowling parts have been pulled from the mold. Here’s a picture of the first top cowling and it is a very nice part. I was surprised at how light it is. The lower cowling is coming soon and I now understand the true amount of work to get it to the plug stage for making a mold. David

who knew it would be this much fun?

Neither of those. I'm curious where you were studying that you came up with those two options. As you can tell from the responses already, Mooney pilots, just like their airplanes don't like to slow down. There are lots of other airplanes that are really good at slowing down. But we don't like slow, and so we fly Mooneys. Do some research on shock cooling and you'll find that theory has been well and truly debunked. Once free from that OWT, you'll be free to cash in that altitude and get the speed back you spent in the climb. At the top of descent, just trim down for your favorite descent rate, such as 500 ft/min down. Don't touch anything else. At pattern altitude, level off, pull the throttle back and set prop and mixture for landing. This worked well in my M20C on descents from as high as 12K or 13K. Now in my 252, it works just as well from the flight levels.

Leaf peeping - Autumn here in the North Country - Adirondacks region. Our house is just off the wing tip in that town river shot. Gorgeous day just flying around.

After putting it off for several years I finally decided to adjust the cabin door, it now has a very positive over-center and holds the top latch secure. Since I’ve owned my Mooney the door has never really had a positive feel when rotating the interior handle forward to latch the door closed and the exterior handle always stuck out farther than I thought it should have. I’ve never had the door come open in flight but I did get a ton of wind noise around the top of the door. Another thing that I didn’t like was having separate keys for Ignition switch, Cabin Door and Baggage Door. I didn’t take any photos but I do have the drawing out of the Parts Catalog along with a few I did for replacing the Door locks. The following drawing is from the 1965~1967 M20C, 1965~1966 M20D, 1965~1967 M20E and 1967 M20F Parts Catalog. The first thing was to remove the plastic cover from the cabin door, and in typical Mooney fashion I ended up with a pile of screws. After the cover was removed and the door open I was able to find part of the problem, there was pink fiberglass insulation packed in and around the interior door handle up inside the door (Area “A”). Once the insulation was removed rotating the interior handle forward felt a lot more positive but still no over-center that I could tell. I knew my top latch needed adjusting due to the wind noise so I started there. The upper latch assembly (#6) comes out as a unit, start by loosening the jam nut on the clevis (#24), then remove the small screws that holds the assembly in place, there are 2 machine screws that come in from the top. Care should be taken when removing the cotter, washer and clevis pin from #24, don’t drop them in the door. Once the latch assembly was out I got a better idea as how it all worked, item #18 is a stop, keeping it from going to far over-center. I turned # 24 2 full turns in (shorter) and re-installed the assembly (#6). I could now feel in the handle it going over-center but it was more pressure than I liked. Removing #6 and turning #24 in 2 more turns did the trick. The interior handle now has a positive lock and the outside handle fits nicely with the door. With the door closed and latched I wasn’t able to pry the top of the door away with my finger tips as before and it felt very secure. The next thing was to look at the locks for the Cabin & Baggage doors. Ideally I want just 1 Key that works the Ignition and both door locks. I removed the lock assemblies from the doors but was unable to remove the cylinders to key them the same as the ignition. I stopped by a local Locksmith shop to see if they had any lock assemblies that could be keyed to my ignition key but they had just sold all 20 something they had in stock (figures). I stopped by Lowe’s to see what they had but no joy, Home Depot was my next stop and it was a score, Gate House # 0252974 looked like they would foot the bill but I wanted to make sure my original Bendix ign. key would fit the new locks. A clerk came by and asked if I needed help and told him I want to see if this key fit in that lock, he opened that package and the key went right in, plus the key cut was very close to mine. Once home I removed the cam which allowed the cylinder to be removed from the body. The way most locks work is the body of the lock has a keyway (these have 4) and the wafers/pins are spring loaded into that keyway, keeping the cylinder from turning (unlocking), when the key is inserted into the cylinder the cut of the key allows the wafers/pins to be pulled into the cylinder out of the keyway which allows the cylinder to turn. These were never meant to be re-keyed and the wafers were not removable. By inserting my ignition key in the cylinder I could see which wafers stuck up past the cylinder. The drawing below shows what I’m talking about. The wafers are brass and easily filed down to the radius of the cylinder allowing it to rotate in the body. Filing is done with the key inserted (fully), once they are filed down insert the cylinder with the key installed and check that it rotates freely in both directions completely. Once all the filing is done clean out all the metal filings and reassemble. I had to modify the cams to match the originals but its fairly straightforward looking at them side by side. Pay close attention to your old locks on orientation in the locked and un-locked positions, the new locks can be set by how the “Rotation Washer” is installed. Once I had both new locks keyed and correct (after a test fit & try) the cam is held on with a screw, which was removed and installed back with thread locker (loctite). As an added measure once the locks were in place and tightened I verified that they worked as needed, I then added several dabs of RTV on the nut/body/door skin and the screw/cam for safety. I now have 1 key that works the ignition switch and both door locks……..Hope I explained this well enough and if not shoot me a message and I’ll try to explain it better.

Stick to doing it on jacks rather than in the air. Sure it should work fine, but we've seen enough failures in the air leading to unavoidable gear up's like the incident mentioned above that we no longer do these in the air at the MAPA PPP's for this reason.

Nose over and bombs away!

My local FBO has a flat rate for annuals by model. They complete the inspection process first, before performing the maintenance functions of the annual, and provide a squawk list of items found with an estimate for each segment of repair. They are listed under two categories, airworthiness items and non-airworthiness items. You pick and choose what gets repaired and know the cost estimate before making your decision. They rarely will run more but, if unforeseen issues pop up, they will advise before moving forward with an adjusted estimate as well. Although I do most my own maintenance, I am the chairman for our maintenance committee for our airlifeline planes. This relationship has worked amazingly well over the years and rarely do I ever get a surprise AFTER THE REPAIR. There's been some "gulp" moments before approving the work, but the shop is outstanding in keeping their customers informed BEFORE dropping an unexpected final invoice on you after the plane is signed off. This is how my dealership works as well. Very few surprises at final billing time. We bill over $100,000 a month in labor sales (this does not include parts on those service invoices, this is pure labor sales). Good shops keep their customers informed so they will come back! This policy also avoids the dispute at completion. There's nothing worse than "let's make a deal" once we have all the labor and parts invested in a job because the customer is getting a surprise with his final bill. Tom

Baloney. We delivered power for decades through area of dry brush in all areas of the West. My father was a lineman for Idaho power at one time and later for a contacting electrical services firm in CA. CA has totally mismanaged the grid to create third world conditions. First you clear the woods and brush around the lines! It requires regular maintenance which cost money (more on that later). Second it requires a belief that trimming and clearing the brush is a necessary ingredient to a 21st century existence and not listening to the watermelons. Third, in creating a buy back program for solar, the cost of grid maintenance is not being allocated to the solar users, only to the users of utility wattage. It does not take a genius to see the more solar buyback, the more the grid maint budget will be starved, while inferior allocation in the form of solar expands. The CA PUC has botched this so badly it is beyond anything I could imagine when I lived there. This is America, we don't have planned electrical outages like Venezuela. We fix the problem so we don't have to have them, not accept the line of baloney being delivered.

Hello, I am new to the group and we paint lots of beautiful airplanes and I like to share with the enthusiasts. Currently in the shop, we have many aircrafts ranging from Cessna 150 to Cessna 414A. I am very partial to this Mooney we are currently painting with the beautiful blue paint so I wanted to share some current images. I will send pictures once we are done with it. Thanks, Sara @ Hawk Aircraft Services 813-549-3200 https://www.facebook.com/hawkaircraftservices/

The worst shock cooling I've experienced is when the hot water tank ran out of hot water.

Roll inverted and pull... She'll come down! Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Thank you all for the feed back. Sounds like I am trying to figure out a problem that does not exist. I am happy with the prebuy I am not looking for perfection They are motivated sellers and the plane priced accordingly. after flying it I gave them a refundable deposit pending a prebuy inspection. I agreed on there price they agreed to fix everything because I didn't try to beat them down on the normal things that happen to a 30+ year old airplane. I am really excited about the way it is going. Should be mine by the end of the month after they fix the squawk list. Thank you all.

The yellow arc is normal operation. Don’t fly there in severe turbulence, but otherwise use it. Lots of these planes cruise in the yellow arc.

Descending in your Mooney is easy. I calculate the descent by counting on my fingers how many thousands of feet from pattern to where I'm cruising; double that number; then add two or three, and when my fancy WAAS GPS shows I'm that final number of minutes from destination, I push on the yoke to establish 500fpm descent and trim for hands free. This generally has my C indicating right around 160-165 mph. Va = 132 at gross, less when lighter, so start earlier and go slower if it's rough. This high speed descent turns altitude into free airspeed and makes up for the low speed climb at the beginning of the flight. Because MP increases as you descend into thicker air, periodically ease the throttle back and the mixture forward to roughly maintain your cruise MP and EGT values. You should arrive at TPA somewhat slower than your descent speed, with a few miles left to slow down. I generally walk the throttle back and keep trimming up to stay level, with the goal of entering the pattern and lowering Takeoff Flaps at 120-125 mph at about the same time. Ain't much easier, and I can do the "mental math" even when I'm tired and / or distracted (but if distracted enough, may miss the proper beginning point . . . ). Happy flying! P.S.--if the given speeds for my mighty C are too high for your Mooney, please adjust them downwards by the correct amount. Some people with those hard-to-hot-start fuel injected engines have been known to not touch throttle or mixture until pushing everything forward on short final, but coming down from last trip's 10,500 msl to 1700 pattern (almost 20" up high would be ~28" in the pattern, way too high power at 2500 cruise RPM down low; 28 + 25 >> 46 Key Number for my engine!!

I have a J model, but I just point the nose down to the desired descent rate. Power stays at full throttle and cruise rpm. Once in a while I'll pull the throttle back a bit, which is actually a little more efficient, but also slower.

regardless of what you buy...it is expensive to fix up a plane....you are better off finding exactly (or close) to what you will want out of a plane (even though it may be above your price range) than what it will cost you later to fix up a plane....including engine, paint, corrosion, avionics, autopilot, tank resealing, LED lighting Maintenance items like tires, brakes, donuts, are manageable. I started with a really nice hanger queen with a worn out engine for $65,000...and I now have a real nice IFR machine with a factory rebuilt and all the trimmings for over $150k...My biggest regret is that I think I could have found what I now have for about $120k

Hey all, Rocket Drivers especially: my 86 Rocket fresh out of paint and interior today. Good as new, faster than new (almost) but 1/4 the price! What a machine!

I can just imagine. you mean they have a non owned policy that would cover your car and you...good luck with that. I think you pretty well defined who will be training you in the future. Oh, did I mention the insurance guy is a CFI who is young, yet still wont let you or your insurance carrier hedge their ineptness or bets with his assets? It is evident I cannot get you to consider this point, so I will leave you to whatever belief you want without further trying to pass along a few years of experience in this area of training and client/cfi relationships. A final thought for you to consider when you do buy a plane and pay for insurance. Dont just select a policy based on whats below the bottom line.

Thanks @NJMac, once I have it out of down-low mode I'll update MS on the journey. My last PA28-235 was sold to start the analytics company that built the basis for this new thing so I have a history of converting airplanes to businesses and back to airplanes. The Cherokee gave us the ability to build analytic plugins to Altiris, Symantec and Microsoft platforms... it worked out great last time; hopefully bigger and better this time.

You make several good points, especially about how solar reduces revenue and puts a greater financial load on maintaining the system. I don't know what the laws are in Idaho but i can tell you that in CA there are people that would just as soon shoot you as let you touch their trees. And PGE has no legal authority to force them to permit trimming. One big fire that happened in Butte country that was blamed on PGE a few years ago was started by a broken tree top that was over a hundred feet from the wires and the high wind blew it into the wires. When is tree trimming and clearing going to be considered far enough to say PGE is not to blame. my opinions are not based on an indirect assembly of information I worked for PG&E for 35 years in both the line and engineering departments retirement just last year. During part of that time I was the tree trimming coordinator in the Oakland east Bay Area overseeing our tree trimming contractors for that region.

The fact is that if PG&E is going to be held liable for billions in damages if any one of their thousands of miles of rural lines starts a fire, they're going to have to shut off power. We don't have the technology to perfectly deliver power to remote areas through dry brush, etc with zero risk of fire. Its a simple risk/reward calculation. Remember it was the National Weather Service who issued the red flag warning for high winds and dry air. Imagine being the PG&E official on the stand of a civil trial explaining why you left the power on during a federal red flag warning? -Robert

Hawk is the best - here is mine from 2012. You all should consider becoming a sponsor here like we are. By far my best marketing ROI.

Between the paint (AF-400) and other supplies it probably cost around $250 and that would have been enough paint to touch up the entire plane. I just did the tail sections. The downside is that the finish isn’t as glossy as the original paint but unless you’re looking under a shop light it’s tough to tell. Is it perfect or as good as a paint shop? No way. However, the color matched extremely well from Finishmasters and the “brighter” leading edges below are mostly from the light outside the hangar. @jerrodmonaghan was kind enough to help me with the job as well as applying some bravo decals afterwards! I’ve included a few before and after pictures below:

Reminds me of a joke. What did socialists use for light before candles? Electricity.

Back in the fall, a thread was started about an MT Propellers. Back then I had one on order for my Bravo. I promised I would give a pirep when I got it installed. I ordered the prop right after OSH and it arrived about Christmas. I needed to help a friend in Titusville so I decided to stop in Deland and have them install and balance the prop. Long story about install but I will save that for another day. Since the install I have been to KTIX, M54 (Nashville) and back to Denver and done some local flying. My impressions so far are The prop (a four blade) is extremely smooth. One reason I wanted to do this is that after 3.5 hours behind the Mc Cauley I needed to get on the ground for a spell. The vibration was fatiguing and I often do long trips and I need 4-4.5 hour legs. On the way home from Florida I did 4+ hour legs without difficulty. The four blade MT is about 2" shorter than the McCauley. It makes the cabin much quieter. In fact I am very comfortable flying without a headset. Since I like background music I still wear the headset a lot. I found takeoff runs shorter and the climb rate better. I also found I need to keep the taxi RPM down to 800 or lower or get going to fast. Landing is different, I think due to blade drag and the lighter prop. The airplane seems to float less and decelerates faster which I rate as a positive factor. I find I can hold the nose up longer as the tail has less weight to lift. I have not put this to the ultimate test as yet. The test will be a full load of fuel and two fat boys in the front seats. The Bravo now handles much more like a K model. The ride in turbulence is a little less desirable than it used to be. With the heavy prop. the Bravo would really plow through the bumps. It now bounces a bit more. Cruise speed I am still working on. I normally use 28/2300 and a fuel flow of 15.5. When the MT was set to that power I got the same indicated airspeed at lower altitudes (under 10K). Since the prop is shorter I tried 29/2400 and found that the fuel flow was higher and the plane was a little faster and the gas mileage only decreased 3%. I also tried 32/2200, fuel flow about 17.5gph. The result was a good 5% higher indicated over the McCauley and the gas mileage was about the same or a little better. The percent power however is 81%. When the weather gets warmer I will get an idea if the engine cooling is improved. I think it might be. Well that is about as much as I have observed so far. I see improvement in all the areas that I deemed important when I ordered the prop. Not large improvements but certainly worthwhile improvements. The only potential problem is that to pour enough TKS fluid over the prop blades they increased the flow which seems to cheat the flow to the wings. I only flew in a little ice so I need to evaluate this a little more. One other thing I have found more difficult is trying to install the lower cowling. A few more practice sessions may improve my skill at this.

started with crimpers and wires. then metal work

I've been called worse than random dingus. But you're right, I shouldn't have stuck my nose in. I should have left this between you and anybody you wanted to argue with. Edit- But if you want to pick a fight, you should find someone who isn't as well respected around here as Mike Elliott is.

There's lots of detailed info out there now on the nature of the 737Max issue, and it's hard to look at the picture without concluding that it was a truly awful design of aircraft systems, irrespective of the compounding failures to inform pilots about those systems and train them to handle potential malfunctions in them.

So proud.

Not too long, maybe 6 hrs over 2 days, but well worth it. My prop is off for IRAN so I haven't flown it to see if the noise level has gone down, but it should......

Exactly. You can block 150KT for the whole flight that way. You take a speed penalty on the climb, why not make soem of it back on the descent?

Nothing technical about my decent..... smooth air, trim for 500 fpm decent and go like hell !!! Super fun in the Mooney

The cowling is made up of one thin layer of fiberglass, three layers of carbon fiber and one thin layer of fiberglass from what I was told. David

I can't find an easy way to build time appart from few days tripin good weather, I tried to build hours by squeezing few at sunset/night after work, local flights in winter weekends with weather but they rarely accumulate that much, it takes 3 months to get as much as flying in a single 3 days trip Obviously, if flying at night is your only option now do it but not for very long (one would get one or two engine stops in a lifetime, my first one and hopefuly the last was stupid fuel starvation)

Focus on the future... Actively Avoiding the challenges is the way to go. Got any technical people that like to solve technical challenges out that way? Shutting the system off, sounds like we handed the problem to my mom... Best regards, -a-

100% correct. And let's not forget in almost every case PGE equipment did not fail on its own but was damaged by a tree that is not owned by PGE but they always go for the deep pockets.

The problem is they are voting with their feet and moving....spreading their idiocy eveywhere.

500fpm with cruise power set works for my F too. I do not reduce power until ready to slow down and configure. 500fpm seems to be about right to keep you in the yellow but below Vne. Enough people have said it, but there’s absolutely nothing wrong with being in the yellow, even close to Vne, as long as it’s smooth. Use one of the multiple math or technology solutions to compute your descent point. 5 x altitude to lose in 1000’s works. ie, 5,000’ to lose, start wot descent at 25 miles.

Hard to believe Slowflyin’ is 195TAS... -a-

F U 2

Yes. And my speed in the descent is almost always well over 200 knots TAS or high in the yellow on the ASI.

Let’s examine the certification standards and the gust loading. Then examine how many m20 airframe failures There have been. In short, outside of a thunderstorm or wake turbulence, you aren’t breaking the airplane at any airspeed under redline. Va and maneuvering speed and full control deflections are another issue altogether.

Metropolitan Area planning Agency, no.... Michigan Academy of Physician Assistants, no... Mooney Aircraft Pilots Association, got it!! I'll check them out. Thanks

No no no.... Pulling the MP back? That’s not Mooney speed or efficiency.... Ok, efficiency yes, but not speed.... Stand by for a dozen various ways people plan for their descents... including IFR vs. VFR... and other limitations like Bravo airspace... Many do calculations in their head, miles per minute, and feet per minute, and altitude to be lost... Being prone to use GPS and automation... I used to use a G device that gave vertical guidance like an ILS... Lately I have been using WingX that gives guidance as you get closer... it gives a descent rate based on distance away... For a NA Mooney... you can descend at about 400fpm from a ways back and maintain a high airspeed.... As you get into more dense air, removing 1” of mp for each 1k’ is a normal expectation.... be aware of bumps and maneuvering speed... important things for keeping the wings in place.... PP thoughts only, not a CFI.... Best regards, -a-

Everyone seems to run at different power settings never mind the fact that they may have had an oversight when entering their TAS in the flight plan. It would be relatively easy to carry over a value from a lower altitude by mistake. I should get 190+ at 13k running at 29/2400.

The vast majority of the 201s were built in 1977 and 1978. Over 400 each year. By the 80s it was under 100 and a few years only 25 or 30.

The foggy pic was at Ithaca a week ago. Can’t be to far from you. Ok, I looked your town up, you are way up north!

Was hoping for a nice VFR flight today, well I’m waiting for landing minimums anyway.