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Any tip how I can figure out which months those will be?

A 40% discount coupon for the panel upgrade I should have done last year.

This time last year I agonised over the decision to upgrade my Mooney or my panel. I landed on upgrading my panel because it would be about half the cost and I know that I can afford my J ... even though it prevents me from upgrading my bathrooms and my kitchen. Regarding watching your retirement plan evaporate before your eyes, I've invested in the stock market twice. Once in 2008 about 10 minutes before the crash and then again this past January. The next time I plan to invest, I'll post it here so you all will know to sell!

Well that's the ultimate question. There's a point where I'll be old enough that the money will be burning a hole in my pocket. Not sure I'm there yet. There's also the satisfaction that comes from upgrading an older plane that you've already "loved" little by little... and the potential frustration that comes from buying a new old plane. I haven't figured out the balance yet. It's a tough trade study at this point in life.

if I can be morbid for a minute, can I ask if you will be thinking on your death bed "gee, I'm glad I died with 60K extra in the bank instead of upgrading my mooney"?

If you have legitimate business use for the plane, and could get some tax deductions and How you actually plan to use the plane is a pretty important factor as well. Renting isn’t practical if you actually want to travel. If all you want to do is get a $100 hamburger twice a month a rental will work, but if you actually use the plane, a rental isn’t really anoption. Rental insurance has changed, and you better make sure you don’t have to cover more than your rental fees is something happens. Safety and proficiency is another factor. Having your own plane that you maintain, know all the nuances and are comfortable flying is safer than getting into any random rental plane.

Cash.

As a result of the mooney summit’s silent action I had the privilege of getting John Liskey to portrait my Mooney in one of his paintings! First John, thank you for all the love that you invested in getting it done. He called me several times asked for pictures of the places I flew and of my plane. Second the painting is beautiful! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Lol…ah hell no. But I’ll have to say it’s location dependent. I now go to a small town dmv that I can walk into with no lines. And no, I’m not tell where it is..

I've considered upgrading my Mooney and I'm retired. Taxes kill my desire. If I were to take money from a tax deferred retirement account, I'll need to pay the taxes (~20-25%). Then I'll need to pay sales taxes (~8%). Then I'll need to pay property taxes (~1%). By the time I'm flying the new plane, I will have sent 30-35% of my money to the Govt. $200K becomes $260K or more. Then there's brokers fees perhaps and pre-buys. So now the value of my new asset, is 65-70% of what I've expended for it. I know I'll pay taxes eventually if I ever spend the money on anything but laying out a big chunk of taxes all at once is paralyzing. For now, maintaining and upgrading what I have seems more satisfying.

So you’re the one

You’re correct. First dot is present position, then predicted position in 20,40, and 60 minutes

Most Retirees that had a plan and followed it upon Retirement die with significant money. That’s for two reasons, one is you don’t know your expiration date, my plan is 90, but it pretty certain I won’t make it that long, but it’s possible I could go further, but would hate to be sitting in the cold and dark eating dog food if I did. The second is fear of running out of money due to unplanned issues and the only way to ensure that is to have an excess. What drives this fear is seeing how those live that Retired with no plan, or simply didn’t have the means to execute a plan. I’m sure every plan shows multiple possibilities, mine has some kind of Monte Carlo simulation that shows a graph of most likely, best case and worst case with of course the extremes getting further apart as time goes by, but to put todays economy in perspective my current plans net worth dropped to a point in one year to where it should be after SIX years of worst case, in ONE year or so. My plan is very conservative with 50% in bonds, and bonds are usually very safe, but they tubed as well. Now it’s recovered somewhat, but where we are is not in a good place and would have normally had the news on fire and everyone worried, but the news largely ignores it, and people are hugely influenced by the media. I assume because of this seeming lack of concern it’s kept prices higher than normally would happen after an economic downturn, and interest rates aren’t high not really just higher than they were and not likely high enough to keep a recession from happening. So in other words in my opinion it’s not a good time to take on significant debt, then combine that with prices haven’t come down yet and that doubles the effect. People in my neighborhood often sell and buy different airplanes, latest craze is LSA amphibs, but I’ve noticed what’s been for sale isn’t moving, where a year or more ago they sold within a week or so of listing it seemed, so I think the market has turned, same for houses but sellers haven’t woken up to that fact yet.

Those are lines predicting the path of the storm cell shown at the current point of origin. The dots indicate time of travel. I think they indicate predicted locations in 20 minute increments, but I could be wrong on that.

No, the price of the plane and any acquisition costs are not included. (For personal comfort I buy my toys with cash) The figures posted represent ALL costs associated with ownership and operation (if I buy shop rags the cost goes into the spreadsheet!)

As an estate planning lawyer, my advice to clients is to spend it all before you die. Maybe even put the last few months expenses on credit cards. You’re heirs are not liable for them.

I flew to Philadelphia the last week of November. This was from fairly early in the flight and I thought this 4-minute video would be interesting on its own. Kudos to the Washington Center controller for patience and taking the time to spell things out. Besides, I was flying a Mooney.

I just wanted to give a shoutout to @DonMuncy for the great looking and awesome fitting visors. I had the privilege of getting to hang out with him and others a little bit at the MooneyMax conference. We had a fabulous time. I mentioned to him I had been looking at contacting him about making me some of his visors. He just happened to have an extra set that he had brought with him to the conference. I purchased them and just got the chance to install them today. They look and function much better than the originals that came in my Eagle. If you're in the market for replacement visors I wouldn't hesitate to recommend these. Way less expensive than the Rosen visors and the quality is at least as good and maybe even a better. Thanks for a great product Don.

Get the one with the bendy thing on the end -- anything from 0 degrees to 180.

I'm no expert but whether a plane is suitable for IFR would have more to do with current condition and avionics than model or age. I can't speak to the B but I'm sure there are folks here that can. I found this to be useful: http://www.mooneyevents.com/chrono.htm

You are correct. Renewals are at discretion of AME but need to be done on an annual basis. It was the initial approval that took 9.5 months that had me miffed. Now, it’s clear sailing as long as my sleep doc fills out the treatment status form and my AME stamps me good for another year.

Go with Snap-On. That is one of my most used tools. You will forget the price eventually.

Sue come on over you change states over here like you do countries over there. Yes north eastern states is congested it’s not horrible. Intimidating maybe but you can always fly further west in Canadian airspace and then fly south avoiding most of the northeastern complexities. In the central to southern states especially at night you can go so long without a radio transmission you call center with a radio check just to make sure your equipment is working and you are still on the correct frequency.

I went this way, with a GTN750xi NAV/COM/GPS and a GFC355 COM/GPS, based on the insanely low probability of my ILS receiver being OTS simultaneous with a GPS outage

@Ned Gravel and @ragedracer1977 are correct. It is only mentioned in one place in Foreflight documentation, in the Foreflight Legends Guide on page 17. There are references in the main Foreflight Mobile Pilot’s Guide to the XM storm cell predictions but nothing about the internal Foreflight storm track prediction capability. Cheers, Rick

I looked it up too https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/regulations/ifr-cruise-clearance-how-to-fly-with-it/

Eh, slow flying a Mooney doesn’t seem right. Fly further, fly more but don’t fly slow.

Don’t most RVs have a fiberglass plenum? What is the reasoning for having an inner plenum? Do all of the E models have a Doghouse? Just curious why my 67F just uses the upper cowling as a plenum but Hank’s 70 C has a doghouse.

I once pushed the warm up because I was late on the 210, it’s oil cooler on the 520 was bolted directly to the engine, it blew its gasket, blew as in just a small leak. I do believe coolers can take pressure in the hundreds, and I think especially straight grade cold oil can get there without trying too hard. 15W-50 Aeroshell as it’s a 15W oil isn’t going to go nearly as high pressure wise, but suppose in very cold weather even it can get like grease.

If you have access to a grinder with a wire wheel as opposed to a stone they are outstanding for removing cork gaskets. For many years the standard was to adhere the cork to the valve covers with contact cement, this held the gasket in place for assembly but without the wire brush made clean up a real bear, a thin layer of grease kept them from bonding to the head. Even if perfectly installed cork gets brittle and shrinks, hardens with age and will leak. Cork has to be replaced every so often

opps, I am a student at this poll thingie...fixed the J issue caused by old age THanks Skip

John, thank you once again for this wonderful donation. This benevolent spirit enables us to assist people like Candi and over 30 others when they need the help

I fully agree with you. I have a similar set up and if I had to start from scratch that is what I would do. Having said that I am happy with my set up… Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

I’ve never asked for or received a cruise clearance. I think I’d probably have to look it up on my FAR/AIM app just to make sure I wasn’t screwing something up.

Enroute from Merrill Field in Anchorage, AK to Kodiak. Upon hand off from Anchorage approach to Anchorage center got "cleared to cruise six thousand."

That should do it. Many thanks! R2

I’m sure it does not include payments, double that or more if there is a loan? Depending obviously size of loan. I keep editing this sorry, but where you are greatly figures into cost, Live in S Ga or Al and a nice hangar is $125 a month, but live in expensive places and it can be many times more. Heck we swallow $50 an hour in fuel and many will tell you fuel just isn’t a significant expense. There are ways that can be reduced some, I’m an IA and own my hangar, so I pay a fraction of that, my biggest expenses are fuel and insurence. I honestly don’t know what it costs, I don’t want to know, because I’m logical enough that if I knew I likely couldn’t justify it. Many years ago my Father told me what a White elephant was, apparently if anyone was climbing too fast, accruing too much wealth or power the Maharajah would gift them a white elephant, a white elephant was apparently extremely spiritual or something, only very important people were allowed to have one, so it was a mark that you had arrived. But a white elephant being such a very important highly prized thing had to be kept in very luxurious conditions receiving the best of everything, so often the gift of a white elephant became financial ruin to the one receiving the gift, which is why it was given to them. An airplane can be a white elephant Then there is the old adage if it flies, floats or f****, rent it. Years ago I did some math, the break even point of owning vs renting for me was 100 hours per year, and that was only because even then I had free hangar space. Very often the first Annual or two pretty much breaks the bank, and this forum has many posts of someone buying an airplane and gets the news that it’s going to cost $40K to fix it etc. I only bring this up to ensure you realize this isn’t like buying a car, buying the airplane is actually not the expensive part at times.

I have a 1994 M20J and this one matches my aircraft POH/AFM. M20J POH.pdf

Don’t freak out if you get increased silicone in your next oil analysis.

The Mcmansion’s are hard to sell even in the best of times, I’ve wondered why and guess when your talking Millions people don’t want used and they want their own design I guess. Houses have become more desirable I think as a status symbol, people often buy the most expensive house that they can qualify for loan wise. ‘I’ve never been a house guy, my Wife however is to some extent, in honest truth anything over say 1200 square ft is to me a waste, but that’s a very specific floor plan, I have no use for guest rooms and extra bathrooms, an office or living or dining rooms. ‘But I like having 3,000 sq ft of climate controlled hangar

Assuming flying isn't your job, remember that after your training your flying will regress back to something like 50-100 hours a year. Sure, the cost-effectiveness of ownership improves during training when you're committed to flying heavily, but life won't allow you to keep up that level of commitment continuously. I don't think I fly enough at about 60 hours a year, but my mechanic says that's more than the majority of recreational owners he deals with. I'd suggest renting for your PPL -- you probably won't have an idea of what your mission will end up looking like and what you need until you've gotten some time under your belt, and the cost of renting will not likely be worse than the costs of ownership anyway. After that, a flying club is a good way to test out a couple different types of planes to get a feel of what you like I'd definitely suggest buying a plane if you do IFR, though.

Of course the obvious difference is that if a glitch happens with your career, economy, health, etc. etc, you can easily stop renting. Once you finance an airplane the payment still comes due every month, along with all of the other fixed expenses.

Just realize that the cost of buying isn’t the actual price. Yearly costs on everything else quickly catch up. Those are the ones that sneak up on you. Get a good read on those vs your budget. The initial price is easier to comprehend.

I've gotten the opposite. after acknowledging cancellation, "Stay with me for a while longer."

You know you can save three additional words... You: Cancel IFR At that point, I doubt ATC cares a whit whether you have the airport in sight

I bought his plane and they are wonderful! David is working on a version 2 of the cowling but I'm not 100% sure he'll use the Van's Baffles again. -Don

I hope this satisfies the doubters: https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.gov/files/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/avs/190204PARCRNPAROCSTransHarmonRecs.pdf

For my F, the dry erase board is perfect. I find no reason to search for a complicated solution to a non-existent problem.

I am still making visors. I am temporarily out of stock, but that condition should not exist for more than a couple of weeks. As to the E, I am not sure. If yours mount in the upper outside corners of the windscreen, mine fit, if not, no. Thanks for the kind words Ziggy.