Bob - S50

We have not done it yet, but another way to cut the basic aircraft weight would be to replace the stock position lights and strobes. The stock system uses transformers to build voltage. I've been told they weigh up to 6 pounds total. If you replace the lights with LED combination Nav/Position/Strobe units they to not need the transformers and you can maybe save up to 5 pounds or so. You can buy the units for about $1000. Definitely pull out equipment you don't need. We pulled out the ADF, Radar Altimeter, and Telephony that came with the plane.

I've been at two airlines and we did it two different ways, left to right, top to bottom and top to bottom, left to right. Whatever works for you. In the Mooney I work left to right, top to bottom ending up at the emergency gear handle to check that it is stowed. We had a little extra panel space so we printed up short checklists and stuck them to the panel. They include only items that, if missed, will hurt either us or the plane. That does not mean I don't check other stuff, it just isn't on the checklist. We have one for before start, before takeoff, takeoff, after takeoff, approach, landing, after landing, and shutdown. We use them as checklists, not do lists. Do it first by memory, then read the checklist to make sure we didn't forget anything. Bob

Here's another link for info on many subjects including LOP: http://www.savvymx.com Scroll down and on the right side you'll see a button for webinar details. Click on it and you'll go to a page with lots of free webinars you can watch including: LOP, oil, mags, alternators, tires, and on and on. In one of the webinars he says the most efficient operation is generally about 20 or 30 degrees LOP. They also have this website: http://www.savvyanalysis.com You can sign up for free and upload your engine monitor data to view it graphically. If you perform a LOP leaning, and your monitor has fuel flow, you can also use it to calculate your GAMI spread. FWIW, my wife and I just flew back from SQL to S50 and I was getting 155 KTAS at 8500', on about 8.7 to 9.3 GPH. I was running from 10 to 30F LOP. All my CHT's were below 380. When I used the Savvy website to analyze my leaning, I found our stock injectors had a GAMI of 0.1 GPH. I'll do it a couple more times just to verify that though. Best of luck, Bob

Chris, Laugh-In AFB in Dia Rea TX? Been there, done that. Man do I feel old. We lived there from '76 to '80. Anyway you asked about costs. I formed a group of 4 not because of the purchase cost, but because of the cost to keep it. We planned on $2000/yr for insurance, $2400/yr for annual, $2400/yr for hangar plus any GPS database updates, annual registration, IFR certs, pitot static checks, etc. We decided it would cost us something around $8000 to $10,000/year just to keep it even if we never flew it. We bought a '78 J. With that in mind, here are some websites we found useful in our search for the plane we finally bought: http://www.controller.com http://www.barnstormers.com/ http://www.trade-a-plane.com/ http://www.lasar.com/ There are others, but these will give you lots of planes to look at. What they say about upgrades is correct. We spent about $14,000 buying parts and another $14,000 having them installed. Whatever you pay to buy something, plan on spending the same amount to install it. Best of luck, Bob

Another one headed your way. Bob

FWIW, I've heard it is not good to 'fill' the tanks after flight. You want some fuel but not full fuel. If you fill the tanks and the temperature rises, the fuel will expand and exert pressure on the skin and thus possibly damage to the sealant. I've also heard that it is the fuel vapor in the tank, not necessarily the liquid that protects the sealant. While I'm new to Mooney's we plan to park the plane with 30 gallons. That keeps the wings wet, leaves enough for a 2 hour local flight, or a reasonable useful load if I want to fly with 4 adults. We have not had a leak yet (knock wood) but if we do we'll fix or reseal. I don't like bladders because they weigh about 30# which is that much less useful load available. When researching the purchase of our plane, we also found the cost of purchase and installation of bladders was actually more expensive than a reseal.

Hi TWinter. My first post here. A group of us got together to buy a J. Don't know a lot, but we found that, as someone already mentioned, the '77 had a quadrant but the '78 had push pull verniers. We liked the verniers better because it was easier to make fine adjustments to the prop and mixture. We did not like the '77 for one other reason... the tank selector valve is under the pilot's feet. Although I'm sure others are good at it, we felt it would at the very least be awkward to change tanks. Starting with the '78 they moved the valve to the floor between the seats. Much easier to reach.