wombat

I'm having trouble convincing my partner that getting an engine monitor is a good decision. We are at right about 2,000 hours now and have had no engine problems at all in the last 3 years I've owned the plane. We fly it 100-200 hours a year (Depending on how many trips I take to the midwest or east coast) Does anyone have any advice on why an engine monitor is financially a good decision? Or if you have other thoughts, why it's a bad decision? I'm thinking about saying something like "For every hour past TBO we fly, we should consider the normal maintenance reserve amount to go to the engine monitor until it's paid off" and at $20/hr, if we reach 2,300 hours then it was a good decision, plus the aircraft is more valuable. This is assuming $6,000 net cost of monitor + install - resale of used avionics. The way I am thinking about it, the most cost effective device for us might be the EI CGR-30C, which EI lists at $2,952 on their website including the Engine Data Computer (EDC). Before deciding anything, we can talk to EI in a couple of weeks at the Northwest Aviation Conference to make sure that unit can do what we want and we can get it for the price we want. We would need a couple of extra pieces like the FT-60 Fuel flow transducer for $130, but those are pretty minor costs I think. There are several things we'd be able to replace and sell to help reduce our cost at that point: 6-pack of engine instruments ($700?) MP/Fuel Press ($100?) EGT ($100?) SR-8A ($100?) What we'd gain is: Data logging Fuel flow monitoring for more precise power control More accurate fuel usage measurements Ability to look at all CHTs and EGTs at once for better problem identification if one cylinder is acting up No fuel or oil lines in the instrument panel Assuming the same sort of install effort as the CGR-30P and that the shop rate is $90/hr (I forget what it is, I'm just guessing) that puts our total cost at $3150 for labor plus $3300 for the hardware, minus $1,000 for selling the existing hardware, for a total of $5,450. This number is estimating high on accessory cost and install cost and low on sale price for our existing hardware. If the install is only 30 hours and we don't need any extra parts and we get $1,500 for our stuff and a 10% discount, that would put us at $3,987. The real price will probably be somewhere in-between the $3,987 and $5,450

I bought with 1700+ SMOH a few years ago and am happy with the decision. Now over 2,000 and the engine still runs great. I watch it as closely as I can (and am considering installing a better engine monitor so I can watch it better) Reasonable worst case is that I have to IRAN/Overhaul/Replace the engine and then I'm starting with a new known quantity but I got a couple of years out of it in the meantime.

The IO-360 engine in my 1964 M20E is relatively high time right at 2,000 hours and many years and rather than replace or overhaul it for no known reason I'm considering getting an engine monitor and replacing the existing instrumentation. Some of the features that I find valuable with this are: Better temperature and leaning control since I can see all 4 cylinders at once Recording of data so I can analyze it later Fuel flow and totalizer plus getting rid of finicky existing fuel gauges Easier engine scan since it's not spread out between the the ends of the cockpit What I have right now is mostly original with the addition of an EI SR-8A where I can cycle through the different EGTs and CHTs. The 'contenders' that I know of and their list prices are: EI GCR-30P ($3600-$4300) EI GCR-30C ($3000) but I'd have to keep the existing RPM and MP instruments EI MVP-50P ($5600) JPI EDM-900 ($3400) JPI EDM-930 ($5800) Whole panel (Plus nice view) picture of the current setup in my plane: https://goo.gl/photos/JFcCbL1DHnappGus6 I'm leaning toward the GCR-30P or JPI EDM-900 because they are the cheapest that allow me to replace (and sell!) all of the existing gauges and instruments. Panel space is not a concern; I could add the EDM-930 and a second GPS and keep all of the existing gauges and it would still all fit although that would be tight. Does anybody have any thoughts or ideas? I'm planning on talking to both manufacturers in February at the Pacific Northwest Aviation Conference & Trade Show later this month. They generally offer 5% or 10% discounts at the show. My annual is coming up in March so the timing seems about right.

Marauder: Is the "22.0 USD" showing on the 830 the gas bill for the flight so far?

Badmoonraising: Is that series of PDFs and leaning procedures something you can share with the rest of us? Or maybe just me. Regarding keys: My plane used to have three separate keys, one for the door, one for the baggage door and one for the ignition. I went to a local locksmith with a sample of the door and baggage compartment locks and asked if they could re-key those to be the same as the ignition key. They could do the door lock but not the baggage compartment lock. They could give me a brand new lock similar to the baggage lock, but I'd have to countersink a flathead screw into that to make it fit. Countersinks are cheap in Mooney dollars and having one key open everything on the airplane is really nice.

I'd say it's less luck and more good planning. There are a few routes around that have MEAs above 13,000' but mostly you can make it at 13,000' or below. A lot of them have MOCAs of 11,000' or less. If you are flying very heavy those altitudes might be slower to achieve without a turbo, but you should determine what altitude you can climb to and plan for a route that doesn't require you to climb above that. Even a C is fast enough that you can go around some pretty big mountain ranges without losing too much time. Sure, having more power at altitude and being able to climb higher/faster would allow you to fly additional routes, but there is still plenty of flying that can be done without a turbo.

I've crossed the Rockies 4 times now in a M20E in June July and August. I did go solo, so climbing to altitude wasn't a problem. If I want to go direct or nearly direct over the mountains I also want daylight and a lot of room between the mountains and clouds; 5000' ceilings from the valleys at least. I don't mind going IMC if I will have an opportunity to pick a good landing spot visually in the event of an engine failure or icing. If I don't have those things I'll pick a different route to give me good access to lowlands and glideable airports.

When my plane is hangared in a private hangar with a lock on the hangar door I typically don't lock it, but I do remove the keys and take them with me. When the plane is outside I lock the doors. I don't think that there is significant risk of the airplane getting stolen and flown away.

Where did all of your circuit breakers go? We can't see the right edge of your panel, but they used to be lined up on the bottom next to the yoke, and they have moved somewhere!

When I see sellers that have silly requirements like "It won't leave my hangar" or "Only my mechanic will do the pre-buy" I just run the other way. That screams 'anti-authority' because they believe they are the only authority on their plane. Which also means that if they think that duct tape is an acceptable method for holding pieces on, that's what they are going to do. Let that sale fall through, they'll maybe re-price it later or change their minds. And while maybe that plane is a good deal and very safe, you might not know until it's too late. Which could be on your first annual, or worse, on your first flight.

I've got a M20E myself in Seattle and have taken my plane down to Troutdale for my pre-buy and annual. It's about an hour to an hour and a half flight from Arlington. I've found them to be knowledgeable and helpful. I'm not sure if Command Aviation is a MSC, the Mooney website doesn't reflect that which makes me a little curious. And being a MSC or not doesn't mean that they know their stuff or not, even in relation to Mooneys. Also, I'm available to ferry planes and provide training if you need it. Getting that plane over the Cascades and Rockies this time of year will be fun for someone.

Well, I am not sure what the USPS was doing for the last two weeks, but my spare keys finally showed up. Next stop: Key shop to have extra copies made.

I've asked my shop to try, they will stop by with their ring of keys sometime.

I had three keys previously, all different. The door and baggage door I can get replaced without too much problem, but the ignition is an issue.

So I lost the keys to my plane. Luckily it's unlocked in the hangar so I can at least get inside it. Yes, I had a spare set of keys at the shop, so I asked them to mail the keys to me. The spare set never showed up. Now I'm trying to figure out how to get a replacement set of keys for the plane. Does anyone have any good ideas?

I too have a '64 M20E and had a leaking boost pump. My plane had a dukes and I replaced it with the Weldon last summer; it was a drop-in replacement. About $800 for a new pump from aircraft spruce plus an hour or so of A&P time.

I just talked to David, and while has has a new stub spar, he is unable to find an A&P willing to go to his home field (It's a small strip) to work on it. He can't really take it anywhere because it's completely unairworthy. It's in a hangar so not really degrading very much and he has hopes of getting some work done on it over the next year or two. In the meantime he bought a Stinson and has been flying that (got his tailwheel endorsement to fly it).

I doubt their claims because they don't have statistically significant data available that proves their claims and they have financial incentive to overstate the benefits of their product. I would like to put their exhaust on, but it's a gamble to do so... Will the cost of purchasing and installing the exhaust and the extra time the aircraft is down waiting for it pay off in fuel savings, engine savings, increased airspeed sale price? If they had more data I'd be able to make a more informed opinion. But without that data I am just going on my pessimistic opinion of humanity and wild guesses. As for the ELT; a new 406MHz ELT is a lot more than the $47.50 that it cost to replace the antenna on my existing one. On Aircraft Spruce it was $579 for th ACK. So I saved myself $520 on this annual. Yes, it would be safer to have the new one. It would be safer to have a new engine. And a new airframe. And a second engine. And a full-time CFII-MEI. And a second GPS. And a third VOR, and redundant attitude indicators... And on and on. There is no end in sight. We each have to figure out where our budget intersects with our desire for safety and speed and comfort. This year mine crossed at a new antenna. Maybe when the battery runs out it'll cross at a new ELT.

Annual is finally complete and I went and got my plane yesterday. The new exhaust is awesome, I probably got 95 mph speed increase and burn 54 GPH less fuel. (Just joking, it works just like before only doesn't have cracks spewing CO into the cabin) The shop re-rigged the ailerons and flaps back to factory zero and the plane flies straight hands free now. It used to have a noticeable bank to the left even with some right rudder. The new prop cable (and re-positioning it between the throttle and mixture) is great. The new cable even came with the standard blue vernier. Idle RPM and mixture is fixed. I now see about 75 RPM rise from 1000 RPM when I lean, and pulling the throttle all the way results in idle at 625 to 650 RPM. Two new problems have cropped up. The new fuel gauges seem to be quite temperamental; they both seem to indicate full when the tanks are full and empty when the tanks are empty, but everything in between changes second to second. I can see the movement from fuel sloshing, but I can tap the gauge and have it go from showing 1/4 to 3/4 or the other way around. I'll work on this over time. I think I should be able to buy individual gauges to fit into the Garwin cluster for this model. Also, the ammeter doesn't seem to show anything negative, but that's OK with me. The flaps will no longer stay down. It now takes 1 to 5 minutes for them to come up when they should be staying down, but they do tend to come up. I'm hoping that this is just some debris in the valve that will flush away after a while. If not I'll probably have the valve rebuilt. So overall, despite spending a lot of money on this annual, I'm happy that the plane is now in good flying shape again and isn't worth less than it was before. I still wonder if I wouldn't have been happier with spending more on some upgrades, but I figure I can do that some other year. The upgrades I would consider first are: Modern engine analyzer. Electronic ignition. Powerflow exhaust (despite my comments in another thread that I don't believe they produce quite the improvement the company claims, I do think the exhaust does produce some extra power by being tuned for a specific RPM and scavenging exhaust gasses out of the cylinders.) So hopefully I'll know well ahead of time the next time I have a large expense coming up in one of these areas and I can make a little improvement in the plane. So now, on to flying! The weather has been beautiful and if I wasn't stuck inside working all weekend I'd be conducting systems tests all weekend.

cctsurf: I'm in agreement with you that each person should make their own decision. Unfortunately, I find that your anecdotal evidence is unconvincing. What I do find compelling is the fact that they have not run their exhausts on a dynamometer in comparison to a stock exhausts in order to generate a statistically significant set of test results which would be extremely useful to their sales and marketing department. They have a single result where with the stock exhaust the engine was producing 83% power to begin with and their exhaust still produced less than 100% power. I do think that they are producing a quality product and their ideas are good, but I don't think that the exhausts are really producing a 10+% performance gain. I think that the gain that we do get with the exhaust is exaggerated by the placebo effect. Just like all of the speed mods with speed gains posted on them, the fuel burn savings of LOP ops and an EI and the Powerflow... If I took all of these at face value I would expect a 30MPH speed increase at 3GPH less.... That would put me 170KTAS on 7 GPH. Hank: Yes, that was my muffler and exhaust headers. Everything but the tailpipe.

I just went through my annual and decided not to go with a powerflow exhaust. I figured that a full replacement of my existing exhaust was about $1,700 but the Powerflow was about $4,600 and I would need to save 500 extra gallons of avgas before that was worth it. While I expect that there is some improvement in performance, I don't think it's as much as their advertisements lead you to believe. (FYI, a 0 knot speed increase can also be stated as "Top speed capability improved by as much as 6.5 knots at 11,500 feet")

I recently had a fuel gauge issue that is similar to your issue with the right gauge. I sent it out to Kelly Instruments, who does quite a few repairs. They said that it was a non-fixable fault inside the gauge itself. My suspicion is that it is a short somewhere inside the gauge, perhaps part of the coil that physically moves the needle. I'm planning on getting my old gauge and tearing it apart if I can to see what's going on. My left gauge is what is broken, so maybe we can work together and create a single working gauge cluster.

The shop my plane is at is a MSC.