Fly By

This is a known serious issue very common with K's especially. Lubrication is a very temporary "fix" and has resulted in some not-so-good outcomes. SB M20 325 88A is a permanent fix.

Electric landing gear would always extend normally but intermittently would not retract. Troubleshooting confirmed motor needed overhauling (bump motor with fist when in failed mode or reverse leads and it started immediately). Overhaul shop found brushes were completely gone. Overhauled motor was reinstalled in plane. Same problem. Diagnosis found motor was again not working properly (same symptoms). Motor was returned to shop where a new armature and another set of new brushes were installed. Reinstalled motor in plane. Same problem, but troubleshooting confirmed motor was now working normally. But now when the DN relay was tapped lightly the motor started immediately. New down relay was installed. Same problem. Tapping the DN relay did not start the motor now but tapping the UP relay did! UP relay was also replaced. SUCCESS!! Moral of the story... if your Mooney has over 3,500 hours and/or is over 40 years old, you probably should have the gear motor overhauled. There is a 200-hour requirement to inspect the gears and coupler in a Dukes actuator, but the brushes (inspection not required) cannot be inspected without destroying the caps (which are epoxied in), so they need replacing anyway in order to inspect them. The motor overhaul was under $1,000. You might also consider replacing (or cleaning if you’re lucky enough to have Cutler-Hammer relays) the gear relays since they have had a good life and can start causing real problems when they get weak. If one relay is bad, chances are that the other one is not far behind. This happened in a '77 M20J with 4300 TT that has a Dukes 1057 gear motor with 40:1 gears but could happen in almost any Mooney. I don’t want to hear from you guys with Johnson bars though! Hope this saves someone the headaches and expense I had wrestling with this compound problem that was defying resolution. -Lee

Another shout out to PowerFlow... Mine is a '77 J model with a LoPresti cowl. PFS Owner Darren Tillman has been working patiently with me for several months to get it right. We had tried everything conceivable to make it fit and work optimally but kept running into one snag after another. PFS sent me several new parts and spent hours looking for solutions. He finally invited me to bring the plane to the factory since he wanted to fit the superior Generation 2 system in a Lo Presti cowl without having to modify the landing light. His engineering and production team worked for four days to fabricate a custom system. He took back the original Gen 1 system which had about 100 hours on it and did not charge me a penny for the new Gen 2 system. That's what I call excellent customer service! Happily the new Gen 2 fits perfectly and performs amazingly. Highly recommend this upgrade. Their customer support is refreshing. They stick with you until you are happy and stand behind their product 100%. It is a noticeable improvement in horsepower and performance.

Pay particular attention to the “I did not have enough control to really pick a spot at that point, but I had enough rudder to keep the nose between the trees” part. That is his Navy training kicking in. I preach rudder control during slow flight and stalls to my students. Ailerons are ineffective, but the rudder works all the way to the ground. This likely kept him from rolling over and auguring in like we see so many GA pilots do in scenarios like this.

Link to local news report: http://wavy.com/2017/10/07/3-people-survive-plane-crash-after-plane-crashes-into-middlesex-home/

Unconfirmed, but guy reportedly filled up with low price gas at W75 and then departed from intersection (1500' remaining) with a 5 KT tailwind. Came to rest approx 1700' from end of runway.

Dan recommend a CO detector, but going to Sensorcon's website I see 3 different flavors of the same unit (Standard, Industrial and Industrial Pro). Recommendations?

Since my name has been dragged into this discussion.... I am still waiting for the CiES hardware to arrive. I'm told it will be any day. I installed a JPI 900 recently and attached the "legacy" gauges which were of dubious accuracy. Seems that the fuel totalizer was unhappy with the legacy sending units' accuracy also as I began to see "Fuel Mismatch" alerts frequently. This means that there existed a difference between the reported fuel quantity (sending units) and the computed fuel remaining (totalizer) of more than 5 gallons. So either I needed to have my 40 year old sending units rebuilt or go with improved technology. But then the JPI rep at OSH alerted me to the fact that there are two different ways for the JPI and the CiES to communicate. CiES tells me that the difference in accuracy between the "EI Voltage" and the "Digital Frequency Hz" is negligible except for the last few drops of fuel. Since my comfort level is well above that risky range I figured that I'm good with the ones that were plug 'n play and save the $350 plus shipping and down-time to send the JPI unit back to CA for the conversion that would have been required to allow it to accept the latter method.

You can expect a posting very shortly. Goat is working out some last minute details, but the Mid-Atlantic Clinic will be at LYH (Lynchburg, VA) on June 23-25. Thanks for your interest and eagerness. Stay tuned!

On modern transport category aircraft there are painted stripes to indicate the limits and zero trim positions. This might be a nice enhancement on our Mooneys that would provide a visual confirmation during walk around that the trim is set for takeoff since our stabilizers move relative to the fuselage just like the big boys!

Mooney just released Service Bulletin M20-325 pertaining to the stabilizer trim on J, K, L, & M model Mooneys. I am told it may be a few days before it is up on the Mooney Support site, but your MSC should have received it. It closely follows the guidance in Service Instruction M20-88 which is currently posted.

Picked up my plane after a new autopilot had been installed (non MSC shop). During the takeoff roll at rotation I discovered something was horribly wrong. The plane was extremely nose heavy and began to porpoise. It bounced back on the runway and required a very large amount of elevator pull to keep it from impacting the runway and possible prop strike. Adrenaline is a good thing! Post incident inspection revealed that the trim had been improperly reassembled resulting in two full turns of the trim wheel nose down when the trim indicator was indicating normal takeoff range! The trim was readjusted, checked, and has been fine since.

Thanks for clarifying. I was not suggesting that this be done every flight but only run to the stops periodically as a maintenance check until MS20-88 or subsequent Service Bulletin has been accomplished to see if there is any tendency to bind.. and on the ground.

Threads are fine. You're just seeing some loose junk that did not clean off completely for the picture. Yes, the plane had previous inspections and lube done by two unrelated A&Ps. Worked fine after that... for a while! See Mooney Service Instruction MS20-88 for the approved "cure." This matter has been escalated at Mooney and a new Service Bulletin is expected to be released soon.