DXB

Interesting - good to know in case one pulls a cylinder purely to examine the bottom end.

Something doesn't make sense to me here. I have no idea how one would remove a cylinder without seeing the entire piston including the rings. One normally takes off the cylinder first. Then one taps out the piston pin to remove the piston. One could leave the piston in place on the connecting rod if the only goal was to inspect the bottom end, but I think it's typical to replace the rings and rehone the cylinder barrel to ensure everything seats up once the cylinder goes back on. My mechanical knowledge is a bit suspect however - someone please correct me if needed.

yes

This is what I used. It works well and burnishes one's cb credentials. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08X1G8VSZ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1

Based on weather situation, it's a distinct possibility this pilot flew into a thunderstorm and lost control. I don't know if there was a resulting structural failure, though that airframe looks pretty intact from what I can make out. Either way, he may have deployed the chute well outside the envelope with favorable results. I think there have been some chute deployments on the piston Cirri outside the envelope after loss of control - some ended favorably and others didn't.

Sweet C with lots of good stuff on it, looks fairly priced considering the current market, reputable seller. Who cares about the paint. I'd put in a GFC500 and an engine monitor first, and I would jump on this were I looking for a C model today.

That time frame approximates the full demise of the traditional economic model that supported print journalism - it is now reflected in deterioration in size and quality of their workforce. There are real consequences for society - absurdly bad aviation accident reporting is perhaps the least of them.

Good discussion, relevant counterpoint. I'm keeping my membership for now, but it would be nice to see AOPA address some legit internal issues and rededicate to members, perhaps in unison with a membership drive...

What you describe isn't normal at all. +1 for SB 202: https://www.mooney.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/SBM20-202.pdf Also, too much slop in the pedals can come from wear in the nose gear steering horn, which needs to be shimmed after 1000-2000 hours and then typically replaced the next time. That often shows up as a shimmy in the nose wheel as you slow down.

+1 Cole Aviation. AGL Aviation in Morganton NC is also very reputable last I heard.

Interesting discussion - I'm curious how many owners here who fly exclusively certified aircraft find value from their AOPA vs EAA memberships. I am a member of the former but not the latter, but am open to joining EAA and/or dropping AOPA. My AOPA+Basic Pilot Protection Services membership did have some value for me when a vindictive ex filed a false report on the FAA anonymous pilot reporting system regarding my using medications that are not on the approved medication list. Their lawyer reviewed and edited the response letter I had to send back to the FAA and I would say overall did a good job helping clear up the issue. I was a little miffed that they pushed me to buy additional legal services (referring me to their preferred list of local lawyers) that I really didn't need in my particular situation (I declined). However, I was certainly glad I had the membership when this came up.

OMG what an abject horror story - only thing that would make it worse is a mechanical failure that gets someone hurt or killed. Not too long before your misadventure, I had a friend who came across the country to get a bargain overhaul with them and has been quite satisfied with the results - now several hundred hours in. I would have strongly considered using them before this post. It sounds like the combination of taking on too much work, labor force depletion, supply chain woes, and a nasty divorce has utterly destroyed what may have once been an engine shop that offered great value. Thank you for the detailed precise documentation @201Steve. This is the part of the aviation hobby I hate the most - though I've never caught it quite this bad...yet.

Wow - Interesting phenomenon I've never heard of or thought to look for. I imagine these are overhauled, not first run cylinders? I did find this article that is relevant: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1350630719314232 It sounds like high porosity in the cylinder head aluminum is a manufacturing flaw that happens at the time of casting. It's hard to believe that alone would cause the kind of air leak that your A&P observed though. Per the article, linking of the pores with microcracks predisposes the cylinder to head separation, which is obviously worth preventing. I imagine the microcracks are what actually produce the visible leak? I really have no clue how common this issue is or whether it merits new cylinders in this scenario; I'm hoping to learn more here however...

Great to know! That's a fun little airport that's a 20 min flight for me. I've been many times but not this season.

It's easy to imagine myself in the shoes of the guy in the 152 here, much less so in the place of the 340 making the 10 mile straight in when there's obviously traffic established in the pattern making standard position reports. As my experience has built up, I've announced plenty of straight in approaches 10 miles out "if there's no one in the pattern at X" while looking and listening carefully to make sure there's no one in the pattern - the second I see or hear someone there, I consider it my responsibility to announce a change in plan and enter the pattern in a way that gives them priority. Not wanting to be right but dead, I've also given way to plenty of 10 mi straight in traffic while I'm already in the pattern, usually by extending my downwind, but I'm in a bad mood while doing it and consider the person coming straight in to be an a-hole. This accident is a good reminder for me not to give in to temptation to exacerbate the traffic conflict out of irritation at being cut off (of course don't know the 152 pilot's state of mind in this situation, just my own in similar ones). Changing the behavior of the 10 mi straight in type folks is probably a lost cause, and a worse than useless one to take up until one is safely on the ground.

Any guidance on how to delete? I followed the link but can't figure out. It says I've used 247MB of 195MB available.

Tugging on your Johnson repeatedly on base and final to relieve nervousness related to gearing up is a tried and true tradition among vintage Mooney pilots . Unless the gear position sensing switch in the down lock block is perfectly adjusted (mine isn't), it can show green without the Johnson bar sleeve being fully locked in receptacle. It's not a priority for me to fix - the gear position lights are a regulatory necessity but kinda stupid on these planes in my view. The position of the bar itself along with manually ensuring it is fully locked down is all you need on these planes.

As mentioned, an inflight mag check under the conditions where you see the high EGT is the way to go here. That will definitively narrow down which plug/harness/mag for #1 is the problem (the side of the ignition system where the engine runs rough and EGT plummets). Then the easiest way to start is to test / swap the relevant plug before going further. The plug most likely offender and it is cheap and is easy to swap. Bear in mind this issue can happen out of the blue when a plug fouls in flight. In the couple of instances where I have experienced it in 1000hrs of flying my Mooney, the issue cleared spontaneously before I landed and did not recur, so I did not pursue it further.

My O-360 in the C model got a HUGE power increase from this exhaust. Along with that power gain comes increased fuel consumption. I'm not at all surprised you get 13gph at 100 ROP, 24-squared. Leaning at all at that high power setting may be somewhat abusive for the engine (power is higher than the POH charts predict for that MP/RPM and mixture because of the exhaust). It should also haul ass at that setting (well over 150 kt - maybe even close to 160kt at 5-6k ft). By contrast, at 23-squared, burning ~8gph with one or two cylinders running LOP is completely feasible in my experience and still gives good performance in the low 140's for knots TAS.

Got the frame on mine welded a while back rather than replace - some advised against but holding up well so fat

Program looks great, gonna try to make it but won't be sure until date is closer. Relieved to see AOPA is represented but Dan Gryder is not - it was disconcerting to see him about to be given a platform in the Mooney community in last year's program.

Ahem...moderator?

The tailpipe for some reason seems to be a common first point of failure - at least it was for me- way better that than a riser or the muffler. Exhaust systems definitely have a finite lifespan - mine was long in the tooth (>20 years) when the tail pipe started to disintegrate. If the exhaust is old, I'd treat the tail pipe failure as a sentinel event and overhaul/replace the whole thing. I replaced with a Powerflow, which uses heavier steel and supposedly has a longer service life when maintained correctly - then again it costs twice as much.

Seems like the MSC in question should provide a generous allowance for @M20Doc to remediate this issue and perhaps offer a bit of a labor refund to the OP, along with profuse apology. Assuming they do that with the appropriate attitude, I wouldn't encourage naming the MSC publicly or going to the FAA. Even very good teams f*ck up from time to time - it's how they handle it that matters.

This very recent Mike Busch article sheds further light on the valve failure issue and also calls into question some of my impressions articulated previously in this thread: https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2022/may/pilot/savvy-maintenance-failure-to-rotate It also raises more questions in my mind than it answers... -He seems to think that valve failures are far more likely to originate from subtle defects at the time of manufacture and/or IRAN/overhaul than anything the pilot did. -Another striking point is his belief that a valve with early signs of a hot spot on its face can reasonably be lapped in place and the rotator cap replaced without pulling the cylinder. This impression runs contrary to my assumption that by the time you see asymmetry on a valve face, the guide must already be trashed. Maybe next time I see early signs of a burned valve on borescope I will insist on a formal wobble test before deciding to pull the cylinder. -He does do a nice job highlighting the differences between Lycoming and Continental valve design but leaves me confused regarding their implications. The rotator coils on Continentals seem to fail commonly but the same issue with the Lycoming rotator cap is rare. But in my experience the burnt valve issue in Lycomings is not rare at all. And does it really make sense often to simply lap a Lycoming valve in place and replace the rotator cap given that difference between the two designs?