StinkBug

We've got a pretty good group of Mooney Formation pilots around, and I'm always looking for people who are available to practice with. I'll be at the Yuma Clinic (this will be my 3rd), but after that I'm hoping to drag some of the other Best Coast pilots out more regularly. One of my Coworkers has a Columbia 400 and wants to get trained as well, so if I can find another safety pilot we can pick a day and get it done.

If the others don't work out I can probably help after feb 11th as well. 1200hr commercial pilot, with most of that time in Mooneys. I'm also based in SoCal so transportation would be fairly simple. 760-525-6886

I lost a cap entirely once (don't ask, I'm still mad at myself). The fuel level was about 2" down from the top. I flew on that tank until it was dry. The engine burned it all, none was coming out the top. I'm sure if it had been full a bit would have been sucked/splashed out by the air flow, but it was fine since it was down a little. I have a hard time believing that any level of maneuvering could cause a tank to drain overboard in flight. If there were some way of doing that I'm sure I would have found it with the way we fly the jump planes at work.

My governor was set too low when I bought the plane, and getting to the adjustment screw is a major pain. When I had it in the shop we managed to raise the rpm, but now it will go about 20-40rpm over just after take off. It's such a pain to adjust that I called that good enough. I simply learned exactly how many turns out from full in on the prop knob it takes to hit 2700 and made that setting the last step of my run-up.

I hadn't heard about this, and now I'm a little bummed out as well.

I fly to KFUL a lot, and I feel for you trying to find it without knowing the area. I've landed at that airport dozens of times and still have a hard time sometimes. It just blends right into the mess.

Might just check around with other shops as well. I'm sure there's a place you can fly into and have it done pretty quickly. When I was shopping for airplanes I remember looking into it and not having too much trouble finding people to do it. I ended up buying a plane that had a new prop though, so I didn't end up needing a shop. Probably a good thing too, as I would have had to have that inspection done 7 times in the last 3 years.

Why not just fly it down to San Diego? It's a pretty short flight.

I've had my C to 15k on a day when the DA made it about 18k. It took a while to get there, but flew pretty decent. Also climbed to 14k coming out of Denver heading west bound later on the same trip. With a little planning it's pretty rare to actually need to get that high though, even out west.

There is a pretty broad price range on jet charters out there, just depends on the aircraft. I was chatting with the pilot who had my job before me and he now flies right seat in a Citation CJ2 that is used for both charters and medivac. He told me the Phoenix-San Diego round trip he was on that day would cost a charter customer $6-7k. The same trip in a newer Gulfstream would be more than double that. Jets aren't cheap to fly and the company wants to make a profit as well, but I'd be surprised if any company that flies single pilot certified aircraft (like the CJs) would turn down money for an hour long scenic tour with you in the right seat. That's just easy money with nearly zero logistics work. Wouldn't be as cheap as your first cessna flight, but certainly not $20k

If you have a CPL you could even get paid to sit right seat. I've got about 3 hours in the right seat of a Citation CJ1 just because I ran into the right charter operator in the FBO and they had a flight scheduled where the customer requested 2 pilots. Officially it was a single pilot operation, but I got to enjoy the front seat of a jet from SoCal to Idaho and back. I also got about 20 minutes of actual stick time on a G3 on a repositioning flight a while back.

I recently installed one of the little flyweight Sky-tec starters and the first time I turned the key I scared myself. It spins the prop faster than the engine idles it seems! The 12lb weight savings was nice too.

After looking at the cost of "Aviation" O2 systems, and what the local FBO was charging to fill them I laughed and went with a cheap "medical" bottle and regulator, then bought the fittings to fill from the "welding" tank I already had in the shop doing nothing since oxy/acetylene has been made pretty obsolete by plasma cutting these days. I wanna say my big tank is 150cu ft. and I can fill my D size medical tank 5-6 times from 400psi up to 1500 or more. It costs $20 to swap out the big tank for a full one, so I don't feel bad about whatever I'm wasting once the pressure drops more than I'd like. I think right now I have about the same amount of money in my entire setup including the big tank, fill equipment and all the stuff I bring in the plane as one of the portable kits marketed for aviation use.

I chalk that up to very good prior maintenance by the past owner and Don Maxwell, and the fact that I fly it a lot and keep a careful eye on things myself.

I don't include fuel in monthly costs, because that can vary so much. I also don't have a hangar. My tie down at CRQ was $200/month, my new spot at MYF is $115. Insurance started at about $1800/yr, but dropped a lot after the first year. I'm at about 1000tt and 700 in type now, paid about $1200 last year, waiting to hear what this year is gonna be. My annuals have averaged around $1600/year, and about $800/year in other maintenance, not including oil changes. I fly a lot, so my oil and fuel numbers may not match yours very well at all.

The back seat in the C looks REALLY tight, until you slide the front seats forward to where they actually are in flight. I've had 4 adults in mine before as well. Not what I would call roomy enough for long distances, but plenty good for short fun flights.

Mike Jesch is a great guy, even though he's a Cessna owner. He's also a close friend to the Mooney Caravan. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend him to anyone. As for A&Ps, there are a lot of options around, but the nearest Mooney Service Center is Crown Air at KMYF. They treated me well a few years ago on a pre-buy, and one of my friends has them do all his annuals and is quite happy with them. Now that I'm based at MYF I'll probably use them more as well.

I used to work for an architect building multi-million dollar homes in some of the most tightly controlled real estate in the country. When submitting plans we would often add features that we didn't want, and that we knew the neighbors and planning commission would complain about just so that they wouldn't complain about what we really wanted. As for the tag, mine is in the exact same spot in the vent. Thinking about it though, I'm pretty sure there is another tag under the tail that someone made with one of those old school plastic label makers where the letters get embossed in the plastic ribbon. Guess someone really wanted to get out of it without any work.

And I'm still on board for the hat rack parts!

I'm not so sure Mooney was the one making the big show. The videos I saw were all posted by the guy doing the flying, not Mooney. I get the feeling that flying the test plane to KERV was just the easiest way to move it out of Chino as they close up shop there.

I did all my PPL training in planes with KIAS, and it felt a little weird when I got the Mooney, but that went away very quickly as I got used to the plane. Personally, unless there is something else wrong with the ASI I'd fly the plane for another 20-30 hours and see if it still bugs you. As for the 60, 80, 100 numbers, those are basically what I use in MPH, no need to translate.

I find that the units used are somewhat meaningless. As you get used to the plane you figure out which numbers correspond to the phase of flight you're in. I actually use both scales for different things in my C. Basically I pick whichever primary marking matches what I'm doing so I can check it at a glance. After 700ish hours in my plane I'm not sure I could actually tell you what the exact speeds are, I can just tell at a glance if the needle is in the right place or not. When I got my G5 installed I could pick whichever units I wanted. I picked KTS at first, then quickly changed it simply due to being used to the original ASI, and scanning both.

Those aren't crashes, they are vertical landings.

The pilot actually addressed that in a response to someone giving him flak for the outfit on facebook. He basically said it's a personal preference after his near death experience crashing another even more experimental aircraft, and that because he's constantly traveling doing testing of all sorts of aircraft it's easier to pack and use the same equipment for everything, rather than having a full mask setup and a non mask setup. Kinda makes sense, pack for the worst case scenario and you're always covered.

I can say that I've done enough formation flights that involved a camera toting passenger that I know it's quite difficult to get a shot that does not involve part of the wing in the frame. I think that's the point Steingar was trying to make. If this is even a secondary mission of importance it makes sense to take the level of non-suitability of the aircraft into consideration before buying.