Godfather

I agree with the above posters. The important thing is they are working on the problem. I personally don't think avidyne is responsible to pay the shop time that was used to diagnose the problem but I feel they would overnight a pre 10.2 540 to @thinwing now that they know it's a problem. Don't tell me your working on it...make the customer happy and get the bird in the air.

Ask avidyne to revert your software or provide you with a loaner unit without the update.

I would go for the ifd440 for the cheap install. If you have a larger budget I'd go for the 540 or 750 ... should cost around 12.5 if you can find a used one.

For some reason I do not find cots very comfortable. I have the aluminum army style and the cheaper Walmart versions and prefer to use the blow up air mattress instead. For a cheap tent you will probably want a 4 person tent. However, if you spend a little more you might be able to find a lightweight 6 person unit. With your wife's knee it might be very important to have a tent she can stand in...if I was in your shoes I'd find a 5-6 person tent she could stand upright in that fit in the Mooney and pay whatever it took to get the job done. You might find the cost of a one night hotel stay could upgrade the tent considerably.

Thanks for spending some of your free time to engage kids in aviation and the practical uses of technology that drive it.

Nice to have a Mooney collecting so many hours. 400 hrs seems a little fast to need an overhaul. The system on mine lasted a lot longer and I would think 1000 hrs would be attainable. I'm interested to hear how the PW holds up.

Great! I was just going by what you said in your previous posts. I hope you find what your looking for but IMO the 125 is a great value. I do find it amusing how much you disregard anything older than recent releases but don't really realize how much cash it can take to put the good stuff in your panel. I think once you start talking to the Garmin dealer about a 650 you will find out why many of us still adore the "old" 430w and king radios.

Might want to look at the kx125's for sale on this forum. Would make a great replacement for your current radios and much less expensive vs the sl30...

I'm honestly surprised you are still flying IFR with both coms only working occasionally. I have a hard time believing the nav units are working any better. Take it to a professional you trust and have him fix one of your coms and check over your nav unit. You don't need any backups but for goodness sake get one unit working reliably before you take off into the clouds again. I know I have higher minimums than most but I would not take off on a perfect vfr day in busy airspace without a good com unit. Also I'm sensing a pattern with your post. You might want to start a thread keeping all your mx questions in one continuous area. Don't worry many will still give you help to keep the plane rubber side down.

Any links to his adventure? After I get 4-500 hrs on the new engine I'm thinking a wtw trip might be a possibility.

As someone who is looking at a panel overhaul I agree that most of the good shops are very busy right now. Most are quoting sept/oct slots...

I'm thinking about swapping mine out for a esi500. I'll let you know late this week if you're still searching for one.

So I'm a little confused. These post are trying prove the previous posters were wrong about your plane?

Not to mention taking time off work, flight to see the bird, etc. the process can be very expensive. When I look at owning any plane I see 8-25k (depending on plane and hrs per year) spent to keep it going per year. So the purchase price is a small factor when looking at owning a plane for 10-15 years. 1NU I'm glad you found a bird you can be proud of.

With the 330 and 430w you are 90% done. I'd send the 330 back in for the upgrade and get it installed before the $500 rebate ends (imo the program will be extended).

G5 HSI? Unless you have a AP w/ a DG heading bug...

Do you realize how much money one could save going without a plane for 2.5 years! My Operating expense over the past three years could almost land me a J...

Aircraft ownership solutions has a nice E with electric gear that was added recently Link

Garmin sent out an email about a week ago answering some questions. Basically they said that because the G5 (AI and HSI) is not TSO certified there would be huge headwinds from the FAA for even a heading bug output. A full AP system is 1-2 years out minimum (my guess).

I agree but still believe the G5 is the perfect single Aspen display backup for shoppers on a budget. Funny thing is I would have no problem with the legal limitations if they required a backup AI with every G5 install. It's the good enough for primary but not to backup/copilot instruments/etc.

The Garmin does not have a single point of failure. You can run the unit disconnected from the P/S system with slightly reduced accuracy. The FAA lowered the requirements for primary replacements to encourage cheaper glass replacements in older aircraft. The Garmin rep said the FAA did not (and probably won't) reduce the TSO requirements for the backup instruments. In the end the G5 was not tested to the same TSO levels because Garmin did not want to incur the cost to do so. However, it might make it that much harder for them to have any type of certified AP interface because of that.

You might be able to find a used one that recently had the screen replaced. The screens fail in many different ways and Garmin used to repair them for $500 but stopped that service a number of years ago. Might be a better investment to buy a new / used 650 / 440 / 430w versus a sl30 to kill two birds with one stone.

You should be able to find a sl30 for around $2700. You will probably want to change your indicator at the same time (Garmin 106). My guess is you will find a mess of wires behind the dash. You might want to bite the bullet and redo a lot of the wires while you have access to a cheap A&P to help for future waas gps / audio panel / and adsb upgrades. You should be able to find a great condition ASI from someone upgrading. No reason to start off with inop on the dash (make sure you mark it if you're going to leave it that way).

For flying around for fun or a local fuel run i normally climb to 3-4K. So for that mission it includes 5 mins taxi / warm up, 3 mins for takeoff and climb, and puts around at LOP cruise. I'm guessing the actual fuel burn difference between the J and R for that mission will be very little. Even when I'm going on a trip I normally switch over to LOP cruise climb in the 4K area.

Take a picture of your connector. I've never had a leak from the factory system and the only less than ideal aspect is the expensive tank replacement.