Skates97

I use an Excel spreadsheet for all the maintenance as well. For my personal (BFR, medical, IFR currency, night currency, etc) I use http://www.myflightbook.com, it is not just a free logbook but also keeps track of currency. You can add pictures and notes to flights. You can also print off an 8710 for as well.

If I was flying those speeds I would be there before I felt the need to turn on autopilot. Yes, I am.

If you're looking for led's. In the world of aviation parts it's not much. Think of it like about an hours worth of fuel.

These will fit the same hole. https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/elpages/lsdimled.php

There was a webinar a few months back with one of the controllers from the SoCal TRACON that was excellent. It is a couple hours long but was full of information to help better understand what is happening on the other end of the radio.

SoCal Approach can see your N number with ADS-B out even if you are squawking 1200. If I'm not on flight following for a VFR flight I will still monitor approach. On more than one occasion on a short flight I have had approach call me in the blind asking "November 78878, are you on frequency?" I'll respond and often they ask if I would like flight following or just my route of flight to help them know what to expect from me. Here is an example of a data block for a VFR aircraft from the webinar I linked in my next post.

At $30k buy it and fly it. Have something in reserve just in case it starts making metal. After sitting three years there's a good chance that after getting used again it will make metal and need an overhaul. Of course you could get lucky and not need one, but have the money set aside just in case.

I agree with @Pinecone and I would not fly without shoulder harnesses. @neilpilot's experience is a perfect example, and there are more out there. Adding shoulder harnesses was the first thing upgrade I did as soon as I got my plane. I have the inertial style and have never had any issues, but even if they did get stuck from time to time when I went to change tanks I would still keep them. I would rather spend a few seconds getting them unstuck to switch tanks than have my face smash the panel in the even of an incident. My DPE for my PPL refused to fly in anything without shoulder belts. His son landed off airport, I believe it was a Luscombe. All went well until he hit a small berm which flipped the plane. It did not have shoulder belts and he ended up at the hospital in intensive care for a long time and was lucky to have even survived. The cabin was not in terrible shape and if he had shoulder harnesses he would have walked away with some bruises and soreness.

Yes, I still love it, and thank you! I would not use the auto products that have an adhesive on our windows. I did replace the tint about 5-6 months ago as it was becoming a little hazy and the grandkids had put some nicks in it with fingernails, but it is so inexpensive and easy to do that replacing every couple of years is a reasonable endeavor.

I dug up my notes from the 2019 Mooney Summit where Bob Kromer presented on Spins among other things. He showed some video of the testing that was done and then addressed spin recovery in Mooneys. I was typing away madly on my laptop as he talked. My notes on spin recovery from his presentation are "Recovers per standards but will easily exceed Vne in the near vertical dive that results from the spin so did not pursue certification."

I agree completely. When I was finishing up my PPL I told the owner of the flight school I wanted to get a Mooney. He told me to get something slower and fly a few years and then transition. He was very familiar with Mooney's, they had one at the school they did commercial instruction in. I didn't take his advice, I finished my PPL with 46.7 hours in my logbook and then with 58.6 total hours bought and started flying my Mooney. I got my transition training and never looked back. There are a number of other members here on the site with a similar story of getting a Mooney right after their PPL. There are even some who did their primary in a Mooney, although I'm glad I didn't. I didn't have an instrument rating, I didn't even have any complex time but still got reasonable insurance and flew the next 600 hours all over the southwest with multiple trips from CA to AZ, UT, ID, CO, OR and all the way to the East Coast and another trip to Oshkosh VFR. One of the things people say is that you go fast enough that you are bound to run into weather. While that is somewhat true depending on the part of the country you fly, the speed also enables you to go around a lot of it and if you have flexibility (a requirement if you are flying VFR) you can go somewhere the weather isn't. We did have to sometimes modify our departure/arrival times because of weather, but we still got most of our flights in. I finished up my IFR a year ago and it has been very beneficial, but not "a must" if you have flexibility.

Hmmm, maybe they should just remove "as filed" from what they are allowed to say when giving clearances and always require ATC to give the full routing and require the full read back.

Pull up your future flight and scroll down to the "Flight Data" section.

^^^This If you file one thing and look on Flight Aware and there is something different, when you get your clearance they are going to give you what ATC approved which in my experience is what is listed in Flight Aware. If you re-file what it shows in Flight Aware you have a better chance of hearing "as filed" instead of the whole routing read off to you which you then have to read back.

Request the log books and review how many hours it has flown each year to start out.

I don't know if the heat gun would have helped. I had a similar logo on mine and tried taking it off with a heat gun, it didn't accomplish anything. Tried solvent, that thing wasn't coming off. I ended up using a rubber eraser wheel which did a pretty good job but there was still a little hint that it was there. She's getting painted right now so it's "all the way gone" now.

Nice video, that's the same setup I have and I love it.

I guess my google search is getting lazy. I was looking on Amazon for them... Thanks for pointing that out, I'll update the article. The Hero 3 was a leftover from many years ago but after finding out that the Drift Ghost will pull the audio with the same cable the Hero 3 has been relegated to the dust bin.

Published in the April 2021 edition of The Mooney Flyer and just recently on my blog. https://intothesky.com/2022/09/24/cameras-mounts-and-cables/

I've been using https://myflightbook.com/ since my PPL. In addition to all the regular stuff you can add pictures for each flight, route of flight, notes, etc... CFI/CFII's can digitally sign it. When I went for my IFR checkride I just printed it out, no issues at all. I regularly will download a PDF copy of it "just in case." Oh, and it's free.

When my AP/IA taught me this trick it was life changing.

I wrote this article for The Mooney Flyer in April 2021 but updated it with some more information after another year + of recording and trying out another camera. If you are looking for a less expensive option that buying that GoPro, Garmin Virb, etc... then read on. https://intothesky.com/2022/09/24/cameras-mounts-and-cables/

Same experience, the standard gasket was always loose. The silicone one has been great. As others have mentioned don't overtighten the tube with the silicone gasket. I've found that just tightening the tube by hand and then putting safety wire is enough to keep it from leaking. The threads are very coarse which contributes to the problem with them coming loose.

I like this guy's videos, less trying to grab attention and more just offering information. He has a M20C that he flies all around CO. Here is his video of Leadville.

It's at ArtCraft, dropped it off Saturday morning. They have been professional and a pleasure to deal with starting with the first email inquiring about a price. They took me on a tour of their facility when I dropped it off, very nice operation. Their design guy was great to work with on the paint scheme taking my ideas and turning them into a reality. Their base price was about 40% higher than another local shop but I've seen a number of planes from the other shop and from ArtCraft and the quality appears to be much higher from ArtCraft. From the estimate (we'll see what it is in reality) they are talking a 30 day turn around as opposed to 6-8 weeks from the other shop. Also, they were able to get me on the schedule and in the shop within a month of the first inquiry, the other shop was scheduling out in next March. They paint on average 13-15 planes, a big operation. Add everything together and the additional cost made sense to me. This is probably the only time I will get it painted. "Buy the best and cry once"