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I thought it was composite covered wood. the wood grain would 100% be perpendicular to this crack and if it’s wood, I wouldn’t be concerned about that crack. If it’s all composite I’m not so sure.

I’ve flown over those areas as well and they are mesmerizing and majestic. I always vacillate between wonder at the beauty and terror at the thought of having to land if I lose my engine!

Agree there too, that is where the captive market comes in. Some may consciously take advantage of it, but I believe the majority may just not be as well organized, but they don’t have to compete as much as other businesses and that affects the ethos in general. I mean your plane is in a thousand pieces on the floor and they say “it’ll take twice as long as we said, maybe”, what are your options? Everyone else there is in the same boat.

It’s a captive market for sure, which undoubtedly affects at a minimum the averages, liability, training and overhead can be punishing at an airport. At my home field a hangar big enough for a decent sized service business would be $8,000,000+++. The land lease could be as much as a million on top, which has to be paid in full at close. A 20,000 sqft metal building would cost close to 100k for insurance. The average home here is north of 500k. Now put business liability insurance, training, works comp, health insurance…. Haven’t even gotten to parts yet, and those things are insanely priced as well.

I don’t actually have a service manual, that doesn’t come with the unit, I got into the configuration but most was greyed out because I didn’t have the boot card but there were many options unassigned. I don’t know the limits of those functions.

One day (half day even better) of sun and fun is plenty…. And tacking it onto an event people already travel for is an excellent idea!

On the new ultra models, Mooney was able to eliminate the annunciator panel completely and program all of them into the CAS messages on the NXI. I was looking at the configuration manuals and options on the TXI and there are more than enough open programmable options to eliminate the legacy annunciator panel within that system. Has anyone done this, or can anyone explain why it couldn’t be done?

Consider your real plan for the future of your plane. If you are planning to sell within the next five years, I would be inclined to use Garmin. It’s proven, prevalent, well supported and pretty widely regarded as most favored. What I mean is it isn’t going to turn anyone off. I really dislike aspens, it’s my personal preference, not necessarily a complaint on the quality. I don’t know of anyone who avoids garmin when it’s already installed. If you are certain you’re going to keep it long term, go with whatever you want. I don’t have any experience with dynon, and I don’t want to denigrate the product, but aviation companies vanish at much high rates than most industries and along with no AP, I think they need a few more years before their long term service record can be established. Owners seem to be happy and say the product is great, but if they can’t get a real toe hold in the market and approve an AP, they won’t be around long.

This is because it is like Milton Friedman said, “the least efficient way to spend money is spending other people’s money on someone else.” there is no accountability, no after action review, no adjustment for errors and no one is fired. my sister worked for the dept of agriculture and took a promotion to leave to work for the IRS. She reported for work, and it took them almost 8 months for them to assign her someone to report to and provide her a workstation. she did nothing for that 8 month period. Nothing.

My thoughts exactly. This is nothing but bureaucratic nonsense to make the systems they spent billions on last year sound like the problem. The amount of money this agency wastes on its pet projects and legacy costs is staggering. 13 billion dollars… They really need a systemic overhaul from top to bottom. Our government doesn’t seem to be accountable anymore. For anything. If it doesn’t work throw more money at it! Sidebar, when I was in college I interned for my uncle who was an electrical engineer. He was the primary engineer for the local airport which does barely have commercial service, but it’s a small class C airport. He did the runway and taxiway lighting for the airport for 35 years. Every year or two it was “upgraded” in some way. Really? Or were they just making sure they spent the money they were given? https://www.transportation.gov/sites/dot.gov/files/2024-03/FAA_FY_2025_Budget_Request_508-v5.pdf Waste fraud and abuse is at least 40% of this bloated beast!

If you use ForeFlight, and have a performance profile setup for your model, you can tweak it to be pretty accurate. I fly a couple or routes as entered and compare the predicted fuel burn with actual and adjust until it’s in the leather. my actual fuel sonsumption now is usually within 3 gallons of what ForeFlight predicts. Trying to plan my mileage won’t ever really work, it has to be predicated by the time in the air to be accurate.

I wonder what ultimately happens to these planes. Remember that chartreuse one that was priced like this? Either they end up keeping, lower the price, or someone ponies up the money I guess…

Marsh brothers makes lots of things for Aerostars. They are the real deal. I have purchased from them before. They also have items on aircraft spruce.

I really like this as well. I know it doesn’t look as new and slick, but the tactile feel, the way you absolutely know you actuated the switch. (Hope that makes sense). Some of the new rocker style are easier to accidentally brush on or off. I do not dislike the new style enough to replace a nice panel, but if I was building a panel I would prefer toggle wherever practical.

I use ForeFlight and an iPad for planning and briefings, but once I am in the plane I only use my panel mount equipment and the iPad and IPhone are just backups.

Sounds like they may be gearing up to enter the market. or sell the data to the market…

That price is two years old as well.. it’s well north of 100 now.

My particular hangar is asphalt on all four sides. The only place I could put it would be on the north side which would make a mess because as much water as it would produce it would never dry…

One thing I would point out is that cubic feet is more important than square feet. I would be willing to bet that most advertisements that use sqft are predicated on an average ceiling height of 8’. Our hangars are likely closer to double that volume, also no where near as tight as a house. I would figure you need 300% more for the same sqft to make any difference at all. In our hangars that would present a challenge because there is no where to pump the amount of water it would produce.

I have often wondered if tenting the whole plane with a giant tarp and putting the dehumidifier inside would be effective.

Fascinating article…. My only question, which I will answer for myself when I fly day after tomorrow, is can I get the cht’s in the “ideal” range, and still control my tit.

Well, it wasn’t a Mooney, it wasn’t trimmed, and it may have had a little help….

I got an email with a link to the aopa article about the Pilatus crash in NC a few years ago. It was a horrible story and sadly easily preventable. It made me think of a different conversation with a friend talking to his adult child. He made a joke about never breaking two rules at once. Such as if you are going to speed, don’t have expired tags or insurance. The takeaway for me anyway, was don’t tempt fate. I think we have all been in that spot where maybe things don’t look so bad and you’re tempted to skip a step here or there, or maybe you don’t do it intentionally because subconsciously you are evaluating the risk. The story is a dark and somber reminder about how quickly things can deteriorate in IMC. Having my flight plan in my gps is usually done right before or right after startup. Even if I haven’t gotten my clearance yet, and I know I’m likely to get something else, I do not taxi without that being done, even if it’s a short hop and direct. It isn’t written on my checklist but maybe it should be. One last note, I took a young eagle up for a flight the other day and I was discussing the dangers of IMC . I asked him how long he thought it would take the plane to go from straight and level in smooth air if I let go of the controls, and how long he though it would take him to notice if he couldn’t see the horizon. He was unsure about the first but was convinced he could tell immediately. So I put him in the foggles (he was not piloting at all just a passenger), and I let go. It took about 15 seconds to find us in a 30deg bank and descending at about 400fpm. I let it go another 10 seconds or so and asked him how he thought we were doing he said we were straight and level. I told him to take off the foggles, and the look on his face was priceless. He went white instantly. It doesn’t take long, it can happen to anyone, and please don’t take these things for granted. https://www.globalair.com/articles/pilot-error-spatial-disorientation-cause-of-deadly-pc-12-crash-in-2022-that-killed-8?id=6913

Again, I’m not suggesting one is better or worse, only that this has not been my experience with the 550. I never had any cylinder issues at all in the years and planes I owned, nor any of the people I know personally. It’s also curious that all of these aircraft builders are choosing the continental over the lycoming if their engines are so troublesome. Given the wide use of the continental 550’s, I’d be curious to know the ratios of continental 550 to lycoming 540 coming through your shop. If I recall correctly you are a cirrus service center right? If you are seeing four 550’s for each 540, I would expect you to see more problems with continentals. While it may be helpful to have compiled data from shops all over the world to build a database, how do you account for how engines are operated. It’s a complex problem with no real data to codify either opinion, at least not yet. Your sample is obviously larger than mine, but still statistically insignificant. For the record, I am now flying 540’s and I really like them. Their ability to run at low rpm and generate much less noise is something I am really enjoying. They are a different animal to me after all the time behind the 550’s, but I do like them. If I had one comment it is that they are not as efficient.

ForeFlight logbook is fully portable and printable. You can retain it after you no longer subscribe. It definitely makes checkrides a whole lot easier.