CoffeeCan

The question of gear up or gear down in an off-airport landing is one I've thought about a lot in the past year or so, as there is a lot of debate on this and quite a few good YouTube videos on it. I had decided that unless the landing field looks like a billiard table, I would go in gear-up on the belly. In this case, I put the gear down almost as a reflex as I lined up to land, and I thought the pasture looked about as smooth as a baby's butt. As my wife and I walked the "runway" the following day, it was truly as smooth as a paved parking lot... except for that one rutted cowpath, which was only about 6-8" deep and invisible from the cockpit.

Mike, as a matter of fact, once I had declared the emergency I did actually say out loud to myself, "This airplane now belongs to the insurance company, and my only job now is to fly it all the way into the ground and walk away from it." And yes, I did open the door when I dropped the gear.

I know a few of you are already aware of my incident on 09/30, but I've been hesitant to post anything until the insurance company made their determination re repair vs write-off. Also, having a forced landing off-airport is an awkward situation to find oneself in, and I've needed time to process the event and my responses to it before opening the topic up for discussion on an open forum. Aircraft background: M5779R is a 1985 M20K (231) with many positive aftermarket mods, including GAMIjectors, intercooler and wastegate, 3-blade McCauley prop (hot), Aspen PFD, JPI 830, Garmin 430, and Garmin ADS/B In/out transponder. The engine was rebuilt in 2016 prior to my purchase, and had less than 100 hrs SMOH when I bought it in 2018. I have flown her nearly 500 hours since then. I had a great deal of work done at annual last year, including replacement of the #6 cylinder, Prop governor overhaul, new right-side exhaust header, replacement of ALL belts and hoses, new gascolator, and multiple other smaller jobs. At the time of the incident 79R had flown 143 hours since last annual. On the date above I was flying from KABI to KDGW in a clear VFR sky to do some hunting with friends. I had stopped for fuel at Borger, TX, and was about an hour into the second leg of the flight at 12,500' when I had a sudden partial loss of power. I had been cruising at usual settings, 32" MP and 2450 RPM and 11.0 GPH (approx. 50% power setting) with a 12 knot tailwind. With the power loss my manifold pressure dropped below 20", but RPM's stayed around 2400. My first thought was that I had a fuel flow problem, so immediately switched tanks and hit the low boost switch. No change. Airspeed had dropped significantly, but the autopilot was holding my altitude and the engine was still making some power. IIRC, CHT's and TIT were fine, but the JPI was reading 20% power output and dropping. Half of my brain was trying to puzzle out the cause of the power loss, but the larger part of my brain was saying, "Look for a place to land, establish best glidespeed, try to restart the engine, and declare an emergency," over and over again. So that's what I did. I looked around at the flat eastern Colorado terrain, saw no airport; looked at my Foreflight moving map, and saw the Limon airport about 25 miles ahead of me and no other marked airfield. My airspeed was still above best glide at this point. Looking back on it now, I estimate that the time elapsed up to this point in the emergency was about 20-25 seconds. The engine was still running, so a restart was obviously not necessary; so I pushed the prop control full forward and there was no change. In fact, I noted that my RPM's were starting to climb irrespective of the position of the prop control. This was my first clue that I had an oil pressure problem. I then looked at the oil pressure gauge, and it was pegged on zero. This was the "Aha!" moment, and I went fully into my power-off landing checklist that I've had stamped in my brain since my earliest flight training. I switched off the magnetos, which caused immediate slowing of the aircraft, and of course also meant no vacuum pressure, so I began setting my attitude manually to best glide (88 KIAS). I keyed the mic and informed Denver Center I was declaring an emergency. The controller, who sounded very young, immediately experienced a 2-octave increase in his voice pitch, by which I gathered he was pretty new to this situation. I advised ATC I had lost power and was descending without power, and intended to land on either a road or an open field, unless he could vector me to an unmapped airfield closer to my position. I started at 6500' AGL, and estimated I had about 10 miles maximum glide range. There were several roads and a paved highway ahead of me, so I simply maintained my heading and descended at best glide speed. As I got closer to the ground it was apparent that the highway was far too busy with vehicle traffic to safely land on, so I decided to try for the nearest east-west gravel road, which I estimated was just within my glide range. However, it became clear quite soon that I wasn't going to get that far. As I dropped below 1000' AGL, I lowered my landing gear (I still had lots of battery power for the gear motors) and advised ATC I'd be landing in a pasture. I maintained clean configuration for airspeed, and the mains touched down a about 70 KIAS. I kept lots of backpressure on the yoke to keep the nosegear off the ground as long as possible. When I could keep the nose up any longer I started braking, but almost immediately hit a shallow cowpath and the nosegear collapsed. I skidded to a stop within about 50 yards of the cowpath. When the airplane stopped, I made sure all switches were off, unfastened my seat belt, and exited the aircraft. There was no gasoline smell, and no smoke, so I didn't hurry. I found I was less than 100 feet from the county road I'd been hoping to land on, and about 150 yards from the paved highway. All kinds of vehicles were turning onto the county road to check on the "crash scene". One kind young man offered the warmth of his car to sit in while I dealt with the necessary phone calls. ATC at Denver called within a few minutes (to see if I was alive), and of course my first outgoing call was to my wife to let her know I was down but OK. ATC got emergency services on the way and I was soon talking to the sheriff's deputy, fielding calls from the FAA and NTSB, and so forth. Eventually all the ducks were lined up as well as could be, and the deputy gave me a lift to a hotel in Limon, where my wife picked me up in her truck the next day. My insurance company has decided to sell N5779R for salvage, and I've signed the bill of sale. Unfortunately, I hadn't anticipated the rise in airplane prices this year, or I'd have re-insured her for what I could sell her for today (about $80,000 more than I paid for her!). I was not injured in the incident. I attribute this to the sound construction of Mooney aircraft, and to the thoroughness of my flight instructor(s) who drummed the engine-out landing checklist into my brain. At no time during the incident did I feel scared or panicked... I just did what I knew had to be done and flew the airplane all the way to the end of the landing rollout. Easy-peasy. I know a lot of people don't have as happy an outcome when they experience an engine failure. I realize that I was fortunate to have perfect conditions for my off-airport landing, or I might not have had as happy an outcome myself. If I had been over rough country or mountainous terrain, or flying at night, or IFR over low ceilings, my landing may have been a crash. But because I had clear visibility and plenty of flat terrain to choose a landing spot on, it was relatively uneventful. On the other hand, if it hadn't been for the cowpath that collapsed my nosegear, I would likely be having my airplane fixed right now rather than shopping for a new one. I share this experience with my fellow Mooney pilots because it may help someone else in their aeronautical decision making process or in their flight planning process. I am an avid reader/viewer of aviation-gone-bad articles and videos myself, am constantly learning from them. I hope this experience might help someone else be prepared in case of an emergency of their own. Postscript on the engine failure: when I landed, the entire belly of the airplane was covered with engine oil. I did not remove the cowling then and there, as more than one helpful idiot has suggested I should have done (including the guy from NTSB that called me 20 minutes after my airplane came to a stop in the pasture) but when the salvage crew got it to a nice clean shop and pulled the cowling they found no sign of a catastrophic oil line failure, etc. What they DID find was an oil breather tube covered with oil, and a splatter pattern in the compartment suggesting that an oil passage blockage had occurred somewhere in the engine resulting in the sump oil being blown out the breather tube. There was still about 3 quarts of oil in the sump, and the crankshaft still turned, so my delay in shutting down the engine apparently did not seize it up. I was just informed yesterday by the insurance adjuster that the engine is going to be torn down and inspected as part of the salvage process, and he will keep me informed as to the location of the blockage. FAA and NTSB have both signed off on the incident as an engine failure, and I have not been cited for pilot error. So that is something of a comfort. Postscript on aircraft damage: in addition to the collapsed nosegear, the right main gear was damaged (framework within the wing bent). Two of the 3 prop blades struck the ground and were severely bent, which of course necessitates and engine tear-down and inspection. The engine mounts were not damaged, but there was some deflection of the airframe back of the firewall which the insurance adjuster estimated would require significant repair costs. At this time I still don't know what damage to the engine and/or turbo may have occurred to cause the power failure. So I'll be airplane shopping now. I love the 231/252 platform for a lot of reasons, and I am strongly tempted stick close to home in this respect. Jimmy Garrison at GMax (formerly All American) says he has a lot of options in that area if I'm willing to be patient, and can stomach the high current prices. But I'm somewhat concerned about the growing scarcity of parts for Mooneys, as the factory continues to not make them. So I may stray farther afield into the land of Bonanzas, Cessnas, or Pipers. I guess we shall see. PPS 12/19/21: I posted the following last week farther down in the thread, but I am copying and pasting it here to save folks having to scroll down. I received an unofficial report on the engine postmortem. The engine crew looked first at the turbo, expecting to find the exhaust to be full of oil, indicating the failure was in the turbo (as the loss in manifold pressure suggested). However, there was no oil. The turbo had seized, but that would be expected with almost any loss of oil pressure. The crankshaft had not seized, and still turned easily… they found there was about 3 quarts of oil still in the crankcase. The culprit proved to be a broken exhaust valve in the #4 cylinder, which fell into the cylinder and punched a hole in the top of the piston. I w@s surprised to hear that, as I heard nothing that sounded like any engine cylinder eating a valve I’ve ever heard before (in automotive and small engine applications). The engine guys suggested I might have had enough power to keep the engine going a bit longer, as it was still making some power… but if I had done so, and tried stretching it the 25 miles between the point of failure and the Limon airport, other nastier things might have happened, such as an engine fire. All in all, I think what was basically an uneventful power-off landing in a field was the preferred option, as opposed to a high-speed and high-angle descent in a burning airplane into a fresh crater.

Very interesting discussion, guys. Thanks for the info. I'm frankly surprised that when I got my transition training in my 231 (from a guy who should know!) I was told to use 40" as my target MP. Hmm. Maybe chagrined at having not figured this out sooner... So after all this input and some more reading, contact with my SavvyMX guy, and taking notes, I flew back home last evening in my 231 using the NEW recommended settings for my aftermarket intercooled and Merlyn'd engine. Ambient air temperature at KVCT at takeoff was 89 F. I set my MP at 37", and max'd the RPM at 2650. I set my climb trim to maintain IAS at 199-122 knots, adjusting airspeed up slightly a couple of times to keep peak CHT (Cylinder #6) under 380 F. My climb rate averaged about 600 fpm and my fuel flow was 20.8 gph. TIT was 1413 at max. I climbed to 10,500 MSL just like that with no untoward elevations of my CHT's or my sphincter tone. The engine seemed much happier. But that fuel flow seems low to me, based on the info you fellas have shared. Next week I am going to fly the Savvy Flight Test profile and download the data so Tom and Paul can look at it and make recommendations to my A&P as needed. But as of last night's flight, I am MUCH happier with my engine's temperatures. Thank you all very much for your input.

jlunseth and warren... thanks fellas, that confirms my suspicioning. My engine does have an intercooler and Merlyn wastegate, which I should have mentioned. I've noted fuel flow to be about 24.2 gph at 40" MP, but apparently someone has set the RPM limit slightly low. I will run this past Paul at Savvy, as I indicated previously... I'm wondering if we need to have GAMI look at the injector for #6, as the likelihood of this being a fuel flow issue seems higher to me than other options.

Well, jlunseth, since you and I both fly 231's, I'm curious to pick your brain further on this. I'm finding this discussion VERY interesting. This is my 3rd summer in my 1985 M20K/231, but my first summer after reading Mike Busch's "Engines" book, and in the past 2 summers I havent had occasion to fly when the OATs here in TX have been as high as they have been the past 2 weeks (high 90's to low 100's)). I'm managing my engine a bit differently now, really trying to keep my CHT's under 380 F, and I've been doing OK with that except for my #6 cylinder (the new one installed last December at my Annual from Hell). This has only been a problem for the past 2-3 flights as the summer temps have soared, BTW. Since I acquired my plane I have been following my POH's recommended climb settings: 36" MP and 2600 RPM. Takeoff power per POH is 39-40" and max RPM, which runs 2650-2670 in my aircraft, and I pitch for close to Vy to 1000' AGL, then reduce to 36/2600. On my last 3 flights in the heat I've immediately noticed my #6 CHT's climb into the danger zone (380+) when I make those setting changes for climb. So I've reduced power even further and flattened my climb considerably to get the temps down. Once I get up into cooler air I'm then able to increase power and climb rate as I've been used to doing, as above. But this has led to some pretty slow climbs to cruise altitude. So I'm wondering if I should I be following Mike Busch's recommendation and stay at WOT (39-40") and 2670 RPM, then pitch for 120+ knots vs going to the 252 settings (37" at 2600 RPM) for better cooling? I'll be talking to my rep at SavvyMX about this as well next week, but it can't hurt to discuss with y'all on this site. I'm also thinking I need to have my A&P look at #6's baffles etc on my next oil change, which is coming up shortly. Thoughts?

I agree with all the above. Folks can call me a wuss if they like, but I've found over the years that my sphincter tone goes waaaaay up any time I get a low fuel annunciation, whether in my Toyota Tundra or in my 231. I have also found that my aeronautical decision making process is suspect when I have high sphincter tone, and it's even worse when I also add high detrusor muscle tension (full bladder). Chalk me up as yet another Mooney pilot who on long XC's does a full fuel top-up (with wing rocking) prior to takeoff, then runs the first tank down 10 gals, then runs the remainder of the leg on the other tank. I have never run either tank dry, and don't intend to. I rarely take either tank below the 9 gallon hashmark on my panel gauges. If I have burned 57.6 gallons of fuel (indicated), it's time to land and stretch my legs and unstretch my bladder. I decided some time ago that on any XC flight projected to last longer than 4.5 hours it makes sense to plan a fuel stop somewhere around the midpoint. The Foreflight map menu has an excellent setting for telling me best fuel prices on my route, and that feature works very well on the ground with good Wifi. It doesn't work so well in the flight levels, so I consult this in advance whenever possible. My wife and I have discovered some wonderful little airports and towns where there's cheap fuel, a great diner, and friendly people by following this method. And my physiological stress gauges (sphincter and detrusor) remain happy.

I've trained myself out of that habit, based on a good bit of reading and some discussion on my last BFR... basically, my plan is to keep the gear down until I have run out of usable runway ahead of me. In the event of an engine failure or other emergency immediately after takeoff, I want to be able to use whatever runway I have left without scraping paint. The corollary to that is that once my gear is up in my climbout, it stays up. If I have an engine failure under 1000' AGL, I will be landing on whatever flat surface I can find ahead of my wings and NOT attempting the "impossible turn". Unless I can see a good hard surface ahead of me, my plan is to hit the turf with the wheels up to reduce the chance of flipping the aircraft on touchdown. Again, my CFI and I did some training on this on my last BFR: I configured the aircraft as if I was taking off (40' MP, 2650 RPM, 1/2 flaps, and Vy) and then my CFI cut the power. Even when I was expecting the power loss, getting the nose over and establishing best glide speed takes a good 4-5 seconds, and I lost a MINIMUM of 300' of altitude before BG was attained.

I never thought of that, but I will be adding it to my pre-takeoff checklist. Thanks!

I know that’s the correct GUMPS checklist, but in my head it’s really: Gear down Undercarriage down Make sure the gear’s down Positively sure the gear’s down Spouse reassures me that the gear’s down

Lots of K drivers on here. Ask specific questions and you’ll get lots of answers. There is no shortage of opinions here!!

I’m not an A&P, so don’t take my word for it... but using all the old exhaust system components, hoses, belts, wires and cables as was done on mine is a good start on cheaping out.

blue, I don't see any "hate" directed at Cirrus airplanes or their pilots here, just an honest discussion of the possibility/ probability that the Cirrus parachute and training system may 1) be selective for timid people who would otherwise not become pilots, and 2) encourage people to fail to execute normal aviation problem solving. If you read more than that into this discussion, I think you may be overreading.

I agree completely on the ability of human beings to assess risk. Humans routinely accept terrible risk ratios without blinking if the activity or equipment involved is something they are familiar with. As an ER physician I have seen this at work every day of my career. Yet other activities/equipment that they are comfortable with due to familiarity, but are actually significantly more dangerous than GA, scare people to the point of terror. Example: the media is constantly harping on the "unacceptably high" numbers of people injured or killed with firearms every year. Occasionally they will point out that firearms kill more people than motor vehicle accidents, but that gets shot down (pun intended) pretty quickly when suicides are taken out of the data pool, so we aren't hearing that as much any more. However, when you look at MVC's from the ER perspective, they have a much larger impact on the health and well-being of Americans than firearms. It is a rare day in my moderately busy ER that I don't take care of at least one MVC-injured person. On most days there will be several MVC injuries, most of which are not life-threatening, but significant nonetheless. On the other hand, even though my ER is in a fairly violent south Texas city, I only see a half dozen gunshot wounds per year. Again, most of these GSW's are not life-threatening. I've discussed this with other trauma physicians, and we all have noticed that the media greatly downplays the impact of MVC's on the nation's health while it exaggerates the impact of GSW's and "gun violence". The same analogy applies to MVC's vs GA accidents. People who do not fly are not accustomed to airplanes as they are to motor vehicles. It's simply a familiarity issue. You can show them graphs and charts until you're blue in the face, but the emotional factors in their risk assessment will overwhelm your facts every time. So, yeah, I can see the emotional security a parachute-equipped Cirrus gives may be a huge factor for many people.

Well, first thing: it's not a measurement, it's an extrapolation of risk; in other words, an estimate. Let's not make it out as if 3.5X RR is an actuality. All we can really say with any degree of certainty is that the apparent rate failure of Cirrus aircraft to stay in the air (or on the ground with the shiny side up) is higher than for most other GA aircraft. But your main point is valid and I agree with it: encouraging folks to pull the chute is probably not helping Cirrus pilots to fly their airplanes as effectively as they could.

I agree. I know a couple Cirrus owners who are truly disciplined pilots who do good work. But I have long suspected that there is a subset of Cirrus owners who are, as you say, unsafe. I have often wondered what the Cirrus fatality rate would be if you added all the chute deployments (or even just 75% of them for argument's sake!) to the fatality rate... and the number you've come up with, a relative risk rate of 3.4 compared to the rest of the GA fleet, is damned scary.

I am reluctant to land on unimproved runways in my M20K, so you're not alone here, Ethan... I might risk grass, but dirt/gravel strips with a low-slung Mooney, IMHO you're just asking for trouble! I had the same ambivalence about backcountry accessibility when I traded my 172XP for my Mooney, but in the end it was easy: a realistic evaluation of my actual flying, and the flying I was most likely to continue to do (or expand upon) led me to the conclusion that my real mission was/is medium- to long-distance flying, not backcountry camping. Besides, I live too far from the mountains here to fly a backcountry-capable 172 or 182 or Super Cub to the campgrounds. I have to say, though, the 200 hours I logged in my 172 were tremendously satisfying, and a deep and broad learning experience. I've heard some folks say the first couple hundred hours you get after your PP checkride are the best opportunity for learning how to be a true pilot you'll ever get, and I sure was able to use my Cessna to the max in that regard.

Excellent advice, sir, thanks! When I did my Mooney transition training a few years ago, my CFI had me work on soft field takeoff technique, but it wasn't really practical at 800' MSL on a 90 F Texas afternoon. I've made a note of your ground effect remarks.

Thanks, sir! Initially, I had no intention of exposing my ineptitude on here. But yesterday I watched a YouTube video by Dan Gryder in which he quoted the GA fatal accident stats last year... the number of deaths associated with low-speed stalls in the pattern (both takeoffs and landings) was shocking. Given the fact that I know my aircraft's Minimum Maneuvering Speed, have it placarded on my panel, and watch it like a hawk when I'm in the pattern, this airspeed SNAFU of mine really got my attention. I owe it to y'all to come clean, and take whatever lumps I have coming.

Thanks, Paul. My experience at high altitude airports is very limited, which is part of why I'm planning on taking a 2-day mountain flying course in NM this summer. I have close to 800 hours TT at this point, but that is almost all in the flat lands. FWIW, Rwy 18 at Moriarty is 6201' long, which bears out your comment.

Thanks for the correction, you're spot on. I had based my calculations on the day on standard temp at sea level. FWIW, I ran the numbers again on a DA calculator, and in the conditions that day the DA was 8167'.

My wife and I recently completed our first vacation XC of 2021 in our M20K,from KABI to KVGT and home again, to visit family. The return flight, at 17.5K MSL, was a delightful 4.2 hour cruise, but of course the outbound leg against headwinds between 8500 and 12,500 MSL was a tad longer (6.5 hr). We made a fuel stop at Moriarty NM (field elev. 6420) on the westbound flight. I must confess I made a significant error in failing to calculate takeoff distance after fueling up at Moriarty. I’m used to flying several hundred pounds lighter at 1000’, which rarely requires more than 1600’ for the takeoff roll. So with my brain firmly planted in the mindset that takeoffs are on rails, I failed to watch my airspeed after seeing the needle pass 60 KIAS. At home field elevation the airplane starts trying to leap off the runway within 3-4 seconds after passing 60. My reptilian brain told me to start pulling back on the yoke, but instead of the anticipated brisk liftoff, we stayed firmly planted on the runway. I pulled harder and the nose came up, but an annoying buzzing noise started which I failed to recognize as the stall warning. We lifted off but immediately began drifting left and the controls seemed heavy instead of the usual lightness I have come to expect. My human brain then realized things were not right. I cut power and pushed the yoke forward and we bumped back down onto the runway (on the mains, nose-up attitude was maintained) and while the airplane bled off airspeed my heart rate jumped to compensate. After a brief pause to make sure neither we nor the airplane had suffered any apparent damage, we taxied back to the threshold and my wife and I did a thorough review of possible things that might have gone wrong. It dawned on me that while our turbocharged engine thinks it’s at sea level, the prop and wings are working with thin 6500’ air density. If that were the case, I reasoned, I had tried to rotate too early. We decided to perform a high-speed taxi on the runway to be positively sure all the airplane’s systems were OK. We did a second run-up, triple-checked our takeoff settings, and did our fast taxi while watching the airspeed and all warning lights very carefully. Sure enough, above 67 KIAS the nose tried to lift and the controls felt light and responsive. Moreover, the annoying buzzing sound failed to present itself. However: it took a LOT longer to reach takeoff airspeed than I expected. Rather than take off, we taxied back and reviewed everything one more time. We then put in our takeoff flaps and attitude, applied full power (yep, 40” MP came up just like always) and rolled until the bird lifted off at 67 KIAS. We climbed out of the pattern by textbook numbers without incident and our turbocharged engine took us up to cruise altitude exactly as it always does. I share this embarrassing incident as a way of reminding myself (and maybe you) that it doesn’t matter how much I am “used to” flying my airplane, new and different conditions require careful preparation and operations. Sure, I did our W&B calculations prior to departure, watched my fuel and kept up with the fuel normalizer en route, etec, etc, etc, but one crucial oversight about takeoff rolls at higher altitudes could have been disastrous. My POH tells me that my takeoff roll at standard temperature at 6500 MSL is closer to 2200’ than the 1600’ I have become accustomed to down here in the flatlands. That extra 600 feet takes a lot longer than you’d think it does. I got careless in this case and made an error that, if I had persisted in being stupid, could have seriously wrecked our airplane or even killed us. Stalls on takeoff killed over 80 people in GA in 2020. Density altitude was a contributing factor in a significant number of those fatal crashes. I hope telling on myself in this way serves to remind other Mooney pilots that our high performance aircraft are still subject to the same laws of aerodynamics as every other airplane. Watch density altitude. It can bite.

I agree whole heartedly, and I am not being unkind here. First job is to define your mission. For example, when I made my move “up” to a M20K/231, I had put a lot of thought into mission. First, I fly for business quite a lot, mostly intermediate distances (250-500 NM), and I needed an IFR capable airplane that could get me to these places expiditiously. Second consideration, my wife and I have 7 adult children between us in TX, NV, OK, WI, and NY, so we wanted a bird thar could take us there in reasonable times in comfort. We rarely have a third person on board, so big payload wasn’t a factor. Since 85% of my flying is way south, FIKI wasn’t a major consideration. But we vacation in mountains a lot, so high altitude performance was mandatory. With these considerations in mind, the Mooney 231, 252, and higher grade airplanes were tops on my list. You have already told us that you need high altitude performance, and your bird must be icing-capable at least, if not all out FIKI rated. I’m sorry, but the first knocks the SR-20 and 182 out right away. At the very least you need a turbo normalized engine, and frankly I’d not settle for anything less than a fully turbocharged engine. Also, and this isn’t a knock on you, you’re a pretty fresh new pilot. A high performance airplane is going to be a stretch for you. I had about 350 hours before buying my Mooney, and 200 of that was in complex aircraft. The step up to the workload-intense 231 presented challenges for me; enjoyable challenges, but I had to work to achieve what I consider a level of conscious competence as M20K pilot. If I were in your shoes, I’d get a 182/182 RG, and put a solid 150-200 hours in it before moving up to a high performance and higher cost to operate airplane.

As the old saying goes, the answer to any technical question is "it depends". How often you fly is probably the most important factor. If you want the opinion of someone (A&P/IA) who knows more about engines than most A&P's, you might want to read this article: https://www.avweb.com/ownership/the-savvy-aviator-52-thinking-about-oil-changes/#:~:text=As a rule-of-thumb,proportionately reduced oil-change interval. Note that it's an oldis article, and he has since changed his opinion on oil additives, but as far as I'm aware all the other advice is current. I've been adding CamGuard to my oil for at least 4 years as a consequence. So far, so good!

Thanks for the detailed update, Paul. Very interesting to hear of your experience. As I learned in my last year's Annual From Hell, you are dead nuts on about the complications of installing a rebuilt turbo engine. The previous owner of my 231 chose to cheap out when installing the rebuilt engine in 2016, so the cost of getting it done right was passed downstream to me in 2020. Yes, there are regrets about having to spend the time and money to do these things as they are supposed to be done, but in the end you get an airplane that runs as it is supposed to and that you can rely on to not fall out of the sky under you! This is, in the end, worth the cost.