Prior owner

You’re going to drive yourself crazy if you start placing a level on the ground and on the wings to determine whether the discs are worn- the service manual (or is it an Service Bulletin /Instruction/Letter?) has the procedure for taking a measurement - taken the top of the main gear strut when the plane is loaded with fuel and sitting on its wheels. You measure how high the strut collar sits above the area where it normally seats. Mooney gives a maximum dimension- someone here will know what it is for an M20C. I’m not near any manuals right now… The nose gear is not allowed to have any gap between the strut collar and the gear, I believe… This needs to be confirmed by reviewing the Mooney materials, though. For shimmy, I’d be looking at tire condition (scalloped?), wheel balance, wheel bearing nut torque… if those are fine, then start looking at the gear. Nobody seems to balance wheels these days. When you do, you are horrified at how much weight it takes to get them balanced!

Sounds like you need to jack the whole plane, confirm that the tire sizes are correct, tire pressures, check wheel bearing tightness and condition, nose wheel/rudder/pedal alignment, nose gear pivot bolt bushing condition & torque, steering horn condition, condition of steering rod ends, nose gear truss for play/ proper shimming, main gear bushing wear, condition of Lord discs (did someone replace the discs on only one main gear? (I have seen this done, and don’t recommend it). The addition of the nose gear strut spacer kit isn’t a magic bullet- it will only work if caster is the reason for your woes…almost all of the time I have been able to correct tracking issues without installing the spacer. Investigate- Good luck!

Definitely look at your rudder to nose wheel rigging. Also, what tires pressures are you running…? 30 psi for all three tires?

Standard A&P stuff….the wires are numbered and can be found on the electrical system diagram.

Best not to go with the lowest bidder for your overhaul…

Nice looking C model!

Before I go into my experience, what oil level are you starting your consumption measurement from? Try filling oil to 5.5 - 6 qts only, put 4 hours on it, then check it the next day when it’s cold- did you really lose a full quart? If you’re starting at 7 quarts, you’re not doing yourself any favors. I too, had issues with my channel chrome cylinders… compressions were good, engine power seemed fine, my oil consumption was a little bit worse than yours, and I spent a good deal of time researching the issue, worrying about it, manipulating my vent tube placement, making a whistle hole, eventually installing an Airwolf oil/air separator, and finally, removing the separator. The fact is, you have chrome cylinders…and like many of the owners who do, you’re never going to enjoy the ridiculously low oil consumption numbers that you sometimes read in this forum. Provided you don’t have any other cylinder health issues and you aren’t exceeding the oil consumption limits In Lycoming’s manual, chrome doesn’t have to be a bad thing. For $600+ An oil/air separator will keep your belly clean and might even give you another 0.25 to 0.5 hours more per quart, but you’ll be feeding combustion byproduct acids right back into your engine- I’ve cleaned too many of these things out, and they just don’t completely separate ALL the acids and water from the oil…. A breather vent pipe accomplishes this task much better. In my limited experience, I would say, have the engine inspected and assessed properly, so that you can stop worrying about it, and feed the beast oil while you enjoy your plane for years to come… or, buy 4 new cylinders and be done with it. The maintenance history on my cylinders was poorly documented, and although my engine was only about 65 hours out of overhaul when I bought the plane, from what I could gather, the chrome cylinders had 200+ hours on them, and my borescope revealed that someone (overhaul shop?) had run a hone through all of them (which is a no-no), and they were all glazed. My oil temp was also elevated due to excessive cylinder blowby. I wasn’t going to put another hour of my time or another dollar into attempts to de-glaze & re-ring chrome cylinders that had been damaged with a hone…so I installed 4 new cylinders. My Tailpipe is now dry, my breather drips a few drops on the ground at the end of each flight, and oil consumption is much better. You might be in a different situation as far as the condition of your cylinders- a qualified A&P with a borescope should be able to properly assess your situation. Here’s one cylinder at roughly 100 hours SMOH and its intake valve (all the cylinders were in about the same condition)- obviously, I had more issues than just glazed cylinders:

Time for a Surefly?

Buy plastic razor blades on Amazon and get rid of it. Mask and apply correct sealant!

I bought a pair of the Citizen Tokyo bikes for the Mooney, a little more than two years ago after starting this thread- they are a little bit heavy, they are a great deal, they are well made, and they will fit on the rear seat and in the baggage compartment of our ‘64. 6 speeds is nice to have, provided you are on mostly flat ground. Occasional mild inclines are fine, but the bikes won’t climb hills at all- the geometry makes it impossible to climb hills with them. Not a huge problem- we just don’t take them where we know we’ll get stuck pushing them. We didn’t get the electric option, so I don’t know whether that would have solved the problem. All in all, we were happy with our purchase.

Pics!

I have always assumed that fully closed was when the cowl flap edge matched up with the engine cowl edge (same height, streamlined).

I’m not saying that it will ruin the case when you apply it, rather, I’m saying that to get it all off later at overhaul time, that it can be very tenacious stuff…to the point that chipping it off of aluminum might require a metal chisel. I have used it to repair things like transmission housing ears and speedo drive towers that had broken off… and the repairs have lasted for years. If the surface is prepped properly, it really doesn’t want to come off later. I was just thinking about the next guy. Using pro-seal eliminates this possibility. Use my opinion, though.

You can permanently ruin the case by applying JB weld, as the case may be damaged later when it is time to remove it. I wouldn’t go that route…. Save the JB Weld for automotive repairs!

Buying another old KX155 to replace yours is really rolling the dice…..with fairly bad odds. Actually, doing anything with these old radios is rolling the dice. The capacitors are old and leak all over the boards and make a mess. Cleaning it up and repairing it is not a pleasant job, and afterwards you really don’t know how much longer the radio is going to keep ticking… That said, I don’t have a lot of need for fancy avionics, so elected to send my KX155 to KX155.com because I couldn’t bring myself to buy another old, used radio with an unknown history. I also didn’t feel like doing an install for a brand new nav/comm. Perhaps I was just feeling lazy? He really knows these radios and he “overhauled” the radio and adjusted everything correctly. It comes with a short warranty. 60 days? The radio came back looking brand new and has worked flawlessly for the last 12 months. It was the cheapest option for me, and as I have retired from IFR flying, I don’t need anything an iPad won’t give me, as long as I have two comms. My glide slope wasn’t working before I sent it in, and it works great now. Just one option. I think it was under $1600. If you want to see prices of used KX155’s, they are listed on eBay every day. Or go to: www.partsforplanes.com

the maintenance manual for your model and year

There might be one reason why the entire row of circuit breakers is not on the same bus bar- to change one of the CB’s out, the entire row would have to be removed from the panel and pushed back together. A jumper will allow the other CB’s to be removed individually. But I don’t know that this is the reason for the arrangement. It might be part of the reason why?

I’m still having trouble believing you might have busted ring(s)…. Burning only a quart of oil every 7 hours with a broken ring seems unlikely. But I’ve seen stranger things, I guess. [Edit] whoops, I missed the final verdict! Glad to hear you’re not facing anything too harrowing!

FYI- The master switch also controls the generator field circuit in the older planes. Not sure that’s his problem though…

I couldn’t say without looking at it… but I would bet there is enough there to bring in over $20k in revenue, if the control surfaces aren’t toast. Used Mooney parts are becoming a gold mine- for instance, you can’t always find a Johnson bar when you need one, and LASAR isn’t repairing them anymore (not the last time I asked them, anyway…). Texas Air Salvage wanted $800 for the one they had not so long ago… The Garmin alone might be worth $5k. The $30 sale price would make it worth the effort, I think

That would be a logical place to start troubleshooting… undo the screws from the belly panel and make sure that the antenna connector is securely attached to the antenna. Check also the antenna connection at the back of the unit. Sometimes people don’t connect the BNC connector at the antenna while re-installing the belly panel. Clean the outside of the antenna, and the inside of the socket with contact cleaner, while you have it open. do you have line of sight with a DME facility ? Has the DME ever worked properly in your plane?

If you had the adapter for the right magneto that is used when timing the magneto, you could run a long wire to the cockpit from that adapter- ground the lead inside the cockpit for engine start, and then disconnect it from ground after the engine is started. Turn the ignition switch to “off” and see if the engine still runs. You have then ruled out the magneto, harness, plugs. All that remains is the switch, correct wiring, and the p-lead.

For conversion You will need: IO-360, completely dressed STC Engine Mount Engine isolators & bolts New lower cowl, complete, with flexible ducting New Exhaust IO baffling Ram air cable, switch, CB, warning light Electric fuel pump Fuel pressure gauge oil cooler New throttle & mixture controls Lots of little parts I’ve only seen one. He must have had a donor plane for cheap parts..

This is a pretty good article explaining what we’re talking about regarding P-lead issues with the Bendix mag on the right side in the Mooney: Aged P-leads and spark issues

If you checked switch function, then it may be an intermittent bad P-lead- conductor wire is grounding out to the shield wire.