PT20J

Here’s a link where someone took one apart. Forgot one more thing: Instructions that came with transducer said not to mount it to the engine. I might try removing it from the engine mounting and rotating it 180 degrees. Still interested if others have run into this problem with the Mooney design. https://www.euroga.org/forums/maintenance-avionics/3929-shadin-floscan-201-fuel-flow-transducer-internals

Interesting. Do you know if this is a factory installation? It doesn't match the IPC which shows wires down.

Soaked mine in Hoppes No. 9 and it worked better but still would sometimes hang up. FWIW, a tech at Shadin said that although Floscan claims 10,000 hours on the transducers, he's regularly seen them get flaky after about 20 years.

The '94 J I purchased last summer is equipped with a factory installed Miniflo-L. The fuel flow would intermittently drop to zero when I bought it. The previous owner had sent the panel unit back to Shadin and it checked out OK and has the latest software version. I replaced the transducer with a new Floscan 201B from JPI (which now owns Floscan) and set the Miniflo-L K-factor to 28.9 to match the new transducer. It seems to read about 6% high, which surprised me as the transducer is rated at 0.5% at 16 gph with 1% linearity. I note that the Mooney factory installation varies from Floscan mounting requirements. Floscan says to mount with the wires facing up; Mooney mounts with the wires facing down. Floscan says no sharp bends within 6 inches; Mooney uses a 45-deg elbow at the inlet side. Of course, I can easily tweak the Miniflo-L K-factor setting to match actual fuel use. But, I'm suspicious of a digital system being so far off and I wonder if others have experienced this with the factory setup. Skip

Seems like everywhere I go, the FBOs have the nose wheel scooper upper tugs. I fly mostly on the west coast, but have some trips planned east later this year. I'm wondering if tugs that grab the nose gear are more prevalent in other parts of the country.

My '94 M20J has some rubbing, especially on the rivet heads. I thought about tape and researched various types but this seemed like a band-aid. And, since most of the rubbing is on the rivet heads, I was unsure how long the tape would hold up and how difficult it would be to periodically replace. My rivet damage is minor, but I saw an Ovation on the ramp the other day and it was so bad that nearly ALL the rivet heads on the top of the flap were worn down to about half their original thickness. I'm not even sure that was airworthy. Don Maxwell suggested an idea that I tried and it worked really well. Lower the flaps slightly. Put a wooden paint stirrer on top of the flap and use a stiff putty knife between the paint stirrer and the trailing edge of the wing to gently flex the wing skin upward deforming it very slightly. After carefully doing this along the length of the flap, I am now able to slide a piece of cardboard from the back of pad of paper between the flap and the wing trailing edge with the flaps up with only a slight drag on the cardboard as it passes the rivets. Before, I couldn't even slip a piece of paper between. Before doing any of this, I checked the hinge play, rigging, flap stops and flap twist , and all were within spec. Skip

1/32” per M20J service manual 32-50-01. S/N 24-1464 on have stops which should be checked/adjusted at annual.

Interesting question. I doubt it makes much difference. Trim drag is primarily the incremental induced drag caused by the wing flying at a higher angle of attack to support the tail down force, and, to a lesser extent, the induced drag of the tailplane creating the tail down force. Near the trim point, any small elevator deflection necessary to generate the tail down force should cause negligible parasite drag. Anyone know why the K and later models switched from the trim assist bungees to a variable downspring? I'm guessing that as the speeds increased, the stick force gradient with airspeed was insufficient to give good stick "feel" around the trim point at higher airspeeds which would be the usual reason for adding a downspring, but I don't know for certain. From Bryan's picture, this change seems to have caused the elevator trim position to shift from slightly nose down to slightly nose up.

Nice picture. Looks like the elevator is aligned pretty well with the stabilizer as expected.

Always nice to have the thunderstorms behind you . This looks like the elevator is deflected up maybe 8-10 degrees. IIRC the K has a variable downspring like the long bodies. So, I wonder if all the models with the downspring trim in cruise with the elevator up.

There are some interesting comments in your post that might help your mechanic find the solution. I note that you stated that you "had" these installed so I'm assuming that you had an A&P do it. Since the problem happened as a result of that work, I'd go back to the mechanic with it. However, a lot of mechanics are not good troubleshooters -- especially with electrical problems. You said that you had "wiring reconfigured." Do you know exactly what was done? If the the JPI and factory gauges use separate probes, it would be a good troubleshooting technique to switch the probes and see if the problem follows the probe. The LED lights draw less current than the incandescents and usually grounding problems are worse with more current, not less, since the poor grounding increases the resistance somewhere and the voltage drop across a resistance is proportional to the current flow. However, LED lights can be a source of high frequency noise which could be finding it's way into the gauge somehow. Are there any funny noises in the intercom or radio audio - especially the ADF if you still have one - associated with the operation of the lights? You said it happens in flight. If it doesn't happen on the ground, that's a clue. What's different in flight? Engine running? Other loads on the electrical system? Alternator charging? Higher bus voltage? Until you find a way to reproduce it on the ground, it will be difficult to troubleshoot. You said that there is a delay of ten to fifteen seconds before the gauge needle rises briskly. Pretty much everything electrical in the airplane goes on instantaneously when power is applied. Do the lights go on immediately when you flip the switch, or are they delayed also? A delay is very unusual and probably a good clue. Maybe something heats up somewhere and changes resistance. The problem is probably easy to fix, but it will take a methodical approach to troubleshooting to find it. A good mechanic or radio shop technician should be able to figure this out. Skip

I have an EFD 1000 and I like it. It has GPSS built in which is nice. Aspen takes care of their past customers and they try to play nice with all the other avionics vendors so you don't find yourself painted into a corner. I find their technical support folks very knowledgeable and helpful and easily reachable by phone.

My 1994 J had electric Precise Flight speed brakes installed at the factory. They’ve been sent back to Precise Flight for overhaul a couple of times by previous owners. They are painted red and the paint looks original. Seems like most of you have red anodized. Does anyone know why mine might be painted instead of anodized? Skip

I think the FAA is going to consider installation of a back seat bladder to be a major alteration since you have to connect to the existing certified fuel system, strap it down somehow to existing structure, and maybe install a transfer pump. That’s going to require a 337, engineering data and a field approval. Not saying it can’t be done, but there are hoops to jump through. The original question was about adding an extra fuel tank in the baggage compartment which, due to weight limitations in that area, would be limited to something less than 20 gallons. IMHO, a better option would be to see if an STC is availble to intall long range tanks. Skip

I was thinking of people who use ferry tanks for ferrying. How do the world travelers make the installation legal?

Good question! To be airworthy, the airplane has to conform to its type certificate. The Supplemental Type Certificate that allows installation of the speed brakes modified the original type certificate. If they were still installed, you could just mark them inop. But, if you remove them you would either need to return the airplane to its original configuration, or get a ferry permit.

Ferry tanks are not designed for permanent installation. Think you’d have to operate on a ferry permit.

Don’s right. Your A&P should handle the details. Legally the airplane would be considered unairworthy in its current state and without a ferry permit you might find you have no insurance coverage.

It was a four course range that used tones. VOR transmits an omnidirectional reference signal and a rotating directional signal and the phase difference between the two defines the radial. The antenna is a dipole and each whisker makes up one half of the antenna. It is not two separate antennas connected together.

VOR, localizer and GS are all horizontally polarized - that’s why the dipole antenna spreads out horizontally. The blade and towel bar style antennas are split on each side of the fin. So, it probably works fine to reverse it. Still, the is no way to be sure without doing it and then measuring the change in antenna pattern. There must be some reason Mooney mounted it the way it did and it would be good to know that.

My 78 J had V antenna facing forward. It probably doesn’t matter as Piper and Cessna mount them the other way around. But still, there may be some reason, so if you change it you’d be the test pilot and it might invalidate IFR certification. I’d check with a knowledgeable radio shop or LASAR. I wouldn’t expect any drag reduction as it will still be two rods sticking in the slipstream. Round cross sections are draggy and it doesn’t matter if they face forward or back. If you want a better look and lower drag, get the “blade” style antenna.

I’ve use the Scratch Off kit. Works well. Also works well on minor scrarches on auto clear coat, plastic headlight covers, and scratched DVDs. When I ran out of kit abrasives, I used Novus scratch remover 2 and 3 from a local plastic store.

Thrust = drag. To go faster, you have to increase thrust or decrease drag. As noted, decreasing drag is more efficient. Mooney started out with a design that packages 4 people in the smallest wetted area (with a cabin width greater than the Bonanza). The aerodynamic cleanup for the 201 got the low hanging fruit in drag reduction. When Mooney ran out of aerodynamic tricks, it did what everyone else does and went to bigger engines.

Sounds like some basic troubleshooting is in order. Separate mechanical issues from electrical. Two most likely issues are mechanism so stiff that trim servo stalls, or weak trim servo. With electric trim off, can you manually move the trim wheel easily from stop to stop? If not, find the source of the problem. Clean and lube easy to get to stuff first. The trim carrier bearing is not that hard to get to and should be serviced but is not likely the cause of the problem. Most heavily loaded parts are the jackscrew and associated thrust bearings. Does alt hold work without tripping trim switch/breaker? Put in alt hold and vary airspeed with power and this will exercise autotrim. If this works, you know that the trim servo is good and the problem is in the manual electric trim either in wiring, switch or the KFC 200 flight computer. Skip

This is a lot less expensive than the 3M UHMW tape that Mooney specifies. I bought some to try but haven’t tried it yet. https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00823JBVG?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_pd_title Maintence Manual has procedure for adjusting gear doors flush.