Austintatious

I am curious why you would prefer a yoke. Is it just because you have not flown side stick? It is one of those things that seems weird until you fly it just a short while. It is not a difficult transition at all. If you have not sat in a Cirrus, I suspect when you do, you will understand. It is like sitting in a roomy sedan vs a Corvette when compared to the Mooney. My father is considering an airplane... He wants to buy into my Rockets but I am urging him to go with the Turbo Cirrus. Similar performance, nice cabin that is easy to get in and out of and the BRS chute. Heck, I may sell one of the rockets and go in on a Turbo cirrus with him.

I am not sure I agree. Cirrus may be good at marketing, However I think a lot of people underestimate the allure of a nice roomy cabin. You put 10 wives in 10 different 4pSE airplanes each and not knowing anything about specs, they are going to pick that Cirrus 10 out of 10 times. That Pipestrel is definitely cool and has nice specs. The thing is that getting the average lady into one is a tough sell, especially if she gets to experience a cirrus cockpit/cabin. Which is sort of my whole point... Performance is nice, but if you have to make large trades in creature comfort to get it, that is a harder sell. I have a hard time believing that anyone that was in the market for a brand new aircraft did not explore other options. I also have a hard time believing that anyone who sat in a new mooney and a New Turbo Cirrus would choose the Mooney. The difference in cockpit feel and roominess is simply staggering. So IMHO, it is fair to say that the creature comforts, the performance, BRS safety feature and the marketing all played a part in the Success of Cirrus. We can of course disagree on how much of a role each played. I am definitely a big Mooney fan... I own 2 rockets for crying out loud. But Even I have to admit, If the price between the rocket and a Turbo Cirrus was the same, I'd be flying a Cirrus.

The problem as I see it for mooney is that even with a clean sheet design, they wont have a product that is better than what is out there... They have to compete with Cirrus... and while the newest moonies are certainly faster and more efficient than the Turbo cirrus, it is not by a great deal and you give up a TREMENDOUS amount of cabin space AND the ballistic chute to choose the mooney over the Cirrus. Until Cirrus came along, the Mooney had a massive speed/efficiency advantage over the competition and the relative cabin size was not that far off. So you didn't really give up anything for those advantages. If Mooney was to go with a clean sheet design... what is that going to be? A cirrus with a backwards tail and retracts? They would be playing catch up and trying to steal BACK sales and doing so without being able to offer a superior product...Possibly equal but not superior. The fact is that the only thing a Cirrus lacks is Retracts. Beyond that it is just about as perfect as one can get for a SE 4 place aircraft. Other than retracts there is not much that can be done to make it considerable faster or more efficient. So, they can either figure out how to make a 200 Knot Mooney cost half that of a new turbo Cirrus... OR likely fade into the history books. I think we are seeing the obvious of those 2 happening. Yes It is sad. I just don't see how buying Mooney would possibly be a smart move. There is no clear future for the company. If your plan was to buy it and go with a clean sheet design, what, other than a name does your money buy? You woudl be better to invest the money into a completely new venture for whatever design you have in mind. The ONLY idea I can come up with is that Mooney could potentially tap into a smaller more niche market.... Perhaps use the tooling for the existing wings and build a Tandem 2 place version with heaps of power. Maybe clip the wing a bit and have an efficient 250+ knot 2 place aerobatic aircraft. I would buy one in a heartbeat especially if it was a Taildragger with retracts. This would be a phenomenal training platform that even some military's might buy, a great cross country aircraft for a Couple and a fun 100$ burger airplane to go bore holes in the sky on weekends. Paint em like a P51 and go have a blast.

Hey everyone, if you are a cfi or know of one who would be willing to give primary instruction in a grumman out of KDAL please contact me. The student would be a new pilot and he will meed ground and flight instruction and will likely want to fly very often once training begins. Thanks, Austin

I have seen this notion that the mooney will not slow down without the gear down mentioined twice now and it is prompting me to tell this story about a friend. First off, this is a half truth. For a normal flight profile, this is largely true as we typically enter the patter out of a descent. So heres the chain. 1. Airplane gets a bath 2. Pilot decides to take it around the pattern to blow dry it. Never gets fast, never gets high. 3. About base turn, pilot recieves a call. Newfangled avionics/comms put call into av headset. Pilot takes call only to tell them he will call back when on ground. 4. No gear warning heard on final, aircraft otherwise fully configured. 5. Scraaaaaaaaaaaape. The gear horn was found to be non functional, even though the aircraft was fresh out of annual. 1 year down for repairs. Lesson 1. while out of a normal flight profile, the mooney is tough to slow down, do not let that instill a false sense of security. These planes can and do slow down to approach speed sans gear under the right conditions. This particular mooney was a rocket. Lesson 2. Make sure the person doing your annual checks your gear horn function and that the horn is loud Enough to actually hear.

Thanks everyone, Yes the pic in my OP is just an example of what I would like to put on my mooney. I hear those CF lower doors are sort of an orphaned STC. Surprised Laser didnt pick it up.

Well, don't let another 4 go by!

Hello everyone.... I know this has been discussed before, but when I search for info I do not find what I am looking for. I have year models 79 and 84 M20k (231's) with Rocket conversions. Neither of them have inner gear doors. And the plastic fairings that mount below the wings and behind the wheels are also missing. Both have brake calipers on the rear (I think that was a mod.) The thing is, when I search on the interwebs, I find pictures of M20K 231's that both have and do not have the inner gear doors. Yet when I search for gear doors I find no source for M20k 231 replacements. So what gives, did 231's have inner gear doors or not? Can they be added? Will the M20k doors fit? Are there replacement plastic fairings available? (the conical trailing plastic that sits under the wing behind the tire) If you are wondering WHY I am asking this.... My aircraft both have every speed mod that can go on them. In fact one of them even lacks a step. Yet they do not make the published rocket speeds. I know those speeds are probably a bit optimistic. However, I can feel/hear the rumble of tumbling air coming from somewhere in the aircraft. I was trying to figure out where is is coming from and the only 2 places I think it could be coming from is either the cowl flaps, or the open wheel wells. The sound does not change when the Cowl flaps are opened/closed. So I started exploring the wheel well situation. It would be fun to add these and note any differences they make, noise and speed wise. I have a good grip on how these perform so I could make a pretty solid comparison if I did it.

I would greatly appreciate it!

Thank you everyone... I think I do have the rocket STC paperwork... PJclark, if you have it handy, an electronic version would be really awesome... Ill owe you a beer! My email address is Austinswill@gmail.com

Hello everyone... A maintenance facility is having trouble after an engine install... They are unable to get the Manifold pressure down from 39" to the prescribed 38". This is a brand new turbo and an overhauled controller. Furthermore, they cannot get the RPM up to 2650 on a static run... they were able to get it from 2550 to 2600, but cannot get the last 50 RPM. This is a brand new propeller and prop governor. It is unlikely the prop governor because we took one off another rocket that was making full RPM in static run and put it on... still low RPM. The prop had even been taken off and sent BACK to a prop shop for an inspection to eliminate it as a cause. Everyone seems to be at a loss as to what to do now. We seem to be completely stuck. any ideas greatly appreciated.

Count my vote for the MH o2D2..... saves a ton of OXygen... I only have to fill my tank once per year and I use O2 on EVERY flight. About 100 hours per year. you can hear that you are getting it and better yet it sounds an alarm if your passengers aren't breathing properly.

Hey everyone... We have noticed that our tach time rolls even when we are at low RPM... This results in a 1 hour flight recording 1.2 or 1.3 for an entire flight. As I understand it, the tach should not be recording time in this manner, but much slower when at lower RPM. We mostly use this to put money in the kitty for maintenance/overhaul, however we have realized that we may be wracking up engine hours which devalues the aircraft. I cannot see any brand name/ model number on this tach so no help there.... I am wondering if any other mooney/rocket owners can let me know what this situation might be. Thanks

I am familiar with the procedure and the things one can do wrong to cause this issue, I just do not have the tools. When setting the metered and UN-metered pressure, the manual states that the fuel pressure regulator must be taken out of the system, then the values set 5% higher than book specifications. The fuel pressure regulator is then reconnected and adjusted to get the proper full throttle fuel flow. The manual states that this is critical or the partial throttle fuel flow will not be adequate. I believe whoever set this failed to do this and that is why I am having issues. I need more than just the fittings you mentioned, I also need the stuff to remove and cap the fuel pressure regulator.

I’m looking for someone near Lexington that might be willing to take a night time aerial photo I would like to have printed for a gift. It would probably take 30 min of flying and I would be happy to buy the photo. if you have a good camera, and aircraft near KLEX and need an excuse to fly then hit me up and I can tell you about tHe mission

No, cant seem to find a mechanic with the knowledge or tools.

Obviously that wouldn't be good... That being said... do you really think a strobe is going to BLIND anyone? I mean if the other pilot stares straight at it maybe. have you ever been blinded by the aircraft in front of you that just turned on their strobes for takeoff? ANd BTW, just so y'all know I am not being stubborn... I rarely fly at night and do in fact turn my strobes off as I pull into the ramp just because they annoy me. I always leave my Nav lights on though just so I don't forget the master.

Who cares 4 CFR 91.209(b) says that if you have an anti-collision light system installed, it needs to be used (day or night) unless the pilot deems it unsafe (taxiing, fog, etc.).

Leave your nav and strobe lights on ALWAYS!!!!

I have not seen them get that far off, but I have seen them be pretty much equal on some days. Typically my GEM probe is reading 50 degrees higher. but not always.

I like your paint job

FWIW, I have read up on, contemplated and performed this test in both my rockets. The principal is this... at a known power setting (MP/RPM) 1700 degrees is the max temp the TIT should reach. Since we can do that for up to 1 min, the POH says to perform this procedure to identify the inaccuracy of our TIT probe. As I understand it, this is to be done every flight. I have a GEM and the stock TIT probe, so what I do personally is use whichever one is higher and run just under 1600 degrees as per the rocket power settings. (1600/1650 max). So I lean to get my highest reading TIT probe to about 1590. Someone said that thermocouples are usually accurate to a "few degrees"... I am not sure if I agree with that. In performing the Rocket TIT test I have seen both my probes vary in their error by about +/- 25 to +/- 50 degrees on different days. I have no idea why this might be the case. It could be caused by minor variances in exhaust flow or some other variable. It could just be the inaccuracy of the probe. Perhaps thermocoupels ARE quite accurate, but in practice I have seen variations in the readings from one day to the next IE: day one probe A hits 1600 for peak and probe B hits 1650. Day 2 probe A hits 1650 and probe B hits 1700. I don't do the test every flight. At this point I am convinced that by going by my hottest probe (which can change one day to the next) and keeping it at 1590 or lower that I should not ever be exceeding the 1650 max in the rocket power setting chart. On some days I cant even lean that far or my cylinder #5 starts to get too warm. So on those days I may have my hottest probe at 1550. I love the Rocket. The only disappointment is how TIT limited it is. Running LOP is pretty much impossible at anything above 55% power. I have tried leaning quickly to try to get past the TIT peak, but it seems I run into rough engine running at that point. I am fine with this, I am still moving around at 200 knots burning 17 gallons an hour and that is pretty damned impressive.

I just found this thread... Did a pretty long flight in the rocket yesterday. M20k. https://flightaware.com/live/flight/N305RK/history/20201013/1830Z/2R4/KFTW I Topped it off to the point that fuel was about an inch OVER the plate. I then took off, burned 20 gallons from the right tank and then ran the left tank until the engine started to falter. Total fuel burn at that point was 53 gallons. This means I only got 33 usable gallons from the left tank. Next time I top off I will do this but start on the left tank. Then I will know how much total usable I have. I am a bit miffed I only got 33 out of the left tank. If the right is the same, That is pretty pathetic. 66 usable gallons with 15 remaining for reserve leaves 51 gallons for T/O cruise and descent. I typically burn 20-25 gallons the first hour depending on how high I climb. Then about 17 per hour after that doing from 180-210 ktas depending on altitude. I made it from Pensicola to Fort worth non stop with a headwind, but I was really working the numbers to do so. Right Fuel guage was showing a tad over the 9 gallon mark when I landed, totalizator said I burned 58 gallons.. During descent and arrival I had it pulled back to 10gph doing about 140 kias. By my calculation I had at least 30 min of reserve with the 6-10 gallons I had left. What sucks is that if I had the full 37 gallons per side, I would have still had 15 gallons on board. Maybe I am still just not used to such small fuel numbers. In the aircraft I fly for a living, if I have less than 600 gallons on board after I land I have messed up!

Attention Rocket owners. I upgraded my RH mag to a surefly. Come to find out it was a stupid move because the Bendix mag only had about 100 hours on it. I can provide verification of the hours and the harness is still attached. Make an offer!

I just cant get my head around the LSA thing... It is an interesting story. The idea was to make it easier to get a LS certificate and then make it so that manufacturers could build new, light, safe and "cheap" aircraft for those LS pilots to fly.... Now there are LS aircraft that cost a bazzilian dollars and cant get anywhere and they get there SLOW! I don't understand the allure. There were already lots of options for people that wanted to go bore holes in the sky. Why is there such a market for this? It really perplexes me.