Ross Taylor

Okay, I called Hi Tech Foams (Seatfoam.com) and spoke with Janice...and ordered two large seat cushion foam laminate pieces. She was delightful and I appreciate the referral to them. Even without her/their expertise, I'd do business with them again just for the pleasure of the experience.

It's a '66 E and these have been stiff since I bought the plane, about a year ago. Being a new-to-me aircraft, without any prior time in a different Mooney, I didn't know what "normal" should feel like. This should be an easy fix and I look forward to the smooth operation to come! Thanks all - I agree that it looks like an easy fix, involving moving those clamp locations up. On a good note, my A&P just called and he is pulling my E out of the hangar now. Annual is starting!

I sort of expected I'd find this, after reading some other threads...and I found we've got firewall rubbing (clearly, based on the indentations!) on ours. And that excess push/pull wire tore through the SCAT tubing, too. I am waiting for the annual, so these will get added to the squawk list. Pics for clarification and suggestions.

What @gsxrpilot said! An autopilot is both a convenience and a safety item, in my opinion. I'm not suggesting you read a book or take a nap, but an autopilot allows you to go hands off to examine a chart or look up airport info or pee. And on a longer flight it helps limit fatigue. Trimming for "pretty good level flight" is good, but it's not the same as an autopilot. If all you'll ever do is putter around your home drome, it's not necessary and you might never use it...but for anything else, they sure are nice. PS - @MooneyStrike as the owner of an E with an autopilot, I fully support your search for a good E model. I know this veered a bit into "hey, buy a J" land, but the E's a great plane. Don't let the helpful suggestions cause you to doubt your original thoughts. I owned an almost-new (factory demo) Diamond Star DA-40 for a couple of years. It was a great plane and a joy to fly, but I'd not trade our E.

Okay, a great recommendation and I'll give them a call today! Thanks @Andy95W and @MooneyMitch

Reviving an older thread, because I didn't find anything more current or definitive. While I await an annual, I'm going to replace the seat bottom cushion foam. The seat covers are leather, and in good shape. And I've redone the back foam with some additional lumbar support...that was easy. But the seat bottom foam is more complex. I do have an electric carving knife for this, so I'm not afraid to cut foam to shape...but, I did not have good luck with my first attempt at making a bottom foam cushion. I pieced together foam, like the prior seat was done...I used 3M Super 77 and it worked fine until the ADS-B upgrade...where I'm guessing there were lots of knees on the pilot seat and the side block tore free. So, since I'm down for a while, I thought it would make sense to replace the bottom seat cushions. And I'd like to just get a replacement cushion that's pre-made/fits. I've seen mention of cushions from Aircraft Spruce, but it seems they only carry the foam blocks. If you used that, which one did you get? I've also seem mention of SCS Interiors, but I'm not clear from their site if they make the cushions to shape or just sell foam. They have lots of pre-cut carpet kits shown, but no premade seat foam. So, does anyone have any more recent sources or favorites or suggestions? Thanks!

Our E's first entry was the test flight by C.A. Elliott...at least I think that's an A. Might be another C, though. This happened on 3-25-1966 and the first Certificate of Airworthiness was issued on 3-30-1966, and signed by (it looks like) Thomas D. Welch? Or Will? Or Welsh? Then a second Certificate of Airworthiness was issued on 4-4-1966, after the gear was converted to electric.

Hi and welcome! I certainly don't want to sound like I am second-guessing your parameters, because you've got a great list. But I would throw out a couple options to expand the offerings. We actually bought our 1966 E shortly after a prop strike...the result of a gear failure. It's a great airplane and the prop strike got us a recently installed factory zero-time engine with a new propeller (with no eddy current AD). Another option is to consider getting a "discounted" aircraft with closer to 2,000 hours on the engine. If the engine checks out well, you might get another 1,000 hours out of it for essentially free. Assuming the price reflects the high-time engine. I'll be following along on your search! Ross

In the original Mooney docs I posted, above, 2 gallons of oil are listed in the "useful load" list...like passengers.

@carusoam detailed reply certainly set a new bar here...but did nobody notice the most impressive detail in the OP's post? They let him fly a C home! I've heard of loaner cars, but that seems to be a completely new high bar.

PM me your address and I'll put a red and green globe in the mail to you.

So, it's 5am here and I just woke up thinking...damn, I didn't account for the negative arms. Like I said, math's not for everyone...including me! @Bob - S50 is right on the money here, regarding the negative arms. As to his question about the different arms for the spinners, I'm not sure why they're different...those figures came from the prop shop that did the work. Hmmm. But at least we're closer now. Thanks, gang.

And...photos and details on the new plane! We also have a '66 E (s/n 1078) and love it. It's a great fit for us.

In our case, the errors all happened after 1999 when she was last weighed. But even in the relatively short time since, our CG "moved" a lot. 50-60 years of rounding...definitely. Plus how many "insignificant" changes happened during that lifetime?

Yay, hangars!

And, just for fun, here's the original W&B calculation sheet

Hi all, I had noticed that our CG was way aft, when using the most recent W&B sheets and entering those data into Garmin Pilot. According to the sheets, our CG was 48.83 without any passengers or load...and that, clearly, is unusually far aft. I had gone through the old W&B sheets and found an error, which I corrected in my calculations. A recent question by another MSer brought this to mind and, since I'm going through all the logs and docs this weekend, I thought I'd share my findings in the event they help someone else. Here's the offending W&B calculation sheet after a prop replacement - it was in this calculation that the CG on our 1966 E moved aft from a reasonable 46.84 to an unusual 48.78. See what they did? They removed a prop and spinner, then installed a prop and spinner. And they didn't deduct the moments from the items removed. Instead of this: 81834.16-(1621.10+105.05)+(1752.30+93.50) giving a new moment of 81,953.65...they added them all together, resulting in a new moment of 85406.10. And to get the CG, you divide that by the weight. And that, friends, started a chain of 3 other incorrect W&B calculation sheets because each subsequent one started with the figures from the prior one (as is normal). So, our CG (on paper only) crept back to a very aft 48.83. There's another suspect sheet, too, where a shop removed the original windshield and installed a 201 windshield. They listed a bunch of removed items, but didn't include the original windshield in that list. But the 201 windshield is listed as installed. So, unless the 201 figures are a net change (which I don't believe is the right way to do that) then not listing the original windshield removal throws that sheet off too. Anyway...I hope this helps someone else digging through their calculations too. Be well, Ross EDIT/NOTE: Before anyone follows my example here, please read the comments below. I didn't account for the negative arm figures, so my math is wrong here too...better than the prop shop, but still wrong.

We have had our E for just over a year now and we love it. The only thing I've ever been envious of is the Johnson bar manual gear that some of you have. We've had no issues with our electric gear, so I'm definitely not complaining, but I do like the simplicity of the manual system. As I sit here, looking through the original documents, I just saw how close we came to almost having the "perfect E" - it looks like the first test flight was done with manual gear (on 3-25-1966) and the Certificate of Airworthiness was issued on 3-30-66. Then, on 4-4-66 the electric gear retraction kit was installed by Dugosh Aircraft Service and another Certificate of Airworthiness was issued on that date. Was Dugosh a factory contractor? And, interestingly, it looks like the panel must have been pretty bare because a whole bunch of avionics were installed on 4-29-66. Here are those pages - if anyone has any historical insight they'd like to share, I'd be thrilled to learn more about that old process.

I love my wife. Why? Because she just quietly let me read through all 35 pages of this...and it's awesome. Congratulations to you, sir, for working towards your dreams so diligently. Funny note...at the part where you showed your DigiKey order of the LED landing gear indicator bulbs I jumped onto my DigiKey account and ordered the same ones...then, a couple pages later, you described how they won't work as wired. I was real timing it, though!

Totally off topic...or maybe not...since getting drunk the night before was mentioned. I know alcohol isn't a factor in this crash, but alcohol impairment was part of my first career. Well, that didn't sound quite right did it? Anyway, interesting fact...a "standard" 170-pound male metabolizes alcohol at a rate of about .015/hour. So, if you're a .20 drunk it will take a bit over 13 hours before your BAC is back down to 0. Not to mention the groggy aftermath that @jaylw314 mentioned. Okay, carry on...

Darn, Paul... you've got good eyes. Where'd you even see a DG there? I missed it. This plane's got so much retro it's actually cool...and the price sure seems attractive. Someone's going to have fun with this lady.

Now if only annuals were extended, too...

Major thread drift/hijack caution... but darn, Anthony @carusoam, you've got to be one of the most well-rounded people I've ever encountered. With your interest/background in TBI issues, you might be interested in this movie trailer: I've had the honor of becoming friends with Andrew Marr and we've been able to help sponsor a doctors' training that he and Dr Gordon did last year. Their foundation, the Warrior Angels Foundation, is making a difference in the lives of TBI victims... both veterans and athletes. My wife and I were supposed to fly to CA for the screening of this movie, with a Joe Rogan Q&A too, but then everything got shut down for the coronavirus panic. PM me sometime about what you do and let me know if we can help in any way. Okay... back to selling an E!

I, for one, would be thrilled to ferry one of these. I am in Arizona and my E is down for annual...and the shop's closed. I've got a ton of airline frequent flier miles I'd be happy to use for the commercial flight segments (which I'm not worried about). And our newly-opened restaurant is now closed, except for Thursday cooking and Friday pick-up. I'm current on medical and BFR, so feel free to let me know if I can help. I miss the air...