1980Mooney

Hmmm...that sounds like it was an immigrant bird....

I had Monroy auxiliary tanks installed in my J more than 20 years ago. I have all the paperwork including the full installation manual and drawings. If you are looking in the Supplement for a conversion table for your panel gauges, there isn't any. The Supplement does have a table for you to manually stick measure the auxiliary tanks. The auxiliary tank drains into the main tank through a single line. The auxiliary tanks sit outboard and slightly higher than the main tank. Since you have speed brakes the Monroy auxiliary tanks hold only 14.5 gal. (vs. 17 gal. for those without speed brakes). When the main tank is half full the panel fuel gauge reads accurately. When it says "16" gallons on your plane then that is what you have. When it says "Full" then you have 46.5 gallons on that wing. So the first half spans 16 gallons and the last half spans 30.5 gallons. I don't think it is linear. I have 98 gallons total capacity. If I am at 98 (49 gal per side) or at 80 total (40 gal per side) the panel gauge reads about the same - i.e. "Full". The line between the auxiliary tank and the main tank has AN-6D fittings. I think that is 3/8 OD pipe and only about 0.3 inch ID. The point being that the gravity flow between the tanks is slow. If your main tanks are below 1/2 (16 gal) and you fill them full to the lip your panel fuel gauge will read full. Wait about 10 minutes and 8-10 gallons a side will flow into each auxiliary tank. Your panel fuel gauges will read about 2/3 to 3/4 full (24 gallons on your gauges). I use the Fuel Totalizer to keep tabs on the fuel when I am above 1/2 tank.. Between 1/2 and Full, the panel gauges just give me a rough idea of fuel on board. However I do know when my panel reads 1/2 full I know I have 16 gallons left in the tank. Here is the Supplement for your plane with speed brakes:

How many shop hours were quoted and how many were billed? @Alan Fox is estimating 60 hours.

@redbaron1982 has posted multiple times that he had Don Maxwell replace the right stub spar cap during 2022-23. Not sure if that is the same spar cap as you are contemplating. Based on the months he said it was at Maxwell’s and the price he has quoted here on MS, it was way, way more than 60 hours. Considering the angst he has posted on line several times, I suspect that he would share details with you.

It will be white collar jobs in danger this time. No need for law firms to use jr. lawyers or interns to search through history of prior cases for precedent - financial analysts searching and analyzing trends, accountants - application of rules, tax - same, etc. The "safe" jobs of the future will be - food service jobs, caregiving, roofing, landscaping, sanitation, construction, and airplane mechanics!

Enjoy your time with them while you can. Your kids will grow up depending upon personalized ChatGTP bots and other AI to get all their information and answer all their questions - and probably use it to communicate with all their friends personalized AI Chatbots. Sifting through mountains of information in seconds is something that ChatGTP and other AI tools shine at even in their evolving forms today. Professionals in many areas have testimonials that tasks that used to be "a day and a half" online search are now done in minutes. New MIT Research Shows Spectacular Increase In White Collar Productivity From ChatGPT – JOSH BERSIN There will be no need to waste time in forums like this or reading blogs in order to sift out information. Let's face it that forums like this can consume way too much of one's time. There will be no more misunderstanding, incorrect assumptions, misreading, political rants, perceived negativity or BS. In fact kids will be even less likely to go their parents for questions and answers because their personal ChatGTP bot won't give them a lecture. And when your kids are in their teens, today's ChatGTP-4 will seem like a neanderthal clunker (like an iPhone3 today,...). They will have a hard time relating to your stories of the past: "When you were little, we used to use things called "Forums" for answers - like something called "Mooneyspace". But they died not long after AI Chatbots became popular and took over. Just like magazines and publications died when the "Forums" were popular. There are a few old fossils that pass around old copies of aging, yellowing paper publications/magazines like something called MAPA - which ceased long ago......"

@T. Peterson said: "This is my question: If your hangar floor had a six inch drop left to right or right to left, even though the whole airplane weighed the same as though level, would the low wheel weigh more than the high wheel? and "What if you did the same test with two scales, one under each foot. Do you think the total would add up accurately assuming the high scale would show less than the low scale?" In each case he is talking about one wheel or one scale which is at a "low" elevation (i.e. "lower") vs. the other wheel or one scale that is a "high" elevation (i.e. "higher). He is not referring to "tilt" of the scale or scales. And in the first case, if you are assuming that the entire floor is tilted and hence both scales are tilted, then both scales are equally in error percentagewise - He is asking if the wheel at the "low" (lower) elevation would weigh more than the wheel at the higher elevation.

The Tower of Pisa leans at 5.5 degrees. So you will have us imagine our plane is in a maintenance hangar that leans twice as much … Really?

In the 2,900 lb GW modification, Mooney only changed 2 tubulars less than 2 ft. long - from 0.035 to 0.049 wall thickness. part - 340155-135 (L&R). That can't make much change in weight. - less than 1 lb?

No - I just read it how it is written.

He didn’t say “tilted scale”. He just said “lower”.

Yes the low wheel would weigh more compared tho the weight when weighed absolutely level. And the high wheel would weigh less by an equal amount.

No you are missing his point - “ So not-only is the airplane not level, ”. He is saying it is a function of both the tilt of the plane and the tilt of the load cell It doesn’t matter if the plane is not level. It only matters if the load cell is tilted. You are missing my point which I thought was pretty clear.

I disagree with your comment about the plane. It does not matter if the plane is tilted. At the point it contacts the load cell the plane pushes down directly in the direction of the earths gravitational pull. It could be balancing on the edge of the wing tip. It will have no bearing on measuring the total weight. Only if the loadcell mechanism is tilted, and not directly perpendicular to the gravitational pull of the earth will it read in error. The error will be calculated by basic trigonometry.

I think what you are demonstrating is the if the load cell is not perpendicular to the earths gravitational pull it will measure the cosine of the weight. We are not talking about the load cell being unlevel - we are talking about the plane. For example the plane could have a load cell under each wheel. If the right main tire goes flat during 2 weighings it will still read the same total weight even though the right wing is now lower than the left side. In fact looking at the cosine table, your 7.4% error would correspond to about 22 degrees of angle. - that looks about like what you have done.

I think you are exactly right. I agree that you need to level the plane to drain the fuel tanks to the same point between different weighings in time to insure the same amount of "unusable fuel" on board. But if one does properly remove the usable fuel (leaving only "unusable"), at the moment the plane is weighed, the total weight of the plane will not change regardless if the plane is level or not. If one measures the weight simultaneously from 3 points, using accurate load cells, the total weight will be the same regardless of the level, laterally or longitudinally. A plane does not change in mass x the coefficient of gravity at that particular point on earth (i.e. "weight") regardless of if it is in a 15-degree climb, a 45-degree banked turn or completely nose down in a dive. Physics are physics and they don't lie. Perhaps the "level" talk is a vestige of the old days when they had to use a single massive mechanical scale which required jacking wheels up one at a time.

I think you mean that the individual scales are measuring right - they are accurately measuring the weight on the individual load cell - but if the plane is tilted at an angle, more weight at that particular moment will be on one side of the plane than the other.

I would think with the advances in today's digital load cells (with wireless connectivity, load cells on jack points, pads, etc,) that issues with accuracy are largely a non-issue today. I bet those "mysteriously gaining pounds" stories are more idle shop talk and denial by owners. It is like going to the doctor - telling them your weight on the appointment forms - then getting on the scale and acting surprised. "Gosh - I wonder where that weight came from..."

2,227 lbs? Is that supposed to be the empty weight of your J or was there fuel in the tanks?

Do you mean the OP should first call the shop to discuss his/her perceived grievances?…. rather than rant on MS, threatening legal action and reporting to the FSDO and communicating only by email?

This same subject was discussed 2 years ago. That is a Kissling relay made in Germany. Mooney originally designed golf cart solenoids into their planes but sometime in the 90’s they shifted to Mil Grade solenoids on all planes. The Kissling relays are dual coil, Mil Grade, waterproof and survive steam cleaning. The Kissling relay comes with the spike suppression diode already installed. They will probably last the remaining life of the Mooney without an issue. Higher performance (more reliable) at a higher price point. Call Don Maxwell or Lasar. I replaced mine during one of Mooney's bankruptcies. At the time there were no parts available so I ordered mine straight from Germany. https://www.te.com/content/dam/te-com/documents/industrial-and-commercial-transportation/global/kissling-documents-data-sheets/Data_Sheets_Documents_Kissling/contractors/KI-Relay26-50A-ds-a4-K1166683-en-2012.pdf

There are no GW increase STC’s. You can throw a lot of money at avionics that might improve UL a few lbs. And maybe get rid of the vacuum system that saves about 20 lbs. A new composite prop will save a few lbs. But the gains are quite marginal compared to the money spent - and they won’t add the weight of a person. The money may be better spent on a more capable plane.

The outcome of this new policy will be that flight schools will abandon training at towered airports with close parallel runway operations. It is probably a good idea that makes sense. “real world the student unexpected overshoots and he panics.” - They should not be training there. And for the rest of us, if we can’t maintain centerline at a busy parallel ops airport, then we deserve to be reported.

Oh you mean these cheap $80 pucks made in South Africa?!..... Go for it!...Be the first and let us all know how well it goes. https://avunlimited.co/product/mooney-landing-gear-shock-disk/

He has Monroy Long Range Tanks. The "long range" tank is a separate tank that gravity drains into the main tank. If you look at the parts list you will see that they use a straight 3/8 inch union fitting, AN832-6D, and a a 3/8 inch elbow, AN833-6D, to connect the 2 tanks and allow fuel to gravity flow between tanks depending on level in each tank as it is filled or the main tank is consumed. Since the connection between tanks is only 3/8 inch ID, that is why the tanks do not immediately equalize when fueling either the main tank or the long range tank fuller than the other.. https://skygeek.com/mil-standard-an832-6d-union-flared-tube.html https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/hapages/an833.php Look at the 3rd pic in this topic - the OP included a copy of the parts list for an M20K installation.