1980Mooney

Check out the drag inducing radiator on this Kawasaki concept. The good news it can double as a belly saver during gear-ups! Kawasaki Aero Piston Engine | Kawasaki Motors, Ltd.

OMG I forgot: How can we forget the Porsche PFM 3200 - an inferior engine from a lot of "smart guys" And Toyota tried to adapt a Lexus V-8 for GA - the 360hp FV2400-2TC- Toyota is cleared to produce piston aero-engine | News | Flight Global Reportedly certificated but never commercialized. Reportedly Honda looked the possibility and passed - developed their turbine instead. And Kawasaki is diddling around. It will be brilliant packaging hanging that off the nose of a Mooney....

Unless you have a heavy foot or are drag racing from every light, the engines on modern cars with 7-11 speed transmissions may not touch 3,000 rpm for even a moment. And they are rarely ever at WOT. I bought a Mooney to fly fast. I am WOT takeoff, climb and cruise. And when descending from the low teens also WOT. Now if you want to use an automotive engine limited to 2,700 RPM in an airplane, then don't plan on having much HP. In fact plan on tripling the size of your engine if you want 200 hp for climb (or 300 hp for Long Bodies). I have a turbo MB which shows HP and Torque. At WOT with RPM at 2,700, the HP was about 85 out of a maximum 241. That is only 35% of rated HP. Look at a normally aspirated Ford 350GT. It produces about 140 HP at 2,700 RPM out of a max 467. That is only 30% of peak. Many here think it would be so easy to just slap an automotive engine into an airplane. Thielert, Austro and Orenda could not adapt automotive engines to run at 2,700 RPM. They all need gear reduction. Rotax needs gear reduction also (2.27/1 or 2.43/1 rpm reduction) Although many also think the engineers at Lycoming and Continental to be lazy and stupid, those engines are an amazing combination of compact power density, simplicity, light weight and RELIABILITY. My MB M274 DE20 engine weighs over 300 lbs. reportedly - I bet it does not include the radiator. M20K owners would need almost three of those limited to 2,700 rpm to equal the TSIO-360. At least 900 lbs on the the nose... The Ford VooDoo 5.2 GT350 weighs about 430 lbs without accessories. So Ovation owners would need over 2 of those limited to 2,700 RPM to equal the IO-550.....only about 1,000 lbs on the nose....

When you say "shedding debt", remember the buildings in Kerrville are leased from the City of Kerrville in a long-term lease. A long-term lease is a liability similar to long term debt. If LASAR picks up the long term lease from the City then that sheds some liability from Mooney. If LASAR "sublets" it from Mooney - then Mooney is still liable but it helps Mooney cashflow. However that is small in the scheme of things. The Kerrville Airport Authority has not posted any of Minutes of the recent Board Meetings so it is not clear what is going on. I don't see how this "sheds the 20%" still owned by the Meijing Group of China". Meijing put a lot of money into Mooney. I bet most was via debt to themselves and is still on the Mooney Corp books making Meijing, Mooney Corp's biggest Creditor. It is exactly what the VanGrunsven family did with Vans Aircraft. VanGrunsven was selling the stock of Vans Aircraft Company to the employees, but the VanGrunsven family loaned money to Vans Aircraft Company as debt to provide the financing and working capital for it to function. Vans became insolvent and filed bankruptcy. In bankruptcy the stockholders (equity) usually get wiped out as the debtholders seek to get enough value to cover what is owed to them (either from liquidation (auction) of assets or if there is not enough liquidation value, by taking ownership of the company in order to get paid back over time). At the time of bankruptcy, VanGrunsven was a minority shareholder (like Meijing at Mooney), but in bankruptcy VanGrunsven wound up owning 100% of Vans. - just like a rubber band the VanGrunsven family snapped the ownership back and the employee shareholders got hosed. I am willing to bet that if Mooney files bankruptcy, the Meijing will wind up with 100% ownership again....

I have used the same for years with no problems.

I didn’t paint my bead trim. If you paint it before installation I don’t see how the paint withstands bending in the corners (or if it does, how it remains durable over time.). And if you paint it after it is installed then it gets “glued” into place and leaves a painting/ ridge if ever moved. I like to be able to remove it if I need to repair a panel. Another thing is that the beading will shrink due to the factors of time, heat and sunlight. Maybe you won’t keep your Mooney long enough for it to matter. Maybe the material has changed. But over 25 years of ownership, I replaced the beading once with factory material. It has always been hangared. The beading was installed perfectly with no gaps but now there is a gap and noticeable shrinkage.

You sound/act like there are no and have never been any smart people anywhere working on this. Tell us why Thielert tried in 1999 and failed. Tell us why you have not mentioned DeltaHawk as a possible near term solution.

If it is so easy why hasn't Rotax developed a 6 or 8 cylinder in all this time? Why is there nothing above 160 hp? Modern car engine....solid block, unleaded fuel, synthetic oil.... Oh and they don't run for hours on end at WOT....they would not last long.

There has been so much trouble with the "new tech" Lycoming iE2 TEO-540 that Tecnam switched to "old tech" Continental GTSIO-520 engines. Reportedly Cape Air retrofitted engines. Continental GTSIO-520-S ready for P2012 installation | Magazine | Business Air News Tecnam offers Continental engine option for P2012 Traveller and Sentinel series

Are you replacing the windlace around the door while you have everything out? It’s a tedious job. But now is the time if it’s worn.

https://vantageassoc.com/finishing-materials-window-beading-krbbeige-145.html

It would be a whopper for your plane. The iE2 is a FADEC turbocharged Lycoming 540 rated at either 350 hp or 375 hp. I see that Air Power has the ECU alone for that engine on backorder - the price is only $25,000+ for the box alone. 60B29062 | ECU ASSY IE2 TEO-540-A1A Lycoming - Air Power Inc. I bet the engine costs $150,000....maybe $200,000? It would add probably 250 lbs forward of your firewall...... But man would it leave the M20J Missile conversion behind...

Exactly. 15 years ago Lycoming introduced the iE2 engine. Also if you think it is so easy look at the Orenda V-8 liquid cooled engine development. It started as the Thunder Engine in the 1980's and then the Orenda in the 1990's. Then Texas Recip in the 2000's and TRACE in the 2010's. No applications. Lots of money wasted in 40 years. iE2 Engine | Lycoming Aircraft | Lycoming Engines Turbo charged 540 with electronic engine controls. First experimental with the Lancair. Then certified on the Tecnam Traveller P2012. You won't find many still on the Lancair or anyone that likes it. And Beechtalk reports that Cape Air put their entire fleet of Tecnam P2012 up for sale in May - reportedly the engine was an issue - heavy and expensive. The iE2 has been a commercial failure. There are no other installations in 15 years. From 2010: Ready for takeoff: Lycoming’s iE2 — General Aviation News Lycoming IE2: Incremental Technology - Aviation Consumer By automotive standards, the IE2 is about on par sensor wise. But it doesn't need the oxygen sensor circuit nor the transmission controls found on modern cars to improve fuel economy. The basic inputs are venturi pressure and temperature for mass airflow calculation, MAP, induction temperature, CHT, TIT and RPM. For crankshaft and top dead center reference, the IE2 has two magnetic position sensors, one on the crank and one on the cam. They sense crank position by magnetically detecting a missing tooth in the gear train, but unlike Hall-effect sensors, they aren't powered, thus eliminating at least one failure point. Speaking of power, its delivered to the engine via a dedicated dual-channel power box that can run the engine either from the aircraft bus or from the default position-a dedicated permanent magnet alternator installed on the accessory case. The engine is designed to run independently of aircraft electrics, although it doesn't have to. It has provisions for an additional alternators on the accessory case or via front-belt drive. Starting with the air, gone is the traditional Bendix RSA throttle body and injector system. In its place is a throttle body that still has hard linkage to the power lever, but one that's equipped to measure mass airflow and temperature, with redundant temperature sensing capability, since air density and flow is such an important player in power setting. The engine control unit is housed in a single box the size of a thick netbook and is dual channel-either channel can run the engine. The ECUs use sensed throttle position as a target reference for the pilots power command, then the mass airflow data is used to fuel the engine accordingly by referring to a customizable look-up table and fine tuning that according to a feedback loop with programmed limits and protections. The IE2 uses electronic pulse injectors whose reliability in automobile use has been raised to nearly failure-proof levels. These run from a common rail at a pressure of 3 bars or about 43 PSI. This fueling option adds a measure of reliability because the engine is set up to run each cylinder as an individual power unit-if one fails, either due to fuel or ignition, the other five will continue running as smoothly as the software can make them. The system is configured with return lines which circulate fuel as a hedge against vapor lock. Ignition still terminates in two plugs per cylinder, but rather than mags or remote spark generation, each plug has its own direct-fire coil similar to the high-reliability type found on modern motorcycles. In automotive and motorcycle apps, direct-fire coils usually attach to the plug, but on the IE2, there’s no room for that. All of the coils-12 total-live in an array mounted on top of the engine where the fuel injection spider would otherwise be found. As you'd expect, the ECU channels cross control, so if one fails, the other can still fire at least one plug in each cylinder.

Excess oxygen may slightly improve complete combustion but the bigger improvement comes from improved thermal efficiency. Regardless you can already achieve that by twisting the Red Knob (or pull the Red Lever as @N201MKTurbo says) with our current engines.

Why would Mooney pre-punch anything at this point? Pre.-punched to match what? Mooney is making individual parts only to repair existing handmade aircraft. None of the existing holes on the sheet aluminum on our planes are pre-punched.

You are mixing partial throttle with full throttle. "We could reduce our fuel consumption by 30% with a computerized injection system." No way. At full throttle it is basic chemistry. The fuel has a given amount of energy. At 14.7 to 1 you are burning everything.

If an engineer is using worst case then they would assume that. Let's not forget that long ago, Mooney's were used for training. Does anyone remember the "AT"? GMAX has one for sale now. I seem to recall a few years ago there was one in Asia used by an airline for training. It was imported into Canada I think with something like 10,000 hours. 1990 MOONEY M20J AT For Sale in Spring Branch, Texas | www.gmaxamericanaircraft.com (This is a former instrument trainer (it was an 'AT' when new).

So let's say on average you cycle the gear five (5) times every hour over the life of a plane - that means it should last 4,000 hours...... I seems reasonable that is what the engineers were thinking when they designed it.

Swift has been diddling around with 100R for a long time. Have they said anything about the shelf life of it when it sits in fuel and wing tanks baking in 100 F sun? (or hotter in Az...)?

I don't know why you feel better. The "Aviation Property Network" posting "For Lease" is current. Look at the post - it says "2025 Copyright". They just happened to use an old PowerPoint slide pack from one of the many times that Kerrville County/City has needed to worry about Mooney as a tenant. Office / Shop For Lease at KERRVILLE MUNI/LOUIS SCHREINER FLD | Listing 2512

Kerrville had the Annual Joint Airport Board meeting on August 20, 2025. One week later on August 27 they had an Airport Board "Special Called" meeting. Events • Agendas and Minutes - Kerrville, Texas • CivicClerk Tomorrow morning at 8:30 AM there is another Joint Airport Board meeting which is open to the Public. Can someone in the Kerrville area attend and find out what is going on? Kerrville-Kerr County Joint Airport Board Meeting • Agendas and Minutes - Kerrville, Texas • CivicClerk

Agree. The facility has been marketed on APN for 2 months. That PowerPoint came from it. (click on "View Brochure") The City of Kerrville and Kerr County own the entire facility. The title of the post is "Shop for Lease" and the documents make that clear (20 year remaining). Since the City/County have been marketing it for 2 months, it sounds like either Mooney has not been paying the Lease and the City/County gave notice of eviction or Mooney let them know that they are giving up. Office / Shop For Lease at KERRVILLE MUNI/LOUIS SCHREINER FLD | Listing 2512

"I usually use TO flaps for landing. It puts the airplane in a better landing attitude IMO keeping the nose wheel a little higher off the ground." I think this is great point. I don't understand why so many highlight wanting full flaps to keep the nose down more.

No idea how standards were developed for 5G but I seriously doubt that the standards were set using the "lowest common denominator", the lowest requirement. If big bore Lycoming and Continentals and other high-performance engines are the critical path, then the standards should be set to meet them. It shouldn't be "let's get together and set standards for a fuel that we call "100" but really only satisfies the "94 fleet". i.e. "marketing hype". Let's all hope that it works for the more demanding high performance engine segment. But they should have been testing this in 520's. 550's, 540's, 580's Turbo and NA from the get-go. Not "Announce 100R ASTM - Great Success"....oh but we forgot to test it in engines that actually need 100. - and "Stand by for about 2 years while we begin testing"

The point is - be realistic. And they should be too. They are not going to institute "new manufacturing". More investment? Ridiculous. They should focus on cutting cost and getting it in line with inflow. They can supply parts using much less infrastructure. And this dream of taking planes in trade and refurbishing is a whole different business model. They are going to drown in negative cash flow. This is why companies restructure, some potentially successfully, in bankruptcy.