Fritz1

There are large demographic and economical forces at play that wiggle small airplanes around like a dog wiggling its tail. One way for the OP to get ahead is to get personally involved, do dirty and boring work, find parts, nudge the schedule, buy pizza, generally become a guy that is good to have around, the shop has to have the feeling that the OP fixes more problems than he causes, profitability is higher with the OP doing stuff than with the OP not involved, by doing helper work you replace a guy that costs the shop let's say $30/h and is billed out at let's say $110/h. OP has to find a way to balance that out. Once the balance is established it is beneficial for everybody, once the shop trusts you they let you comb through there parts storage on weekends because they know you pay on Monday and bring pizza. This works for handy people, the shop then has to explain to Joe why Phil is allowed to work on his own airplane while Joe is not allowed to enter the premises. The concierge service means in the last consequence that the OP owns and operates a maintenance shop, beware what you wish for, once upon a time I knew a guy in Vienna Austria who owned a Citation, unhappy with the performance of the avionics shop he bought it and started to manage it as a hobby, think he got personal pleasure out of it, RAF trained fighter pilot and successful business guy. Key to successful small pane maintenance is to find the best setup you can and then support, manage, and subsidize it as needed and you will achieve amazing things, I keep fingers crossed....

ask yourself what has been touched besides the propeller when the balancing was done, then be methodical, spark, fuel, air, whatever is going on may not just have one single cause, cleaning the injectors is easy, do a flow test, put each injector into a measuring cup, run boost pump for a couple of seconds compare contents of cups, look for intake leaks, how is the fuel pressure from the mechanical pump, test all the spark plugs

boron nitride dry film spray, interesting, feels good to be in touch with people who know stuff!

in order to clean the bushings it is best to take the two bolts out that hold them in the panel, then wiggle and clean with contact cleaner over and over again, the ball can wear out and get wedged which causes the binding, most of the time cleaning the ball and the shaft solves the problem, taking the yoke shafts out is a lot of work, cleaning is easy by comparison, lubing with any oil attracts dirt, robbing Peter to Pay Paul, anybody tried dry graphite lube?

To my best recollection the can says that you can also put it on your dog, helps against ticks and helps injuries heal better

Think Ballistol has been around for 100 years for cleaning guns that have steel and wood parts, not sure what it does to Aluminum and paint, Triflo is the light oil of choice according to Mooney service manual, inexpensive, widely available, found that it even removes lead bromide exhaust stain from paint

I did the pilot side of the cabin last year with 1/2" Soundex from Spruce, had the left side panels out chasing an air leak around the WEMAC valve, overall 1/2" felt like a good compromise between insulation, noise attenuation and weight, think Spruce sold that stuff in 4 ft increments, as said before make paper templates and then ballpark footage, maybe call LASAR, OASIS or Maxwell, they will know the total footage needed and may have material sitting there in bulk

Starting with mixture cutoff will eventually resolve a flooded engine, everybody has their own way of doing things, I start the Bravo with mixture rich, 4-5 seconds priming injection at full throttle which actuates the boost pump, pull throttle to idle, 1.5 turns on the throttle, if she does not fire after one revolution, hit the boost pump and she will fire, idle at 1000, I rather underprime than overprime, quick shot with the boost pump into the cranking engine resolves any underpriming

like the homemade ac, thought about making one, key to success is to pack in as much ice as you can, pre-cool in hangar, top off ice, 1h run time is plenty for taxi and climb, turn off as soon as the ambient air gets cooler and you might have some left for landing,

B-cool is the best bang for the buck, pack with large ice blocks, fill the gaps with ice cubes, use in hangar to precool airplane running off battery minder, top off ice, pull out airplane and get in, runs for about 1h, cooling power is about 2000 BTU, thus 1/3 of a window unit, really helps during long taxi, real ac is 100x more expensive, I use mine 2x or 3x per year, but then it makes a big difference, the unit weighs about 30 lb loaded, pulls about 10A at 12V, filling in the ice is a hassle, but beats sweating in 100F heat when holding for takeoff

I had a sticky trim switch in the KFC225 a couple of weeks ago, the left half that energizes the trim servo clutch did not zero by itself any more, easy to check, wiggle the trim switch up and down after the error message comes up, a stuck AP disengage switch or a stuck CWS switch may cause that error, too, not familiar with the GFC700 though

yes, absolutely, only the silicone pieces, slide onto the outlet tubes of the cannula, acts almost like a check valve

the phone ear buds on the cannula outlets taper inward, they almost seal when you breathe in, you draw more O2 and less air, allow you to still breathe out easily through your nose since they flex, costs nothing and improves oxygenation, have an O2 mask, but hardly ever use it, cannulas with the ear buds work well into the high teens

wondering when an O2 generator will be available that is powerful enough to supply two people in the high teens, I use the precise flight demand conservers with the boom cannula with good results, cuts down the O2 consumption by about 2/3, put i-phone ear buds over the outlets of the boom cannulas which further improves oxygenation, keep O2 tank in the hangar, usually swap tank once or twice a year, think rental is $120 per year, swap is another $120 each, truck comes to hangar, pretty convenient and reliable, biggest reason for having tank is not to have to deal with the FBO who usually dings something, either the airplane or the O2 door, usually swap tank when it is about half empty, about 900 psi, transfer boost pump is prohibitively expensive, think new about $14k new, not event FBO has one, never even saw a used one for sale, most FBOs just daisy chain two or three tanks, keep portable backup tank in the airplane, with the concentrator backup tank is highly recommended as well, never had any issue with O2 supply in the Bravo, go to FL210 on a regular basis, go to full flow at 8000 ft when climbing into the flight levels

still doable, scratch your head, list the hours and what you did and find an A&P to sign off, I started working on airplanes in the 70s as a high school kid, found stuff signed by people long dead, worked with the A&P IA that does my annuals, eventually the FSDO signed off, Community College typically too time consuming for an OP that has a job or a business, bought an online class instead of going to two week prep class. The written is a multiple choice test, you buy a question catalogue and grind through it until you reach about 90%, then you will pass the FAA test with better than 70% for sure, don't have to be an astronaut to pass, the A&P is a license to learn, I am fortunate enough to have several people on speed dial that have forgotten more about airplanes than I will ever know, Mooney guru, engine guy and avionics guy, one of them will typically know what I don't.

getting an A&P is doable for an OP. Start putting together all the hours that you spent fixing your airplane and what you did, find an A&P to supervise your work, help identify what hours are missing, define a program how to get these hours and sign off your application, apply with the local FSDO, take written, oral and practical test. Once you get started and log every oil change and spark plug cleaning the project of getting the A&P becomes less daunting with every month. The required numbers are doable, for the Bravo I ball park 200 maintenance hours for 100 flying hours per year between pumping up tires, oil changes, repairs, upgrades and annuals, lots of OPs have flown and worked on their airplanes for decades, all takes to get started is listing all those hours and you might be almost there

Happy wife, happy life, beauty is absolutely in the eye of the beholder, cabin is significantly cooler when painted white though, touch white paint versus black wing walk on a sunny day and you will feel the difference, happy painting!

Don Muncy visors, sized right, well made

Minder is connected directly to batteries, amp meter shows full discharge, thus about 8 amp, about 5 come from the minder and 3 from the batteries, gives you at least 4 hours to run avionics before the battery voltage drops, then minder tops off batteries overnight, poor man's ground power unit

my alternators do the same, one starts flashing at about 850 RPM, battery minder is helpful, if batteries are same age you can charge in parallel, need only one battery minder makes for a nice ground power unit to run avionics in the hangar, parallel batteries give you 20 Ah, battery minder gives you 5 A, running the radios typically draws 8-10 A, plenty of time to program avionics etc. 8 years is excellent for a battery, replaced both my Concords after about 7 years

the BK switch is in stock for about $2,600 the three microswitches are 1SX74-T , about $30 a pop and easy to replace, just take two screws out, most likely the tiny wire return springs are tired, too need to be reformed or replaced, I found a new switch, the switch in my Bravo is tired, left toggle for clutch does not reset any more by itself, triggers trim fail warning, not sure if left toggle is worn itself or just spring tired, will take apart after I have installed my new switch, think great care has to be taken that the two small toggle return springs do not jump out when the pins are extracted from the bezel

Lumbar support is a good idea, both mechanical lumbar supports in my seats were broken, replaced both of them, really helps on flights over 1h

how are CHTs? was the oil cooler flushed? check baffling

good advice, I never use the AP disconnect switch unless there is an emergency, using the AP disconnect switch everything goes out with a big bang, think I found a trim switch but also ordered three 1SX74-T microswitches just in case, to my best understanding there are reset springs in the switch assembly in addition to the microswitches and these loose power, switch worked for 2000h

Interesting, I am wondering about this myself, I bought the Bravo with a 200h factory reman engine, used Shell W100Plus until about one year ago and then went to Phillips 20W50 Victory against the advice of my A&P IA, immediate change in oil consumption, two bottom plugs that were typically oiled up became bone dry all of a sudden, either the Phillips is a much better oil or leaking valve guides coked up so they are not leaking any more, I do not have any sticky valves yet, thinking about going half half, W100Plus in Summer, Phillips in winter, the Lycoming appears to be prone to coke up valve guides with certain oils, just can't quite put my finger on it