A64Pilot

Of course be sure the throttle is wide open or you will get low readings, and you will want to short out the mags, remove all plug wires or something.

Looks to have cracked at the edge of a weld?

Concerns over top overhauls are over rated in my opinion, I’m sure some, possibly many A&P’s may have very little piston experience. I didn’t, but grew up as a motörhead so I didn’t have a lot to learn, but many mechanics didn’t grow up tearing everything apart and modifying it like I did so unless the book specifies a procedure they don’t follow one, assuming of course they read the book. First if you have 6 new in box cylinders then you replace one as one is removed so the case half torque is never broken, but if your removing all 6 for overhaul then as each is removed any decent mechanic should stack a couple of fender washers on each stud and torque them, full torque isn’t required. Lycoming has “special tools” which are plates that are installed and torqued as each cylinder is removed. I had intended to get condemned cylinders and band saw the bases off for torque plates but learned Lycoming beat me to it, I haven’t looked but would suspect such bases are available for Conti’s and if not band saw off 6 condemned cylinders. My advice is if you want factory new then put them on order and keep flying until they come in. Already have the shop picked out that’s going to exchange them, I’d use an engine shop. Be aware that many GOOD engine shops will take a brand new Conti cylinder and rework it before install, most aren’t crooks, Conti cylinders have “issues” and fixing those issues can add many hours of life to even new cylinders. Talk to a good shop, it may be that overhauling the ones you have may be best. Using a reputable engine shop that overhauls in house should keep the down time reasonable. Everything is an opinion this is just mine, but 1,000 hours on a bottom end shouldn’t be anywhere near its end of life.

I do NOT have passenger brakes and I do think that complicates things. But I have found that some aircraft, Mooney’s being one of them do much better if a bleeder ball is used to bleed the brakes, a bleeder ball can push a significant amount of fluid through the system thereby forcing air out. It can push a continuous high volume of fluid through the system, where for example an oil can pump cannot. Whenever I bleed, I flush the system, replacing the old fluid with new and cleaning everything out, a way is to replace the tank plug with a nipple temporarily, put a hose on it and flush into an empty water bottle or similar, I actually just stick a slightly larger piece of clear vinyl hose into the plug hole. Finally I’ll throw in my push for 83283 hydraulic fluid as opposed to 5606. Military, Army anyway changed from 5606 I’d guess 40 years or so ago, 83283 is much more fire resistant, but more importantly in my opinion is it never turns into jello or goo, which 5606 does when it gets old, if your flushing fluid anyway, why not switch to the good stuff? Note 83283 gets thicker in real cold temps, but we are talking like -65F cold, not normal cold, so it’s not normally a problem, but if it is there is a syn fluid now that works even in stupid cold, but I have no personal experience with it. https://www.groveaircraft.com/fluid.html

I’ve honestly probably seen more airplanes with serious “career ending” corrosion with decent looking paint than I have ones that had obvious external corrosion, some I believe get pretty paint jobs to sell, called a Mary Carter overhaul by Rednecks. My theory is most people including A&P’s etc don’t look for it. You really can’t tell anything from an external look, you have to look and especially for pretty airplanes, why them? Because the potential loss is likely greater as they bring more money. My wings look almost that bad, it’s from rain, it’s purely an appearance thing.

Lycomings take on oil temp, now this isn’t aircraft specific, it’s general engine statement and I believe C’s run a little warm and J’s a little cool. ‘What’s particularly interesting is the statement that the oil actually hits 50F hotter than indicated, so 165 is hot enough because at its hottest it’s 215F

It doesn’t, maybe but does seem to me to indicate that it was fully tested, by fully it seems the test pilot allowed the spin to fully develop, which I don’t think the FAA requires, from memory they only require one turn. Spin testing is eventually done at worst case as in max aft CG and max gross weight, and I think most of us are most often fwd CG. It seems that the more modern a design is, the less spin resistant it is. I should have said the less likely to recover easily as I think the Cirrus is very spin resistant. My test pilot mentor told me to be very cautious with aircraft that were spin resistant as often they were hard to recover. Easy in, easy out he said. I think maybe because back in the day spins were thought of as a sort of normal maneuver and everyone was taught to spin and recover. Anyway the C-210 I used to have in a power on stall, and I mean relatively low cruise power if you stalled it, it would spin, you couldn’t stop it. I knew it was going to be ugly because before the stall the rudder was buried and the ball was coming out of center, but I didn’t expect it to roll over on its back and start to rotate. I didn’t spin it as I pulled power as soon as it went over on its back, but it shocked me because I thought all Cessna’s were benign, gentle things. But the 210 has a laminar flow wing too where most other Cessna’s don’t, maybe that plays into it? I’ve got a video of me spinning my little C-140 somewhere a long time ago, it too goes over on its back and comes out spinning, but you can spin it until you puke and it will recover almost instantly when you want it too, very good spin trainer. But it has very high rudder authority, I think tail wheel aircraft have to, and when nose wheels began to be designed the require t for rudder authority is much less and they are harder to recover from a spin, I know the 210 doesn’t even have enough rudder to keep in trim when approaching a power on stall. A theory of mine, tailwheel vs nose wheel that is.

Once in a blue moon, I’ve never seen it but apparently electric model airplanes will light off after a crash. I don’t trust the bags as those batteries often burst with I believe enough strength to bust a bag, I used to charge my model batteries in one of the Wife’s corning ware dishes with the glass top. None ever caught fire but as we rapid charged them apparently they did every now and again. Fast charging is another way to light one off, it’s the high temps I think generated by rapid charging. I regularly fly with electric scooters in my baggage compt, but they are years old, I don’t charge them in the airplane and the batteries are UL certified etc. I know it’s a risk, but with my knees it’s either that or be stuck at the airport because calling an Uber ever weekend to eat breakfast is a little excessive. If you use a Li-Po battery, best to ensure it’s a high quality battery, and if LifePo4 AKA Lithium Iron etc, go that route as LifePo4 is harder to make have a thermal runaway than lead acid. Many group all Lithium batteries as being fire hazards because they don’t know any better, but there are major differences in the different chemistries.

Trivia, but seating height doesn’t change much with height, height very much is in leg length. The AH-64 we had to sit at “design eye height” so that the system that measured exactly where you were looking would function properly and only a few inches of vertical seat adjustment allowed for over 95% of all adult males to work, covered I think at least from 5’2” to 6’6” at least. Of course there is always the outliers. A C-210 has a large amount of headroom as do several other designs, but of course taller cabins come with increased drag.

It would, just as the heavier engine in the nose does, or wing tip tanks like on Bonanza’s. Spins I think have lost the concern they used to have maybe because it seems that inadvertent spins that occur at recoverable altitudes are exceedingly rare. Having said that even aircraft that spins aren’t allowed are usually spin tested. I say usually because I’ve heard of major modifications where the FAA required it, and times when they didn’t. I talked to the test pilot that flew the cert tests for the -10 engine STC on a Caravan and apparently he had to spin it several times. There used to be a video of a NASA test pilot spinning a V tail Bo, when he entered a spin with opposite aileron it quickly wrapped up and he had to jump as it wasn’t recoverable, interestingly that video was removed from the internet. Interesting to me because I think most inadvertent spins will begin with opposite aileron input. No wing tanks on this Bo either. I never had to spin any Thrush in any of the Certifications we did, and never asked why, because I had no desire to. Maybe it’s because the FAA realized that any spin a crop duster was likely to get into was well below min recovery altitude? Anyone know if the big Mooney’s were ever spin tested? I have no idea. We seem to have a pretty good sized vertical and there seems to be a correlation between spin recovery and size of the vertical / rudder, so maybe we recover well?

Ref oil cooler. Even on cold days it should be pretty warm / hot. Oil flow is always through the cooler, but when cold and the Vernatherm retracted the oil flows both through the cooler and bypasses it, majority bypasses it as that’s the least resistence. As there is still oil flow through the cooler that’s why in cold weather covering the cooler helps raise temps. If there wasn’t constant oil flow through the cooler in real cold temps the oil in the cooler would turn to almost grease so there has to be some flow to prevent that. You may have a blockage, 235 in cruise sounds hot to me. When the oil is hot, the Vernatherm extends and blocks off the bypass around the cooler and All oil flows through the cooler meaning maximum cooling of course.

It’s not too tough, you have to ensure the wiring from the alternator to the battery can handle 70 amps, to include the ground side and install a 70 amp CB. A way to do it would be to follow the drawings of a Mooney that came equipped with a 70 amp or higher rated alternator. About the only way your likely to exceed 50 amps though is to have a heavily discharged battery, battery could be charging at say 35 amps, then if the aircraft draw exceeds 15 amps your breaker will likely trip. Those numbers are made up, but a deeply discharged battery can suck up a lot of amps initially. Maybe the biggest advantage of a high output alternator is that if it’s never put near its max output then it’s never getting hot, and a cool running alternator will last much longer than one run near max output.

If it’s for sale the PC can be bought and the buyer can go into manufacturing right away. If it’s bought correctly the new company has no liability for anything produced not by them. All of the Process specs remain approved as does the QC manual etc, that’s a Huge Major deal, it would likely take years and millions of dollars to start from scratch and no way would your process specs be as lenient as ones from “back in the day”. The real value in my option of Mooney is the PC, not to build Mooney’s unfortunately but to build, well parts and maybe other aircraft. But with LSA seeming to be the way forward as they allow the FAA to wash their hands maybe having a PC ain’t what it used to be? Oddly if you buy a Repair Station you do not buy the “FAA rights” if you will, the new owner has to start over as a new Repair Station and get a new manual etc approved.

The nose gear truss tubing is heat treated, but I doubt the stop tabs need to be, they probably are of course as the whole thing gets heat treated. Pretty sure a good welder could Tig weld a repair without removing the tab, issue may be finding one that will because it’s an aircraft.

All metal self locking nuts are spec’d for high temp applications, as brakes can make wheels hot that may be why. Several Cirrus have overheated brakes so badly from just taxing that there have been fires, so it doesn’t take as much as you might think to get aircraft brakes hot. https://www.avweb.com/leadnews/cirrus-to-issue-sb-on-brake-overheating-fires/ If they had steerable nose wheels I bet they wouldn’t have burned.

I believe to be technically correct we are supposed to measure the drag torque (torque required to turn the nut prior to it making contact with the surface) then add that torque to the torque. For something like this that would be beyond silly I think. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2000/september/pilot/airframe-and-powerplant-(9) Look under free running or friction drag torque

It depends completely on if someone in the FAA gets motivated or not, sometimes they do, many are pretty good people actually, it’s the one bad apple that gives them the bad name. I learned something that shocked me when I was a manufacturer though, and that’s that the FAA has 90 days to issue an Emergency AD, seemed like a long time for an Emergency to me. Oh, and type clubs, AOPA etc really can expedite the process, squeaky wheel I guess.

Joking of course, however the Amazon link may help someone in the future

That would be the old engine that was designed in the late 50’s by Detroit Diesel for an Army requirement for a light observation airplane or a helicopter. Military designation of T63-A700 318 SHP or 720 420 SHP, Civilian designation of C-18 and C-20 I think. I was an OH-58 Crew Chief for a few year and the 58 used this motor as did the OH-6 and many Civilian helicopters, the BO-105 had two of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allison_Model_250 Installed on many Bonanza’s and C-210’s etc and the Turbine Maule. Its not a bad engine really but I’m sure a modern design would be much better, if anyone had Government money to design and build one.

It’s not a problem, as the quote on the Thrush, it’s still that way on the Pratt models, but no Avgas. I don’t think Avgas was ever allowed except maybe as an emergency fuel, lead deposits is the problem. All Garrets on their fuel controls can be adjusted to run Diesel etc., the settings are based on the specific gravity of the fuel, but most turbines don’t require anything. Even though it’s still allowed no Ag pilot I know of burns Diesel anymore, bought in volume Jet is cheaper, being Ag they get some kind of tax exemption, but Diesel burns dirty and your fuel injectors require more frequent cleaning, which is a bigger job than it sounds like and has bad consequences if you don't. Actually #1 and #2 Diesel don’t exist anymore it’s all ULSD, so technically you can’t burn ULSD in a Thrush. ‘But tax wise think of all of the large amount of Autogas STC’s, none of them of course pay the aviation tax, but it’s legal.

You should replace the wire to carry the potential higher amperage and replace the CB with a higher rated one, but if the original CB is left in place then it should be fine safety wise, but the possibility exists that the alternator could output more amperage than the CB could handle causing it to trip. Would it reset or just trip again? I don’t know. What would it take to max out an alternator? Maybe a dead battery? Bottom line, you have to do whatever the STC calls for, if it says just R&R the alternator and regulator then that’s all you have to do. Putting a Plane Power on my little C-140 the STC called for bigger wire and CB, but that was to replace a weak generator.

That’s a pretty big hole, I’d be curious as to what’s stopping it up and why it can’t simply be cleaned out?

Very often approval for an off the shelf part comes when the manufacturer inducts it into their Quality Control system. I’m not saying this is what was done with the valves but is how some things like off the shelf filters become vacuum filters for example, or how for example an OMC starter solenoid is installed on a factory airplane. The catch to that is of course the identical solenoid bought from OMC isn’t an approved part, in order for it to be approved you have to buy it from the aircraft manufacturer. That can get complicated when that manufacturer goes out of business and is one reason why the FAA has become so much more lenient on parts for antique aircraft like ours. Some IA’s will stick their neck out a little and go by the “form, fit and function” rule and will substitute parts that comply with that, but if the approved part is available but just costs more than you think it should then that’s tougher to justify.

I love how people who don’t like something like to claim it’s some kind of unsubstantiated belief. However it’s not. I’ve spoken with a few Hartzell Engineers and Joe Brown a couple of times on this subject as well as Igor Brunchelik owner of Avia propellor and Zbynek Tvrdik one of Avia’s Engineers and if all things are equal the fewer the blades the less the drag, so fewer blades are more efficient, being more efficient means greater thrust. This has been known forever and because of this single blade props have been tried. I can’t seem to find it on the internet but I believe way back Hughes Aircraft even built an Experimental single bladed helicopter to see how much more lifting power it would have. Any perceived increase in efficiency was I believe more than washed out by the problems a single blade caused. You go to multiple prop blades for many reasons, but primarily it’s because of ground clearance, some other reasons are to enable lower tip speed as when tip speed gets up to roughly .84 Mach its noisy and inefficient. For example the smallest Crop Duster we built had a three blade 106” prop that could turn a 2200 RPM which is about .9 Mach, working with Pratt and Whitney we were allowed to increase engine torque from 58.7 PSI to 64 which still gave us 750 SHP reducing the prop tip speed to .83 Mach which both increased performance and reduced noise significantly. Multiple blades can reduce noise somewhat and can be slightly smoother, but as there is more surface area there is more drag. There are other considerations of course, for example when Hartzell undertook designing a new prop for the GE H-80 engine they ended up with a four blade prop, they were trying to exceed the performance of the three blade Avia prop, but the required blade profile to do so exceeded the centripetal force limits of any of their existing hubs so they had to go to a four blade prop. It’s entirely possible that a three or even four blade prop could outperform a two blade, but it would be because of a superior airfoil, not due the number of blades. At the air speeds we fly at all things being equal, the fewer the blades the better, unless of course someone builds a three blade with an airfoil that’s efficient enough to overcome the increased drag

They do work better, if your mag(s) are weak they will make the engine start easier. Whether they save any fuel or not is arguable, they wouldn’t on my engine as it will run smoothly way more LOP than optimal with massives. IF and that’s a big if, but if treated well, they will last the life of the engine, at least to TBO any way. When I ran them I would only dig out any clinkers with a dental pick and never clean them with any kind of abrasive blast. I never had any problem with them, but in truth I’ve never had any issues with plugs really, but until very recently I removed, cleaned and rotated them at every oil change and maybe that’s why I’ve never had a fouled plug? I see them as being similar to tires. I doubt many wouldn’t say that Goodyear flight custom III tires aren’t better than say an Airhawk, but are they worth three times the price? Not to me the Airhawks work just fine from what I can tell.