A64Pilot

A few things. As someone else stated there was a post covid boom, that will return to normal after the economy slows. That’s my belief too, the economy slowing Many being trained are hoping for that Airline job, not their own private airplane, and only a very few are expecting to buy new, vast majority are salivating over a 50 yr old C-172 or maybe an old Mooney etc. of the few who are being trained to be a private pilot. Finally, I did NOT say no one could afford to fly, what I said was the working stiff can no longer afford to fly, back in the 60’s and 70’s most of the Physicians in my town had new airplanes and the successful local plumber, electrician, small business owner etc had a 5 yr old used airplane, very, very few had “old” as in greater than 10 yr old airplanes. Every weekend there were several people out flying and on a nice day you had to wait in line for the wash rack. There were two FBO’s and follow me trucks met every incoming airplane vying for their business. None of that is true today, but the town had at least twice the population. There are literally millions that can afford to fly, visit any South Fl Marina and walk down the rows of more than Million dollar Sportfishermen etc by the hundreds, each one burns way more fuel than an airplane and slip rent is more than hangar rent etc. But they aren’t the common man either. Face it, the gap between the Wealthy and the rest of the population is quite large, much larger than in times past. But flying is hard, many sweaty hours in tiny airplanes that you barely can fit into, being bounced around, and in a year or so you can be turned loose on your own, in a tiny, sweaty little box, where the Sportfisherman you buy it today and are on the water tomorrow, with two young things on your arms, no sweating and “Captains” to drive it are readily available if one of the young things needs attention down below. The people who can afford it, are in the most part not interested anymore. They buy shares in Netjets instead. What it costs to buy and insure and maintain a 1.3 Million dollar Cirrus, I bet you can go with Netjets instead.

Took me awhile to figure that out, but if your asking which school, it was Central Texas College in Killeen, I was in 6th Cav Stationed at Ft Hood.

It’s my opinion that there is significant drag between the wing and fuselage on a Mooney that could be reduced with “proper” fairings. However it would make it a real bear to get into and out of the airplane, so without seriously degrading cockpit access there just isn’t much we could do.

It’s purely a finances thing, a couple of ratty Arrows, 172’s whatever is orders of magnitude cheaper than a couple of new Cirrus. However some have the $$$ to pay significantly more to fly the new Cirrus, so there are some Cirrus trainers, but the majority of people trying to get into Commercial flying as a living do so on a shoestring, so hence the ratty 172’s or Arrow’s etc. I went through a part 141 school and changed a few things, I was never a Private pilot, didn’t see the point, first checkride was Commercial in a M20AT. The syllabus was 152’s, then Cherokee’s for instruments and the then new M20AT’s for Commercial. I disliked the Cherokee’s and paid extra to just fly the Mooney’s after the 152’s. State school, in Tx, so of course Mooney’s.

I hate to say you know what happens, but it sometimes does. I do think the poster that indicated that they may not have been kept cool in storage could well have been correct. I feel sure heat reduces shelf life. At the plant, we used to use the tubes, went through hundreds of them a month, never seemed to have an issue, new President came in and knew nothing about airplanes and he switched us to frozen pre-mixed product to save money, it had a short shelf life and we threw away lots of it at great expense, first time I had ever seen it pre-mixed and frozen, that’s what started me freezing it soon after it was mixed if I couldn’t use it all in one day.

Velocity dive or VD is the test point and from memory it’s 120% of VNE. That number may vary with type and Category of aircraft, I’m not sure. I know your jesting, but you really shouldn’t exceed VNE

Not that I’ve seen a whole bunch of flight controls, but I’ve not seen any that were leading edge heavy, (overbalanced) the few that I’ve balanced you installed the flight control into a jig or sometimes a home fabricated method of it being supported by the hinge centerline, level and measuring the weight at the trailing edge at a specified spot, but there was always weight. (underbalanced) Often bolts sitting on a knife edge is all it takes to support the flight control for balancing. However I do know that the lighter the flight control is at the trailing edge, the higher the airspeed before flutter becomes an issue. There are limits of course, but I balance towards the lightest trailing edge that I can and within allowable limits, this is safest, plus as the aircraft ages, from spot painting or repairs or just dirt or insect nests or whatever in the flight control, they over time move towards trailing edge heavy. I’ve never seen one gain weight on the leading edge as there is a lot less surface area there. ‘Unless the center of gravity of the weight is different, you’re going to end up with the same weight, regardless of how heavy it started with if your changing weights, if it was in balance to start with. Personally I’d like it to be too heavy than too light, it’s a whole lot easier removing some weight than it is to add weight. Note, I’ve never balanced a Mooney flight control but can’t see how it’s any different. If I were the King, I’d ship weights that were too heavy, making life easy on the mechanics.

Assuming nothings broken, the motor can’t turn if a limit switch is messed up allowing power to stay on, on the motor. The motor would stall, no noise, but the CB would trip. The fact that there is a noise is troubling as it seems to indicate somethings broken, or the noise hopefully isn’t gear related. I wouldn’t fly until I found the noise, you should be able to find it by pulling all the CB’s with the master off, then turn the master on, and one at a time push the breakers back in. Hopefully it is an old Grimes “grinder” rotating beacon.

In 2005 we bought a CTS-V, as I have had a Delco battery leak on me before I put an Optima red top in it before it’s first tank of gas, actually I took the battery out of the 2002 Z28 we were trading for the V. The car did sit in storage with the battery disconnected for three years and the car has spent much of its life in storage, the last couple of years on float. But that what, 20 yr old battery starts the LS6 small block easily still, never tried a cap check, because you know, it’s a car I don’t have a clue how or why it’s lasted so long, surely it has to be heavily sulphated. Except for my Golf Cart I will only use AGM batteries

A pig is worse, like hitting a stump. Marine C-12 hit one at Hunter Army Airfield, right prop got it, we were told a Crew Chief had walked into it, whole right side of the aircraft was covered in blood, did quite a lot of damage. Later found out it was a pig. Some are black and pretty much invisible at night. As I frequent grass strips and small non towered airports almost exclusively. I’ve had to go missed and abort for Deer, pigs, turkeys and Coyotes. Big birds are the worst, because the Damn things can fly and some can out climb you. In Central Fl it’s Sand Hill Cranes, big STUPID birds about 3’ tall, they takeoff straight up. Turkeys are smart, they usually run off to the side in plenty of time.

And I remember attending a seminar put on by the FAA where I was told Nextgen was going to fix this type of thing?

Look at all the markets, boat show in Fl was just a week or so ago, news reported that boats under 26 feet weren't selling, but multi million dollar yachts were sold out years in advance. Gulfstream has for years been sold out way in advance. Cessna is very profitable, building “biz” jets, Beech is profitable, building jets as is pretty much every jet manufacturer. Cirrus is an anomaly, most Cirrus buyers aren’t pilots that have been flying for a very long time, they figured out how to tap into a market no one else did, or just as likely they created a market, but it’s actually a tiny market Average Joe can’t afford to fly, and the majority of those that can, have enough money to be chauffeured around in Luxury. They don’t fly, they have people for that. Since the 70’s the actual purchasing power of the average Joe has been decreasing. I believe it’s called wage stagnation, but in the 70’s everyone bought boats, campers and airplanes etc. no more, from the end of WWII every year for the average person they had more wealth than the year before, that trend reversed about 1980. Now only the top percent or two can, and they aren’t buying single engine pistons. Sure Cirrus is selling, but their numbers are a joke compared to the industry 40 or 50 years ago. So the only way is to make airplanes cheaper, LSA’s and Experimental some few average Joe’s can afford, but even them are out of the reach of most. That leaves us, a few that fly what most wouldn’t back in the day, antique, many would consider junk out dated aircraft. ‘Not to be ugly, but who drives a 40 yr old pickup with worn paint and interior with an AM radio, no AC, power steering etc? That’s what most of our aircraft are, 40+ yr old relics. because if your like me, you don’t have seven figures for a new airplane.

I used to run into fuel tank sealant that wouldn’t cure in the Army pretty often. I think because we kept it in Conex’s out in the Sun and it got very hot. My advice buy it in the can as opposed to the self mixing tubes, mix yourself by color, mix a batch the day before and validate it cures, then use that can after it’s been proven. Mixed sealant can be kept in a freezer for quite awhile and it still be good, so if your going to mix a tube mix it, remove what your going to use that day and immediately put the rest in the freezer, then tomorrow or the next day take it out an hour or so before you need it then use it. Even unmixed the shelf life of the two components is greatly extended in the fridge, or better the freezer. You can unscrew the plunger part of the self mixing tubes, push in the valve at the end and get the harder out, then of course just push the product out of the tube if only a small amount is needed so you don’t have to mix a whole tube. There is a machine that mixes the tubes but it’s hello expensive, I’ve redneck mixed tubes by pushing the harder in, then cutting the mushroom head off and chucking the plunger into a drill then spinning it medium speed while pumping the plunger in and out for a minute or so. Buying a mechanical gun for the tube is worthwhile, the air powered ones are really great, but expensive.

Every good battery charger I’ve run, and I lived aboard a sailboat with a 660 AH Concorde battery bank with 4 Very good programmable chargers, when first turned on will initially start out at absorption voltage, even a fully charged battery will initially accept a high charge rate, but very quickly it begins to diminish, Ideally when the batteries acceptance rate hits 1/2 of 1% of the batteries rated capacity the charger will then drop to float, which happens after a few minutes. If you have a golf cart their charger usually has a meter and you can see charge rate, and many other chargers have a meter also. The battery is not being overcharged having a 1.25 or so amp charge for a few minutes, most maintainers are actually very low power chargers, because of course their purpose is to maintain a charge, not to charge a low battery. To see this, unplug your battery minder, tender or whatever on your fully charged battery, then plug it back in, it should start out at absorption voltage for several minutes then drop to float.

That and what the Manufacturer rep posted about within 6” of an exhaust pipe, but I agree having it could help, and I see no downside.

I’ve only very rarely seen an A&P cap check a new battery, in truth only rarely have I seen them cap checked at all, so your sort of a lone ranger from what I’ve seen. Yes a battery is considered “dead” at 80% capacity, but warm weather etc it’s likely one at 50% or less will start an engine with no issues.

Once you clean terminals a little Corrosion-X seems to help keep them clean

All of the drugs would knock my Wife out, I mean dead asleep all day and night except the Stugeron. I believe many of these drugs are antihistamines and they make you drowsy ‘Every year we would spend Hurricane season up river from Jacksonville tied up to the dock with no movement and she would lose her sea legs. We would motor down the ICW to West Palm, those few days on the ICW and she would get her sea legs back so she could handle the crossing to West End.

Why would you want to do that? As evidenced by all the aircraft without a split switch, it’s not necessary All chargers switch from constant current to constant voltage, which is really a misnomer, even cheap single voltage chargers don’t actually switch, but they are initially current limited because they don’t make enough current to raise the battery to the voltage set point, once the battery is charged enough to hit set point then it “switches” to constant voltage, but not actual switching is going on, just it can now hold set voltage is all, then because it can hold voltage set point, current begins to decrease But there is no switching going on, it’s simply hitting its voltage set point is all, just like an alternator. ”Three” stage chargers really only have two voltage set points, the bulk phase is where the charger is current limited, absorption is where it finally hits absorption voltage, then when amps drop to the set point the charger switches to float voltage, but other than the max the charger can make there is no current limits. A “three” stage charger does have two voltage set points and DOES switch from one to the other I think marketing has gotten to battery chargers and a lot of fancy claims are made for sales Now chargers that you can set max current do exist, but they are usually let’s call them professional chargers, way more expensive than most would pay. Alternators are set between absorption and float voltage, so they actually slightly overcharge a battery, but obviously batteries are tough enough to handle it.

There is no need for a separate alternator switch, automobiles don’t have them and we have the same or similar electrical systems. I’m nearly certain anytime the master is on, the VR is powered and therefore there is current to the field on the alternator, nothing that I know of is smart enough to not power the field circuit when the engine isn’t running. Only thing a split master gives you is the capability of turning the alternator off, without pulling the field CB. Cessna’s I’ve flown have those obnoxious CB’s that are flat when on and you can’t pull them, so you can’t de-energize anything with the CB, so you have to have a switch. However I guess not having a separate switch means the pilot has to know that the field CB is the way to turn off the alternator if they ever need to.

Yeah I don’t know what I’ll do, probably some kind of LSA, an Amphib looks like it could be fun. I really don’t travel much at all and therefore don’t really need the Mooney

How I got in was left foot first and sit down with the right (damaged one) leg still on the wing, slide in to the pilot seat and drag the leg in, bending it enough to get past the gear well was the hardest. Getting out I drug my butt out onto the wing bringing legs out last, turn 90 degrees, close door and get off the leading edge. Standing and walking off the training edge would have been much harder, and more likely to fall.

From memory I don’t think the MM is “FAA approved” either. But Crop Dusters are honestly treated a little different than people carrying airplanes, so maybe can’t imply from one to the other. I can tell you that we Certified and were delivering aircraft before the IPC or MM were published. They did catch up, but honestly had errors, quite a few actually. A proper IPC is a mind boggling amount of work, a truly incredible amount of work. Imagine getting every nut, bolt, screw, cotter pin etc. correct.

Some may argue that should isn’t mandatory, but I agree with you. Plainly EI wants it. We never did, so either that’s new, or we were incorrect in our installations.

I know the Thrush IPC as of when I retired about 5 years ago was NOT FAA approved, I can’t speak to other manufacturers. The reason it wasn’t was not because the FAA had any issue with it, but because there just wasn’t anyway they could ensure it’s accuracy, way too many parts. The POH of course is FAA approved, but compared to a parts manual it’s a very simple document.