A64Pilot

At first I thought it was just my perception, but it’s happened a few times. Place the gear switch to down, and there is a several second delay before the gear begin to come down. ‘It’s intermittent, usually the gear starts down as soon as I put the switch to down, I delay gear extension until I get into the white arc, so the only real indicator of gear in transit to me is the gear unsafe light, but today coming back from Breakfast it seemed there was a four of five second delay between selecting the switch to down and it starting down. ‘Anyone heard of this before? Once they start down they come down at the same speed, it’s just a delay in starting. 81 J Model, 2200 airframe hours

We change oil not because it’s broken down, but because it’s contaminated with fuel, carbon and lead. 245 degrees is a joke for modern oil, average car’s oil temp is 220 or so if driven normally and as high as 300 on a track day. OIl is cooled on my wife’s CTS-V by engine coolant that’s 195 degrees, you don’t get much cooling until oil is well above 200. We aren’t stressing a good oil. ‘The older an engine is, the more frequently it’s oil ought to be changed, the reason is increased blow by contaminates the oil faster., unfortunately it’s new engines that people will baby with frequent oil changes, and the old ones get ignored. ‘Oil is as good as its going to get the moment it leaves the bottle, from there it’s degrading, you decide how degraded it gets before you change it. ‘I’m normally against oil analysis, as it’s marketed as and people want to believe it’s an engine analysis. However this is what oil analysis is good for, what it was created for, determining the condition of the oil. So send in a sample at your oil change interval the book recommends, and based on that analysis determine if you should shorten oil change interval. ‘Don’t use analysis to extend oil change intervals, many do, but it’s not worth it in my opinion. I can’t make a case for running straight weight oil in one of our engines, maybe in a C-65 that loses oil pressure on a hot Summer day, but not a more modern high compression engine, even in Florida I think a good multi viscosity oil is better.

I would hope there is no inline fuse that if it blew I have a complete electrical failure, which is what happens if the master or it’s relay breaks. ‘The only inline fuse that there should be is one within 1 ft of the battery to keep a clock alive, I know I have counted 6 or 7 under my panel but I feel sure Mooney didn’t put them there. ‘A CB I can reset, if it’s in a panel, a hidden inline fuse or an inaccessible one? They shouldn’t be allowed, again my opinion.

LASAR plainly states the single master switch IS a switch / breaker. https://lasar.com/switches/rocker-switch-master-switch-circuit-breaker-880052-501 They do NOT make that statement for the split switch https://lasar.com/switches/master-switch-688-169 either their literature is incorrect or the single switch is in fact a breaker as well and the split is not. So in my opinion if you want a split switch, your going to have to meet the original’s specifications, and it appears that the split switch doesn’t. I would not think you would want the master to be a breaker, but I didn’t design the thing.

An aircraft with a “flying tail” can be stable, instability usually comes when the tail is at or near zero lift as it can easily go either way at that point, this usually corresponds to the stick force neutral point which is what it sounds like, no or very low forces are required to move the stick or yoke and no or little increasing effort with amplitude so not only is a aircraft unstable, its very easy to overstress one with little stick force. ‘Usually the prohibition of a flying or lifting tail is how does one recover from a tail stall? In a normal aircraft its self correcting, the nose drops, speed increases and the stall breaks, same for a canard. I don’t play with aerobatic airplanes but would be very surprised if any had tails that in normal level flight produced lift, I wouldn't be surprised if they fly close to the stick force neutral point, I’d expect them to, I’d be surprised if they didn’t. Maybe aerobatic airplanes have so much elevator authority that they can break a tail stall that way, the elevator simply overpowers the stall?

Fully symmetrical airfoils are often chosen because their center of pressure doesn’t change much with increasing angles of attack, where on asymmetrical airfoils it does. ‘Only older helicopter designs use fully symmetrical designs, newer ones use asymmetrical airfoils as they provide more lift for the same power In search of more (free) carrying capacity the Army in its infinite wisdom put asymmetrical blades on the AH-1, (Kaman 747 blades) the center of pressure moved with angle of attack and it fed forces back into the swash plate that it wasn’t designed to handle and some failed of course killing the occupants. As I didn’t fly Cobra’s, I don’t know what other than increased swash plate inspections was done. ‘There have been aircraft designed with flying tails as they would be more efficient, but almost always they end up with the name widomaker, if a tail is providing lift, what’s the corrective action if it stalls? Canards are more efficient largely because both wings provide lift, and of course a normal aircraft is faster and more efficient with aft CG, but more unstable, I believe modern airliners fly with so far an aft CG that they are very unstable, but the flight control computer provides artificial stability.

RE checklists, they came into being when on the fly off to decide which bomber would be bought by the Army, a Military test pilot along with a Boeing test pilot took off in the prototype B-17 but forgot to disengage the gust locks, killing them both and destroying the prototyoe, obviously no control check was performed ‘The B-17 lost the fly off as there wasn’t a prototype to fly, but Illegally if memory serves the Army ordered another fly off, because they had seen the superiority of the four engine bomber compared to the twins it flew against. We came very close to entering WWII without the B-17. ‘But checklists are only good if they are used, this was I believe one of the last certification test flights of the Caribou turbine conversion, and yes it took off with the gust locks, locked, and no control sweep was performed. In the Military we had two types of Emergencies, some required what we called immediate action steps, meaning if you didn’t do something now you were going to crash, others the checklist was allowed to be used as a back uo. ‘An example was ditching power off was immediate action, meaning each step was committed to memory, where as ditching power on wasn’t, for that the checklist was used. ‘I’m still a believer in checklist memorization, back it up of course with the written one when possible. That along with “blind cockpit drills” meaning sitting in the cockpit going through the emergency procedures and touching each switch, lever etc without looking, done repeatedly it becomes automatic

If elevator deflections changed, I’d expect to see an allowable CG range change. ‘If they were changed to correct some kind of lack of control response, I’d expect to see an AD requiring the change on other similar models. ‘In practice increasing negative elevator throw isn’t going to change anything, when was the last time you hit the down elevator stops in flight? The breaking a stall / spin is logical as of course to break a spin down elevator is used as is opposite rudder. ‘My guess why it’s not required of other models is that it was only found in this one model, you would expect the FAA to test every model if they find a discrepancy in one, but that often doesn’t happen. ‘What does drive the FAA is complaints and or accidents, and that actually makes some sense, if on a mature design, there are no complaints and no accidents, maybe there isn’t a problem?

I don’t believe I have a inspection hole on the leading edge. ‘I’m going to breakfast Sun morning, if I remember I’ll leave the gear down after takeoff and see if the timer starts with gear actuation. ‘I’ve seen stall warning switches mounted straight down in underwing inspection hole clovers that air would blow back to indicate flight, but I don’t member what they were for, what device they controlled. ‘Now I bet everything uses a GPS signal for speed to know flight

The M811B clock is still sold. it’s still a good product, I wouldn’t pay $500 for a clock myself, but I won’t throw away a perfect functioning one either, besides the flight timer is kind of neat, I believe it’s wired to the gear switch, not sure, but it does time flights accurately. https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/pnpages/11-05874.php?gclid=CjwKCAjwpKCDBhBPEiwAFgBzjztJ8ipMHS_mWSdim-MSWxeJEBdqWaBiq-vgtPfmC2bEx-tn60rh0RoCIMcQAvD_BwE

Several years ago I had a very similar device added to our type certificate, name of the company was Aglaser. There is some advantage in an Ag aircraft especially in training knowing exact height above the ground. Proper dispersal altitude is higher than you might think, and many fly too low and this decreases swath width. However laser altimeters can’t replace radar, they are too limited in range, they work extremely well at closer distances, not so good at telling you your at 500 feet though. ‘I say that never having seen the product you speak of, and basing it off or other products, most often devices like this, the laser transceiver is an off the shelf product bought to use, and the actual development is in the indicators and annunciators

Before I replaced the master I’d temporarily jumper it, this bypasses the switch and if it’s the switch it of course will fix the issue. ‘However you lose the CB functionality, if the master is a CB, I’m not sure it is, I wouldn’t think it is. I’m also having a fluctuating ammeter / voltmeter, cleaning the external contacts seemed to fix it, but then I thought I ought to do it the correct way and put some DC4 on them to prevent future corrosion, and it seems to have returned but at a much lower fluctuation, its intermittent meaning it only does it sometimes ‘So let me know what you do to fix yours. ‘Whether a split switch is a minor or a major is up to the installer to decide, I’d decide it’s a minor because you only changed from a single to a dual switch, but you should confirm the amp rating of the split switch is as high or higher than the single, for both sides, and confirm it’s not a breaker switch. ‘In Cessna’s I’ve flown the split switch is used as a single switch, meaning alternator off and on with the master. I had always thought it was split in the event of a malfunctioning voltage regulator that gets stuck wide open you have a way to turn off the alternator before it burns something up. Cessna’s seem to favor the type of CB that’s flush and you can’t pull them, I have no idea why perhaps they are cheaper? So you couldn’t pull the field CB on a Cessna, or at least not our old C-210.

I had forgotten I had this picture, notice the tail on one of them, anyone know it’s name?

Again weight, cut a hole in the cabin and you have to reinforce it, also the door of course weighs more just skin, maybe a better question why do high wings have two or more doors? My Maule had four, one baggage but it was as big as a regular door.

Remember no free lunch, it applies to just about everything in aircraft. Typically there are three notches of flaps in a generic airplane, first notch primarily lift with some drag, second notch a little more lift but more drag, third notch is mostly added drag. Some of course may have more than three and some have no notches of flap, but Cessna’s version of electric flaps with stops is a pretty good idea, in this case it would be slap it full up, then down, without having to look or hold anything the flaps would go to first notch. ‘The FAA’s definition of the purpose of flaps is to slow an airplane for landing. So yes, full flaps purpose is primarily drag and drag isn’t what you want to take off of course, however with most airplanes if they are light and low density altitude often there is enough excess power to overcome the drag and shortest takeoffs can be with full flap. A Bush trick is to deflect your ailerons fully, then put flaps down to match the deflected aileron, assuming the manufacturer wasn’t stupid the aileron down travel stops at about the point where the drag curve steepens, they do this to reduce induced yaw of course. But flap matching aileron travel is a way to attempt to get the most lift with the least drag, useful for weak over gross airplanes operated in high density altitude, you know common Bush ops. ‘But all of this is mute, if you need to go around, you NEED to go around, you don’t need to be playing games reconfiguring the aircraft. there isn’t time, and last I looked we don’t have a go around button. However if performing a go around with full flap isn’t to you liking, just slap it up, it will go around with no flap too. There is no need to be lightning fast on cleaning up the airplane, many fly just fine with the gear down. Take your time be sure of what your doing, immediate action isn’t required. ‘The reason we push the prop all the way in and go to full rich on final is so that if we have to we are configured for a go around. ‘But don’t believe me on any of this, pick a nice low stress day with little wind or traffic and go out and try it yourself, be easy on the throttle etc during practice, no need to cob it, there isn’t a hog on the runway today, ease into it, and stop if you don’t like it, get some instruction Has anyone flown a C-150? it had 40 degrees of flap, you could have a steep approach angle with it, but when the 152 came about the flaps were limited to 30 degrees, because at its increased gross weight a go around at 40 degrees didn’t pass. Go out on a nice day and ease into this stuff or if you feel you need to take an instructor along, but don’t have the first time you have to do an emergency go around be the time the hog appears under your nose, the accident report will read failure to maintain control during a take off, the hog ran away of course and everyone else will think what fool stalls and crashes during a take off?

The gear switch being inadvertently fumbled instead of flaps is a very real concern with a Beech Bonanza, for one thing they are real close to each other and to add insult to injury, they are out of sight. ‘But we aren't Bonanza’s, you really can’t confuse gear for flaps in a Mooney, you can grab the wrong handle, the best way to prevent that is practice Keep on not practicing for what I can assure you will happen if you fly very much and that’s a go around after landing, maybe you’ll pull it off never having practiced it, most likely will, but I can assure you that when the time comes, if you have practiced the maneuver, success is more likely. Any of the prop strikes from PIO could have been prevented by going around, and once in a great while it’s simply better to go around rather than to use your superior skill to save a bad approach ‘What’s the fascination of I have to retract the flaps? I can assure you it will fly just fine with full flaps, even at max gross, it’s a requirement to demonstrate that for Certification, as well as being controllable. Aircraft I built had 40 degrees of flap as a piston aircraft, once it got a turbine the flaps were restricted to 15 degrees, due to excessive pitch forces on a balked landing with the higher HP, any aircraft Certified is capable of a balked landing at full flaps, at max gross weight and at extremes of allowable CG.

Years ago I bought a Maule, it came with the original Bose headset, that had a proprietary connection in the instrument panel. ‘One side stopped working so I called Bose to try to get it fixed and got the we don’t support that anymore, so I asked if I could get some kind of trade in allowance, answer was no. So I asked if the new headset used the same connector that was mounted in my panel, again no. Well does the new connector fit the same cut out as old one? No. It's actually Garmin that’s the worst with the we don’t support that anymore, you have to buy new, if you buy Garmin you had better buy they new whatever that just came out, because if you buy something that’s been out a few years, they may discontinue support next year. ‘It’s why I like Bendix King, you can still get 50 year old radios repaired and while they don’t have pretty color displays, they are very reliable.

Nothing wrong with this one, I don’t need a clock, an approach timer maybe. ‘It’s just it’s on the panel and I have this thing about if it’s there, it’s supposed to work. Having said that, I probably won’t fix the Radar altimeter, I will probably put an analyzer there.

Pressurized is what adds to the cost significantly, ask what it costs to add an antenna to a pressurized airplane. B-55’s are so cheap and have been that way for decades, because nobody wants one, it cost three times as much to fly a B-55 than say a V-35, ask a Duke owner what it costs ‘Fuel cost on a small single engine turbine is insignificant, it’s dwarfed by other costs, as far as hot starts, you have to be stupid to hot start a PT-6, and I mean stone cold stupid, they are such a benign start you have plenty of time. Other wise they are so easy to operate, no mixture, no cowl flaps, no cyl head temp to monitor etc, just three limits to watch, usually torque on take off and that transitions to usually ITT in climb and cruise, sometimes Ng speed, prop RPM is just for comfort / noise. leave it full all of the time if you want to, it doesn’t hurt. ‘Now starting a Garrett without auto start is an emergency procedure, be sure you have nothing else going on when you start that motor, same with the little Allison, with it you will be several seconds into the I believe it’s a 6 sec limited range, either can be hot started in the time it takes to glance at your phone or watch. Walters and the new GE are about like a PT-6

Automobiles or motorcycles have nothing to do with our aircraft engines, much smaller combustion chambers with much increased swirl brought about largely by four valve heads etc just are a whole different animal than our combustion chambers. ‘Electronic ignition doesn’t either, unless it’s advanced enough to have a knock sensor and or other sensors, perhaps timing reduction with higher manifold pressures?, electronic by itself doesn't mean anything, except that there may not be points, but a few electronic ignitions back in the day kept the points, just they carried very low current and therefore lasted a long time. ‘However I’m sure we could run 94UL with our N/A engines just the way they are, probably back off on timing a few degrees and my Guess wound be a reduction of manifold pressure maybe to 25” but maybe higher, there is margin now and we could probably run 94UL just the way we are, but at a reduced margin, and that may restrict LOP somewhat. Back in the 70’s I believe it was the University of Tennessee that was conducting testing with what was then called Gasahol. they were running it in one engine of a Cessna twin, and they got it to work, it was car gas. But there are I believe many other issues, so that takes us back to 94UL, which I believe has no issues, except the lower Octane. I know people that have run straight 93 Octane car gas in higher compression engines, 100LL in one tank, car gas in another and did so with no issues, much more susceptible to vapor lock though on a hot day after shut down, but obviously they were operating closer to detonation than if they were running 100LL

If the firewall is indeed flimsy, then maybe a doubler should be added, before the firewall cracks. ‘Then you get to shoot Monel rivets They work harden fast so don’t play around with them, shoot them.

Thanks for the wiring diagram, I can confirm that replacing with 4 AA’s in series works, still seems silly to wait until exactly on the hour to put batteries in a clock, what nut comes up with something like that?

Closer to 40 or more, but I fear that maybe they have the impetus to get it done now, if they choose to, hopefully it will fall below the line

I got the clock out, I assume Mooney added the plastic plugs, the Davtron battery apparently requires the wires to be cut and spliced to replace the battery, that’s why I believe Mooney added the plugs, and to make assembly easier. ‘Anyway my battery was missing, and the ground wire broken off, on disassembly it appeared that the ground wire was soldered to a chassis ground so I attached a new ground wire, removed the plug as I didn’t have the other half and spilced in the battery pack wire, the battery pack comes with the standard 9V connector so future battery replacements ought to be easier. ‘Now to see if I can get it back together without damage to existing harness, it was tough to remove.

I bet it is a strange shaped connector, I had a plastic plug in my mind. ‘The battery wires are supposed to be separate, so I need to keep looking. I intend to replace the battery with four AA lithium’s in series, that ought to last for years