Utah20Gflyer

In regards to oil air separators being controversial. It seems like if you have an oil/air separator and your oil analysis comes back fine then I can’t see a rational reason to be against them. Personally I want to see objective data indicating there is a problem before I go along with someone’s hypothesis and oil analysis will definitively demonstrate whether there is a problem.

I concur with the others, choose an inspection panel that isn’t associated with the fuel tank.

There are several flight schools at U42 and one at KBTF if your son doesn’t want to do a college aviation program. I know one instructor who teaches at U42 who I fly with in my Mooney occasionally. If you’d like his contact info message me and I’ll give it to you.

I’m not sure why everyone is so upset about the government being interested in your butt hole. It just shows they care.

One of the biggest questions is how much recent flying has it been doing and what kind of maintenance has it received. You want to buy a plane that has been flying a lot and has been receiving regular maintenance. If you can actually go see the plane in person you want to try to figure out if everything works. If you find lots of things don’t work on a cursory inspection you can be sure you will find a lot more things after you buy it.

Mine is on a data plate on the passenger side just behind the cowling.

You might check e bay and some other used part sources for that down tube.

I think the most important use is in the case of an over voltage condition you can shut down the charging system to prevent damage to your battery and possibly other things.

Yeah, your plane probably had two King KX 170 radios and then someone replaced one of them with the TKM MX 170. This was a popular upgrade because you slide the King out and slide the TKM in and you’re done. Kind of like upgrading a Garmin 430 with the Avidyne 440. With no install it’s very appealing. Only downside is the TKM radios have a rep for not being very durable. When I sent mine in to get repaired they said it was not repairable and offered to sell me a new one for 2500 or 3000. I ended up putting in the Garmin 255 because I wanted a modern radio that had an internal ILS receiver and was concerned about how long the new TKM would last. I thought that might be a KI 214 CDI but wasn’t sure. If that’s the case then it gets the localizer/VOR signal from the radio and the ILS receiver is inside the KI 214. I also had a KI 214 in my plane when I bought it and it was bad. I also understand from my research that they are not repairable. KI 214s like the TKMs seem to have lots of problems. If you swap the radios yourself be careful of the locking lug that you have to loosen to remove it. If you turn it the wrong way too hard you can actually damage the radio. If you need to replace the king radio I have a kx 175b I’d sell you for 250, I’ll throw the ILS receiver in for free. The 175 is the certified version of the 170, they are interchangeable.

Does the other nav radio and CDI work correctly? The two radios you have are slide in replacements for each other which is helpful because if the other radio/CDI combo works you can swap the radios and determine if it’s the radio or CDI that is bad. You need an ILS receiver if you want ILS capability but you don’t need it for IFR. In particular if you get a WAAS GPS which will allow you to do LPV approaches. You used to need ILS capability to satisfy the precision approach requirement of the Instrument checkride but you can use LPV approaches now. You also need two non precision approaches which could be RNAV, VOR or Localizer. The GPS will provide DME functionality so you wouldn’t need the old INOP one. Personally I like having the option of ILS, but it’s not A must. Ultimately the decision on what goes into a IFR panel is determined by what you are willing to fly into instrument conditions with. Technically you could fly IFR in a plane with a single nav radio and CDI as long as you had your pitot static, Transponder and VOR check current. Few people would want to do that though. You might consider taking a couple flights with a CFII in your airplane and a few different rental planes and see what you think you need after comparing them.

I think the minimum would be a 355 gps com and a G5 HSI, you wouldn’t have ILS capability but would still have all the GPS stuff plus VOR and LOC approaches. Have you diagnosed the ILS issue? Neither of those radios have ILS receivers in them so either you have a stand alone ILS receiver box or it’s incorporated into your CDI. I have a stand alone ILS receiver I’ll sell you super cheap if that will help you get back that capability. If you get a GI 275 HSI they have better compatibility with older radios and you could have everything going into that. Before I had the 255 installed I had a king kx175b feeding it nav information. Something to consider. Your installer may be able to do the same thing with a g5 but not sure about that. I’ve been told they only work with the more modern digital radios?

I had the exact same radios when I bought my plane and unsurprisingly my TKM radio also had issues. Ultimately I went with 2x GI 275s, GNC355 gps/com and a GNC 255 nav/com. This set up gives me everything I need for IFR but nothing extra. I’d like to add an auto pilot but am waiting for the bank account to recover. When I bought my plane it had a Garmin 320 transponder. I replaced that with a 327 which is a slide in replacement. I like the panel a lot and find it to be very functional and easy to use.

You’ll need a gps and maybe g5s or GI 275s before you get the auto pilot in order for the auto pilot to be optimized. You didn’t mention your budget which is a huge factor in giving you feedback. Personally I would rather go with the Garmin 175/355/375 over the older 430s that are loosing support. I have the 355 and really like it.

This was my initial thought. The right landing gear was removed and brakes disconnected just before this flight. Something as simple as some air in the right brake system could cause the right brake to be much less effective than the left and once that turn starts there probably isn’t anything you can do. The one thing that could help- right brake - is unavailable.

I work for a privately owned company and fly to remote job sites a couple times a month. The current deal is I’m paid a fixed “travel reimbursement” per trip and I am responsible for getting myself to the remote work however I choose. I have had to drive before when my plane was down for maintenance (which completely sucked) so I can legitimately say I am being paid to travel out of town and not for flying. The amount I’m being paid doesn’t actually cover all of the expense of operating the airplane but it does reduce the cost and if I factor in the commission for the work I do I’m sure I come out ahead.

This view is even better when you come over that ridge line on a dark night. Sorry to hear about the poor customer service at U42. This might have something to do with the FBO being government run.

How is anyone supposed to take this poll seriously without including the 1968 M20G?

I do oil changes at approximately 50 hours and also do oil analysis every oil change and my test results always come back good. I also fly my plane every week which I’m sure helps. I find the claim that you have to change the oil every 90 days or 20 hours or you are abusing your engine quite dubious. Where is the data that shows better results from changing the oil at 20 vs 50? If we both send in our oil for testing, someone else’s at 20 hours and mine at 50 hours is the lab going to quantify the superiority of the 20 hour oil? If my oil analysis comes back with the oil having quantifiable deficiencies then I will shorten my timeframe, but until then I’m sticking with the data. If someone has an oil analysis from some 20 hour oil I’d like to see it so I can compare to mine. I think that would be interesting. maybe we should start a thread where we all post oil analysis. I’d be happy to post all of mine.

The overhauled exchange unit I got from Aeromotors came with one hole plugged and the other open. I installed the plug on the top and a drain fitting on the bottom. I don’t know this for sure but I’m thinking the drain is to keep avgas from building up in the motor side of the pump in the case of a seal failure. Seems likely if the motor filled up completely with avgas it might stop functioning? So by allowing it to drain out it maintains functionality until it’s caught and replaced? Just a guess but I think it’s plausible.

I think I will add some vinyl tubing over the brake line as you suggest. I believe you about the character building nature of safety wiring a Mooney fuel pump. If the A&P isn’t ok with the lock washers I’m in for a fun time.

It was sounding uneven for a couple years to varying degrees but always put out consistent pressure and ran relatively smoothly. Much more recently it sounded gravely and then on the last trip it started being intermittent and running slow and was barely putting out any pressure. It never stopped completely but it definitely had a precipitous decline over the last couple flights which made me uncomfortable with continuing to run it. After hearing the overhauled pump hum smoothly, or maybe I should say roar smoothly- not sure why these pumps are so loud?? I think I can say that if your pump is not very even and smooth sounding it’s probably got some issues. I’ve considered whether I should have swapped it sooner and I’d maybe fault myself for not changing it a month ago when the decline happened, but on the other hand a trend is difficult to spot in the beginning so I probably only flew it one time more than I should have.

Mounting screws do have safety wire holes although they were installed with lock washers and no safety wire when I removed the pump. This was something I noticed and was going to ask my A&P about. Yes, new o rings and leather backing looked good. No signs of leaks when op checked. The wire coming out of the pump had an extra sleeve over the two wires already. Are you recommending another? Should the brake line get some protection from the Zip ties? Thanks!

I recently had an issue with engine roughness at WOT unless I kept the engine much richer that normal. Turned out to be two intake leaks one of which was pretty significant. Essentially one cylinder was really lean and I had to dump a lot of extra fuel into the system to get that one cylinder rich enough to run smoothly. It’s worth checking, good news is it’s a really cheap fix if it’s some old intake seals or couplings. I think I spent 30 bucks fixing the issue.

So my electric fuel pump just took a dump on my last flight to St George Utah. So I sent my pump in to Aeromotors, LLC. I have the Dukes 4140-00-21A pump. The quoted cost was for an overhaul was $550 and I paid $230 for two day shipping both ways with insurance. Aeromotors happened to have exchange unit available so I opted to take that one which gave me a total turn around of one week. My only real hiccup was leaving the drain fitting on the pump I sent in. My new fitting got delivered today, so once I get that screwed into the pump it will be all ready for my A&P to come inspect the work. Here is my new pump nestled in its new home.

If you rip a piece of pvc in half and slide it in under the filter it catches all the oil and there is no mess. I really don’t see any downsides to the rear case mount.