MooneyMike

Here are a couple ideas in flyover country... KCGI in Cape Girardeau Missouri makes for a good stop. Nice friendly airport and the town, sitting along the Mississippi is interesting and pretty. Plenty of good places to eat in town KRVS in Tulsa has a nice FBO, Christiansen Aviation. I saw 3 Piaggio Avanti's there too. And how could you pass up KBRY in Bardstown Kentucky? Voted the prettiest small town in the country and home of the bourbon industry. Mike

Regarding meeting TBO, there are more issues than engine compression and oil burn. Things like crankshaft counterweights. When I bought my J it had a high time engine that ran great, had good compressions, low oil burn, fuel flow to specs and in every regard was a great engine. But during an annual the MSC said "it has a vibration we cannot balance with prop weights." Friend of mine is an expert on rotating machinery vibration, so we glued a 3 - axis set of accelerometers and logged the data. It had 1 ips vibration and a good engine can be balanced to be in the range of about .2 ips. I talked to quite a few people (engine builders, etc.) and their thought was the tungsten counterweights in the crankshaft start moving and cause the vibration. The fix is to tear it down and rebuild the crank. I opted for factory new as at the time I had a good core and with the economy in meltdown it was available with minimum downtime. I bought the airplane with a high time engine, and knew repair or replacement was in the future. It just came sooner than I wished. Moral of the story is if the plane looks good, have the balance checked during the pre-buy. Mike

I tried every trick I knew to fix this thing to no avail. The event viewer showed some windows updates about the time the thing stopped working but even going into regedit and making changes did not help. Seems the issue was more than just in Garmin's software. Garmin has now released something called Garmin Aviation Database Manager and it is quite different than the previous program. Installed it and I am now working again. Mike

Looks like I've got a corrupted file or the registry link is broken. I've tried to fix it using the standard tools so far.

PT20J, I uninstalled flyGarmin for Windows as that would not open and still does not after re-installing it. The version number has not changed.

Howdy everyone. A couple days ago I decided to check to see if any new updates were in affect and found the flyGarmin app would not open. flyGarmin is the blue box you check before loading the new updates on the SD card. It worked on 12/14 and when digging through Windows I saw a Windows Security updated on 12/16. Of course I was unable to go back to a previous windows version as it had been more than 10 days since Microsoft broke my Garmin. I've uninstalled, restarted, reinstalled, swore at the pos, and it's still broke. Event viewer shows a fault every time I try to open it. AvdbUpdaterUI.exe 1.5.11.0 5f5fced6 KERNELBASE.dll 10.0.19041.1348 9166324b e0434352 0012b502 23ec 01d7fa687a56a539 C:\Program Files (x86)\Garmin\flyGarmin for Windows\AvdbUpdaterUI.exe C:\WINDOWS\System32\KERNELBASE.dll 7eb30f7c-a72c-4721-94e0-3d888de39aa5 Anyone gone through this and resolved it? Thanks everyone, fly safe and fly often Mike N201XF 6I2

Hey y'all, sorry for the delayed response, I was at Barber Motorsports Park all weekend. Nice to hear from everyone! Hangars are at a premium everywhere it seems and I was happy to get one this close to home. E-town, Bardstown and Lebanon - Springfield host fly in breakfasts each month so put one of them on your 'gotta do' list, it would be nice to meet! Mike

I live in Bardstown and based out of 6I2, Lebanon Springfield in North Central Kentucky. Mike N201XF

Hey y'all, I just relocated my Mooney from Bowling Green KY to Lebanon Springfield today and saw a Mooney taxi past. Walked over to the fuel pump and met a MooneySpacer Dominikos flying to Ohio. Anyone bump into a fellow MooneySpacer lately? Mike

I’ll take the Bluegrass and pass on the sand. Couple weeks ago I bailed from California and moved to Bardstown, KY. Nice little town, friendly people. Samuels Field is building more hangars this year and I’m on the wait list. For the time being, I’ve got a hangar in Bowling Green. Once I’ve got all my stuff here I’ll go back and return with my J.

Golden State in San Luis Obispo. The weather is nicer here.

That's a good idea. thanks, Mike

I'm replacing the VR, and yes it was a pain to get out. No quite the shotgun approach to troubleshooting but not far from it either. When the new one comes I'll measure the field circuit again for resistance and see if the new terminal rectified the problem. (yeah, an electrical joke, yuck yuck. A horse walks into a bar and the bartender asks ... )

That is funny! I was just in Florida and geez but every other radio advert was for ED treatments.

Found this burnt connector (the blue one) on the Master switch. The lead pulled free from the connector when removing so that may be the culprit for higher than expected resistance readings. The burnt look is rather suspect. But I was unable to make any resistance readings from pin B to the alternator field lead today. Obviously I'm anxious to see if that fixed it. Being unable to find a drawing for the switch I can only guess this lead is for the alternator circuit. I also replaced the ring terminal connector at the alternator but my resistance readings were with the new connector. In the next couple days a package from Aircraft Spruce will be on my porch and I'll replace the Cold War -era voltage regulator and see if it will deliver 42 years of faithful service. More to follow no doubt.

Greetings everyone. Just before takeoff (whew!) last week I got a low voltage annunciator alarm and saw a discharge on the ammeter of ~ 25 amps. I had seen this once before and it went away after cycling the master and avionics breakers. But not this time. The alternator tested fine and on a bench I saw it put out 69 amps. I measure 9.74 volts on the field lead of the alternator which is a bit low (Master switch on, engine off of course). Across the alternator field circuit breaker I measured 0.23 volt drop and after cycling the breaker a number of times it did not change. From the field pin on the VR Cannon plug (pin B) to the field lead (removed from the alternator) measured 12 - 15 ohms. The VR Cannon plug (pin C) to ground was 1.2 ohms VR Cannon plug input (pin A) measured 12.3 volts when the battery buss was reading 12.5 volts. From appearance, the OECO VR looks original so I've ordered a Zeftronics unit. If it is original, once cannot complain about 42 years of service! What should be the resistance from pin B of the VR Cannon plug to the field lead? It is a switched circuit that goes through one of the two poles of the Master Switch. The measured resistance seems a bit high to me but I don't know if it accounts for my low field voltage reading. I've been working this problem with the advice/guidance/assistance of the local shop A&P so I'll ask them and maybe give LASAR a call too. Thanks all, Mike N201XF

Just a comment on flying so high; why not fly the LAX class B through one of the VFR corridors (Coast Route, for example) then FIM RZS and file in flight for direct? There is lower terrain, plenty of airports and you avoid PXN ROM which are horrible for bumps in summer and ice in fall - spring? Just a thought. Mike

That’s impressive. Not trying to be lazy, but I don’t see links to hangar and/or property on their site. I’m in Venice now, and they’ve got 92 folks on the wait list. Almost seems like an opportunity for revenue growth but no way would I leave my J out on the ramp. I like the area, but would I need to get a ‘perm’ and trade my F-150 truck for a Lexus? Just kidding there... but still.

It is not pleasant. This was on Wednesday. NorCal Approach was really busy, so they sent us to 9000 and handed us off to Oakland Center. No biggie but the air quality was worse the higher we got.

Lot of great info there, and thank you. I was really not wanting to get restricted in flying along the beach, transiting to other areas, etc. And the million dollar question is “are hangars available?” ”Stella” is what I’ve named my ‘78 J.

Thank you everyone for all the great comments and feedback. These comments have opened my eyes to the diversity in Florida; it’s not just Disney World, orange groves and spring training. Today’s high was maybe 72, with a low of 54 or so here on the Central Coast so the heat and humidity would no doubt be a big adjustment. The area is beautiful, people friendly and affordable housing starts a bit under a half mil. But with that paradise comes a political system rigged to allow only one voice. So thanks again, the search will be interesting no doubt

Thanks everyone for all the good feedback. I’ve been to Florida once, a long time ago, courtesy of the Navy and will look forward to Airbnb’ing around to see what I may like. I intend to spend alot of time with the airplane but do have other interests and a hangar home might be awesome if near ‘fun stuff to do,’ especially if it would fit my cars and bikes too. If it was near a good whiskey bar...

Howdy all. I'm right on the edge of retirement and am planning on saying 'adios' to California. Florida is interesting to me for the warm weather and lifestyle. I'd considered the panhandle area / Pensacola but the MOA's and restricted areas look like a lot of inconvenience and make it a challenge to fly along the coast line. Anyone have recommendations? Ideally not far from the coast as I like diving and live now <3 miles from the beach. Budget is about $300k I guess, but the one caveat is I want/need a hangar for my J. Surfing the web I came across a site for Venice. OTOH, when talking to my son, he described it as a dump based on the gouge from a fellow aviator. That might also mean happy hour ended early Anyone?

On the plus side, it looks great and paint and interior are not cheap. Avionics have changed greatly, my last ADF approach was about 20 years ago and I love the Aspen and Garmin it now has. I’d suggest looking at any airplane with the engine hours, condition (paint, etc.) and avionics and from there, price / add what you want in an airplane. Then evaluate from that, because if you want XX avionics and intend to install it, can you find an airplane for sale at a price that works? Carusoam had a good point in that there are no bad airplanes. There are those that may cost you more however. But you already know all this. My airplane has bladders and they’ve cost me about $40.00 in gaskets since I’ve owned it. The reduced fuel load and weight is not an issue for me, but how you use your airplane is your concern. Happy hunting,

Can you be please be more specific? What are you askingto learn? Have you called the shop that maintained it? Have you seen it in person? It looks nice, dated but clean and shiny and well kept. Is this your first Mooney or first airplane? If so, you are in good hands on the forum. We’ve all gone down that path. Have a good job with a nice income. It helps. A lot. The ADS-B mandate has, in my opinion, had a large impact on a/c and primarily in how owners can customize their avionics to meet their perceived needs. It is not 100% universal as except in class B & C under 10,000 feet not required but the situational awareness and what RNAV brings to the pilot is a profound improvement in nav capability. Buy the best a/c you can find, but keep in mind it is a starting point. . regards