Seth

Anthony - not one orientation is correct. Can you please orient so the prop governor is on the left side of the page and the prop cable is on the right side? Some are up side down and some are on their sides. The pics show first the fact that an arm is needed. And then shows the Rocket arm instead of the arm that we had to have them manufacture for the Missile (I don't have the correct arm pictured . . . just the one for the "Rakete." Thanks!

Prop governor and arm The MT propeller arrived along with the new prop governor. As noted, a big reason I made the change was to remove the failure point of a prop governor malfunction causing potential engine stoppage, complexity, and weight of the full feathering prop. However, this also highlighted the “arrogance” or "dismissive" attitude I had experienced earlier with MT when double checking or pointing out certain potential items. The MT prop governor was a smaller size than the prop governor in the Missile. 2.5 to 3 inches smaller in length. So the end of the prop governor did not match up at ALL with the prop cable. This was an issue. Pictures will be on the next post which Anthony can properly orient. A call was made to Larry at Flight Resource LLC, the MT distributor, who said we’d need an arm, and let us know that MT would get it to us. I reminded him this is the first Missile getting an MT prop, and do you need pictures/measurements – it seemed that MT felt they had the data, but I’m not sure how. About six weeks went by and we received an arm extension from MT from Germany. MT manufactured it specifically for us. Pictures will be on the next slide. It was about correct in length and travel, but the loop for the connection to the prop cable was 180 degrees opposite of where it should be. It was the arm designed for the Rocket, not the Missile. This is where we realized something. Chris the A&P doing most of the work at Freeway’s MSC said he bet there was an issue with the translation of Missile in German. So I looked it up and he was correct: The German word for Rocket is “Rakete.” The German word for Missile is . . . “Rakete.” Can you image the discussions? This is the Rakete not the Rakete. Send the Rakete arm but for the Rakete not the Rakete. So they sent the Rakete arm. We sent pictures back with explanations. They engineered and created a new arm/part for us and sent it about a month later. It was close to right but some of the angles were off. We took some measurements, told them what was needed, and a month later on the third engineered arm we got the right part. So, in the end, this delay took an additional 3.5 months. We were now into October 2020. Concurrently, we had some issues with the engine – I’ll get to that in my next written post after posting some pictures of the prop governor and arm issues. To be continued . . .

Is anyone aware of any P-47's with a jumpseat or dual controls where you can get a ride? Does anyone know the private owner of a P-47 with a jump seat that may be open to the idea? I have a colleague who's grandfather flew P-47's. He's been attempting to find one where he can surprise his father with a ride. Planes of Fame in Chino used to have one that had a jumpseat and could give rides but this is no longer possible due to an FAA ruling with egress issues. Evidently there may be one in the eastern US that is a dual seat and gives rides or still has the FAA authority to do so. Let me know what you know! -Seth

I was born in 1981, My Missile was born in 1983. My first Mooney, a 1967 M20F I purchased when I was in my 20s. I now have owned my 1983 Mooney Missile for 25% of it's lifetime, but nearly half it's time as a Missile!! I have owned and operated an aircraft for exactly 1/3 of my lifetime. -Seth

You can see the dust gathered on the upper surface of the wing!

Anthony - please flip the picture This was the engine and prop on there but not everything yet hooked up. As an example the prop governor is not attached, that'll be the topic of the next post as we had issue with the prop governor and MT extension arms sent to fix the issue. -Seth

Further delays. The engine arrived in June. The people I had been working with at Continental were furloughed and the shop was on a smaller crew due to COVID. The engine looked good, but we didn’t check the specific STC items. We should have. We did note that the fuel hose for the front left cylinder was not shaped as the old one so we’d have to bend it or put a new one on to match the “winking” front cowl of the Mooney Missile. That should have been our indicator to look deeper then. I reached out to my contact Larry, Flight Resource LLC the distributor I was working with for MT regarding the prop. The 19 week lead time from late November was well past. We were at 28 weeks at that point. MT says they were not slowed down by COVID, nor shut down, but Germany got hit pretty hard by the pandemic and draconian shelter in place orders were enacted; I’m sure less people were there, suppliers may have been slower, whatever, but we were way behind. The prop was finally completed by the factory in July. That was round 33 weeks from order. There was a week long delay in getting it air shipped due to less flights, and thus less space available for cargo. Cargo flights were flying fine if not at increased capacity. However, most of the public (us aviators know) that so much cargo is transported in the bellies of international passenger jets. With those at a trickle or not happening at all in some cases, shipping delays were simply the norm (and still are, but not as bad now that we’ve “caught up” to the new reality). The prop arrived at Dulles in July, was delivered to Lancaster, PA for final assembly at Sensenitch and then trucked down to Freeway (W00) to the MSC to be installed. It arrived at the end of July 2020 or maybe the first week of August 2020 – I’ll have to check my notes. It was just about a year exactly from the incident. The delays were first on me for not ordering the prop until November, but also on the lead time and COVID slowing everything down during manufacturing. I’ll post some picks of what everything looked like as it was coming together. Next comes all the odd problems and delays that we encountered both with Continental and MT which helped stretch assembly in August 2020 to a first flight in February 2021. To be continued . . .

This is what I needed this morning. Great thread. Thank you.

If I were to move into a new Mooney it would have to be pressurized. Though I originally thought over the last 18 months we'd need a fifth seat (twice), that's not the case right now. So likely pressurized and an extra seat. That said, I do believe a pressurized 4 seat aircraft makes sense for some at a price point below the M350. Kind of like Cirrus with the Vision Jet, the SF50. It doesn't compare well to Jets, it compares well to turboprops, and doesn't have the range nor runway performance of those turboprops. It's the slowest, lowest flying jet, least expensive jet. It's great, and it's selling. I feel a four place pressurized aircraft using much of the current Mooney parts could be something - but this is a discussion for another threat. Cabin space, pressurization, andl likely 5-8 seats is what I'm looking for as the next upgrade. Maybe something similar to an RV8 or a Tarragon as a tandem in line aircraft could be fun too. For now, and likely for a long time, my Mooney Missile is the aircraft for me. My first airplane was a 1967 M20F Executive which I purchased in 2008. Great airplane. It was amy 4-10 year airplane. Get my IFR, learn aircraft ownership, and see if I needed any more capacity as I was still single then. With the upgrades I wanted, it made more sense to sell and buy something with the AP, paint job, GPS in panel, AP, and speed mods. I looked at 252's and Missile's. 3 years later in 2011 the 252's were still significantly more than the Missile and I really didn't need the turbo at the time. The 252 and Encore are great airplanes too! -Seth

Hank - Should I ever move on you'll be one of my first calls. There's one other member Mooneyspace member who has asked me the same! -Seth

Thank you Dan! Again, a good learning opportunity. -Seth

I did that as well, It's how we stayed closer, but he was climbing at a speed that was not typical in the configuration of the Cirrus. Typical configuration in the Cirrus is climb at 120 knots flaps up. So I was already well behind that to stay where you saw it in the picture. Just after liftoff when I realized the issue was upon us, I did not want to pull power nor over pitch until positive rate was established. After that I modified. And the turn out and transition to more of a cruise climb was fine. -Seth

Dan Bass took this picture of us departing leaving Mooney Summit VII in Sept 2019. Alan and Anthony were in the Bonanza and Seth and Mari "Mars" Metzler were in the Cirrus. -Seth

So this is a "learned from that" write up so others don't make the same mistake. I have undergone formation training with the Mooney Caravan and have flown some formation with others. Dan posted a picture of me and Alan departing from Mooney Summit in 2019. I was in a Cirrus SR-22 and he was in his S-35 Bonanza. I have flown formation with Alan in his Bonanza before - with me in my Mooney Missile. Though those airplanes are different, they are more similar than a Cirrus. The Cirrus does not climb as well and climbs faster. So with Alan in the lead when we departed in the Bonanza and Mooney, I stayed with him during a formation takeoff. In the Cirrus, when Alan departed. He rotated and started climbing prior to the Cirrus being fast enough to break ground. His climb out speed was slower than mine, thus I started pulling ahead even though he was in the lead, but he was higher than me. I was getting ready to "break it off." I still had him in sight but you can see in the picture taken how he was climbing better and I had more forward speed. Our saving grace was that the tower approved us for our turnout to the north east and when Alan turned, I was able to use that to get in proper position behind him to the right. Then I was able to manipulate the Cirrus to climb appropriately with him loosely tucked in on the right. I could have reduced power earlier, but with the Cirrus, I don't like to be too slow. However I should have reduced power a bit. Also, since then, I've trained some more and we could have done him taking off, then me waiting until he was a certain length down the runway for a staggered formation takeoff vs an in formation takeoff as we did with the Mooney and Bonanza earlier and as I'd been trained initially with the Mooney Caravan. We should have recognized the dissimilar rotation speed and climb speed but had been lulled into complacency as we've flown together in different but dissimilar aircraft prior. Plus as noted, we should have used a different takeoff technique/procedure. So, we learned something! And it did was fun. I'll repost the pic momentarily. -Seth

Shortest blade available with the nickel leading edge! -Seth

Yup that was it and you likely landed a few minutes ahead of me. Two airplanes got in after us. That was it for over 24 hours. As for getting through the patch, if you taxied in the right spot, you missed a rut and should have been fine. After being directed back in I should have still tried for an edge not the smack dead center. Also, I have the heavier nose and 75 inch prop. I don't think a 74 inch prop would have made a difference with the rut I ended up going through (dropping into) but I bet if I attempted to taxi more to the edge of the patch I may have gotten through unscathed. I'm thrilled to learn your Mooney was safe. Next time, if you see something that looks like that, don't go through it!!!! -Seth

Yeah, at almost 3 years old when he went on it for about a month he lost his PPL (kidding). But after seeing the reaction - I fully agree Anthony - powerful stuff - And you are an expert here. It was AMAZING to see the difference in his overall temperament and emotional well being. Especially for a kiddo who has apraxia of speech (diagnosed afterward) and has a dfficingy in his expressive communication. He just became sad. If his pacifier fell off the bed, he could get it, but since it fell, he would just sit there and start crying. If he was walking and tripped and fell, instead of popping back up. He'd just sit down and tears would start flowing. No noise, just silent tears. He was so sad. He also would throw significantly more fits/temper tantrums about anything all the time and start head banging (which is not good for his well being). So we guessed it was an emotional reaction to the Keppra and not due to a personality change due to the seizure or growth. It took about a month to titrate him over to Trileptal which we determined may be a good fit due to the type of seizure, where it originated after brain scans each time, and also the frequency of the observed seizures. He's had one breakthrough seizure since and we upped the dosage at that time. He soon returned to being a happy kiddo again. -Seth

These are the Cirrus fuel caps. Same for new Mooney? If so it's a 300 series fuel cap - forget the company name. Very lightweight and maybe 2 - 2.5 inches diameter.

Are they the same as the current Cirrus caps? -Seth

Engine and prop update: While I was training to fly regional jets from January to April in 2020, my engine was finally shipped off to Mobile, Alabama to the Continental Factory. This was for the teardown inspection. As part of a teardown, numerous wearable items get replaced (rod ends, bolts, bearings, etc) so even if nothing was found wrong, it’s nice to know my engine bottom end would be in better shape than before. And even though the quality is equal to the good known field shops, having this work done at the factory means something to most potential buyers in the longbook. I had it in writing that any STC parts removed would be reinstalled or overhauled and reinstalled, and not replaced with off the shelf overhauled items. It was made clear that this was from Rocket Engineering’s STC Mooney Missile (again foreshadowing). I knew I was looking at some extras. There was a gear that needed replacement as part of a service bulletin that was not done during the 2011 overhaul (PM me for the shop same in 2011 and I’ll provide it). And I figured, time wise, 700 hours in at the time 8 years was going to show something else. I was correct. It was a lot of somethings. Nearly $20,000 of additional work. The largest was an unrepairable crack in the oil cooler that alone was a $3000 part. And I could not find the part to source myself. In the end, I looked at the math, A full overhaul was around $36,500. We were a few thousand from that total at this point. The teardown was $13,500 and I had some extra money from the price difference in the prop. If I were to simply do this work, then I’d have cylinders getting closer to 10 years old around 1000 hours. Even if I didn’t do a Top Overhaul in a few years but replaced just two cylinders, it would be the same cost as doing a full overhaul now and getting six brand new cylinders, valves, mags, new parts, overhauled parts, and a 0 SMOH from the continental factory on my engine – not a zero time remanufactured engine, but still it made sense. So that’s what I did. I authorized a full overhaul. In addition, I only had two years and about 200 hours on my newer tempest fine wire spark plugs. Insurance took care of this upcharge as that was part of the teardown expense. I have my 200 hour sparkplugs as backups now. While the engine was out, and the removal and reassembly was covered, I had work done to items pretty much removed or available anyway: -I ordered new Lord engine mounts to upgrade and replace the 2011 the mounts -We R&Red the proprietary 8 point engine mount in place where heat had worn down some of the protective paint -I had RPM (Jetdriven) fix a crack in the upper cowl and repaint and blend an upper portion of the cowl (I also had him match the spinner with the cowl paint). We also repaired some wear/scuffing on the lower cowl and the heat shield inside the lower cowl. We’ll fully touch up the “black cherry” color of the lower cowl when we paint the leading edge of the wings later this spring / summer. -I also took out my removable back seats and did a leather treatment at home where I stored them for a little over a year. I did a leather treatment of the interior while the Mooney sat when I was in town. -As part of the engine being sent out, we removed the engine pre-heat system which was failing and falling apart (crumbling) anyway. I learned that Tanis offers a customer loyalty program as long as you trade in your old style system (they want to get those parts off the used market). So for a nice discount, I got the new style Tanis preheat system. If I instead with with one of the commentators, I’d need new JPI probes as well, and that would make it much more expensive than the new Tanis system. I’m happy with it. -I sent the exhaust for inspection to a shop in Minnesota I used in 2011. They looked it over and stated they suggested sending it to Rocket due to not having the correct jig and a portion needed work above their comfort level. So I had them ship it to Rocket. This is where a small mistake occurred, they knew it was Rocket Engineer in Washington state, but for some reason they sent it to a Rocket overhaul at Rocket. -We also found some cracks in the Rocket supplied Missile specific baffles as part of engine removal. Instead of working to weld and fix it, which we could, I ordered new parts from the Rocket stockpile and they had them to me quickly. I’ll repeat this later, but the reason the Rocket supplied baffles are cracking is because we think the new cylinder head designs are ever so slightly larger than those from the late 1990’s and certain areas load up just a bit more thus causing the cracking. We worked hard to get these new baffles into place. -The nose gear bearings were ruined by the trip through the mud/water. They had been repacked just two years prior and were bad – Insurance covered the hours and parts for this. -JPI – I have not done this yet as I realized it’s something I could have done while it was sitting for all this time, but my JPI830 I need to send back to the factory so they can upgrade the software. The version is too old to be upgraded now. So the next time she’s down for a bit I’ll send it in for the upgrade. -The batteries were replaced in 2012. So in late 2020 I ordered new batteries. The concords lasted a long time, and may have gotten me a little bit longer, but I decided to be proactive here. -My master brake cylinder was also no longer holding proper brake pressure so we rebuilt it with new O rings. This repair occurred much later however in the fall of 2020. COVID hit once I had already given the go ahead. I received no updates for a while from both Continental and MT. I returned from sim training for good in late April 2020. Actually, two days before we were sent home, my Director of Operations at the 135 I fly for contacted me and asked when I’d be back and if training at the regionals had been shut down yet. He knew the industry well, and even though I saw what was occurring with other airlines, I thought maybe it’ll be different here. I let him know I was back in town a few days later and started flying for the 135 again. We did complete a proficiency flight prior to flying passengers/clients and I passed my normal checkride at the next normal interval a few months later. Flights were still occurring, but frequency and trips were also dropping off. I began following up with both Continental and MT in May of 2020. The prop was already late (should have shipped in April) and the engine should have been there by then too. To be continued . . .

Hi William (same name as my son!)- I'm out with the regional I did the training with. I'm not out of the industry. I fly for a 135, will be flying jets for them soon (SF50), and am very open to returning to the 121 would at some point. However, the communication break down that occurred at the regional, asking me to get back for sim training to then send me home a few days later when I had my wife at the hospital after losing our second recent pregnancy - it left a bad taste in my mouth. Especially since I asked if it made better sense to push my training back for medical/family reasons. I even asked if it would montiarily cost the company as the sim might go unused. I made it a point to get back on time. Simply returning phone calls or email communication and getting better direction would have been appreciated. This was in stark contrast to just 8 weeks earlier when I was booked home positive space for my grandmother's funeral. I passed every written test with high marks and was ready for my checkride. I recognized COVID changed everything, and any pilot trainee that had not yet taken a checkride except those I'm aware of that already had their ATP and 121 experience, are all no longer with the company. Every single pilot from my class that passed the checkride prior to the day we were sent home was furloughed along with a lot of others. The company made the business decision to clear the books and stop future losses on anyone they legally could - I get that. However, the change in culture and lack of communication, the way I was treated and between the line perceived threats, which I can get into during a PM or phone call with more details it what caused me to decide I'm out with that firm. Also, since then, not having the threat of potentially required exposure to COVID and being home with my now diagnosed son with Bohring-Opitz Syndrome - I'm fine being home vs on the road as much. This may change as he ages (hopefully). I would be open to Spirit, but I need my ATP and experience before I can go there. Also, they don't have a base in the DC region for now - not a dealbreaker, but I'd try elsewhere first - especially with the upcoming pilot shortage in a few years again. That's why I'm going to finish off my ATP this summer. I will indeed look at Spirit. I've heard good things about the pilot group and company. PM me and we'll chat. Take care, -Seth

Richard- I'm glad you are doing this training - it's already making you a better pilot. -Seth

Brad- Do it! The Commercial is the most fun of the checkrides. During my oral for the commercial I stated that I look at every checkride as a learning experience and hope that I'm able to communicate a proficiency level on the required material so that we can continue with the practical test. Most examiners do not have a lot of Mooney time. So do tell they if they want to demonstrate a lazy 8 or other maneuver they can. My examiner asked if he could show me what he was looking for in a lazy 8 and I asked him to demonstrate. It was THE WORST lazy 8 I'd ever seen in the Mooney Missile (heavy nose). He looked at me afterward and said "you really know your airplane" and then "let's go back to the field for some landings). -Seth

Thanks Alex! I'm not going back - go ahead and PM me with contact info - I'll call with the information you requested. I wish no ill will on the airline but they did not handle things in a professional manner. It went from taking care of their own to getting as many off the books as possible - which is a good business move - it just sucked timing wise - and the communication and circumstances left a lot be desired along with the reasoning and threats - again - happy to talk one on one with anyone about it - just not going to post those details on a public forum. The timing was insane. Pax rates are indeed back up to 50% but aircraft schedules and flights are a fraction of what they used to be, thus trip flexibility is low and seats per plane are filling up. In a few years, there will be more people retired from the industry, more pilots not coming back who got burned, and all of a sudden demand will again plow on. The advanced algorithms will have to add flights, and there will be a big pilot shortage come 2025/2026 and beyond until virtual first officers become a thing. And vaccine wise - I'm set for mine Frida 3/12. I hope it does indeed work enough to get heard immunity occurring faster. I qualify in my state due to: -Being a caretaker for a disabled person (William is also diagnosed with IDD - Intellectual Development Disability) -Being an organ transport pilot (part 135 multiple trips the past few months) -Transporting sick people to their appointments (again, 135 flying clients to specialized treatments). -Seth

At the very end, once we are caught up to real time - I'm going to have to do a bullet point streamlined post with everything that happened so if people want they can read through everything to find details and I can see it all in one place. -Seth