donkaye

In my opinion, if you can afford to buy an Ovation you can afford to buy all the databases to keep everything current. I prefer Jepp Plates so buy the 4 seat for the iPad and for another $60 get Jepp Plates for the Aera 760 that I have on my yoke and use as primary for approaches. As an active flight instructor I have both Forelight and Garmin Pilot, so that takes up 2 seats. I also have a 3rd seat of Jepp FD that I really like the best because it's so easy to bring up a plate for any airport is a couple of seconds, but Boeing, who owns Jeppesen, saw fit to stupidly in my opinion discontinue it at the end of this year. For all my Garmin avionics I buy the OnePak with the Government Approach Charts that I find useful and that automatically pop up as I run an approach.

Friends and Family. Venmo? Zelle?

You may be right, but if someone has (for example) 12,000 posts vs someone who has 1, I think it likely that the name is real. I wouldn't be sending money to anyone who has 1 or 2 posts. As for me, I'll use my real name. Most posts I make have something to say that may benefit some people. I'm also in the business of teaching aviation and enjoy passing on some of the knowledge I've gained over the past 56 years of flying. Not providing my name could be a hindrance to that endeavor. I guess it's a risk benefit decision.

I guess I'm a control freak. I know my ethics, but not someone else's. For example, when I sell a landing video, I don't feel right until I ship it out, usually the same day as the money arrives. I've sold higher priced items such as my GTX 330ES and my complete KFC 150, and got them shipped immediately. If I'm the buyer, I will buy on eBay up front for small priced items if the reputation of the Seller is 99%. Anything over $100 I'm not buying online except for a big company like Costco, and only then with a credit card. Luckily, Air Power is a big Company. Those were a couple of the biggest checks I've written without having the merchandise in hand. The most uncomfortable I've been was writing the check for my Garmin product to the avionic's shop because I'd been involved with a shop that wasn't ethical many years ago. I gave them my Stormscope to send out for repair to a company in Reno. The company got it fixed and wouldn't release it to me when the shop went bankrupt owing them money. My Stormscope had nothing to do with that, but I got extorted to get it back. A lawsuit just wasn't worth it. My avionics company with my Garmin product had been in business for nearly 50 years and offered to let me keep the product when it came in until it was installed. I let them keep it, and that trust was respected.

Personally, I don't send anything I'm selling on any site until payment has been received and cleared. Having said that, it is apparent that, after this amount of time, this person has no intention of paying, has no integrity, should be "outed", and banned from MooneySpace.

I wish real names were required here, as they are on Beechtalk. It might make this type of thing less likely to occur.

As everyone knows, while I fly and teach with any avionics, I have the complete Garmin package in my airplane. I have the G500 TXi with G5 for backup and a GTN 750Xi and GTN 650Xi. If the TXi doesn't fail, the autopilot can be switched to run off of either GPS. If the TXi fails, the autopilot will be fully functional, but can only be run off of the GTN 750 Xi. Garmin will not allow the G5 to be fed from 2 sources. In that case in that emergency situation the autopilot could be put in Heading mode and flown using the GTN 650 Xi, Aera 760, or iPad. I haven't tested that, but will.

Russell, It's been my pleasure!

There are a few days in a lifetime that are especially memorable. In my case it would be my birthday, Shirley's Birthday, the day we met 41½ years ago, and the day I closed on N9148W, 31 years and 12½ thousand flight hours ago today. Little did I know at the time the life changing event that would be. Before I bought it, I was in awe of anyone who owned an airplane, and anyone who owned a Mooney TLS had to be in a different league than me. I remember sitting in the airplane that day and thinking, "what have I done?" Will I even be able to learn how to fly this thing? It was intimidating. I had, Suzanne, Top Gun's pilot and a flight instructor, fly with me down to San Antonio where I took the Flight Safety Mooney M20M Course. After the course, I was still uncomfortable and had, Paul Arrambide, my flight instructor fly back with me to San Diego, where I showed my family what I had done. My Mother had not a few reservations. A PPP the following March in Fresno, where I flew with Jerry Johnson and met my soon to be mentor instructor, Robert Goldin, who fortuitously lived close by me, changed the direction of my life. Who ever heard of someone changing from a Real Estate Developer into a Flight Instructor? I did it. Real Estate became a sideline and Aviation took front and center. It still does. It's a passion and never gets boring. Along the way I've met hundreds and hundreds of people who became my students and later my friends. I've met many top educators in the aviation field. Most of them were dedicated teachers. What an experience it has been and continues to be. After all this time, buying my airplane was one of the best decisions I have ever made. It's a special day indeed.

Where does this post come from? I said I had my suspicions, but wasn't accusing anyone of anything. While I'm sure Continental has their reasons for having return lines going back to their respect tanks and not just on Mooneys, I think they are more prone to vapor lock than the Lycoming engine which doesn't have the return lines. So, while I would and have taken off in my plane in above 100°F temperatures, I personally am uncomfortable doing so with the Continental Engine, thus staying overnight in Scottsdale on my last transition training. Maybe that wasn't necessary, but it made me feel better anyway.

I've done a number of Acclaim Ultra transition trainings since that accident. I spend a significant amount of time discussing the use of the low boost pump. While the cause of that accident does not blame the use of the boost pump, I still have my suspicions. The last training I did involved picking up the plane in Chandler, flying to Scottsdale, and then coming back to Hayward. I had it planned such that we would leave Scottsdale before the temperature got near 100°F. Issues with the plane in Scottsdale precluded leaving before the temperature had risen to 109° and rising. Although I've taken off from Chandler at temperatures around 102°F in my airplane with its TIO540AF1B Lycoming engine, I didn't want to take a chance with the Continental engine of the Acclaim Ultra. We stayed overnight in Scottsdale and left at crack of dawn with the tower opened and temperatures were much lower. Our flight back was uneventful.

Since you do a physical install of the FS210 you get a stable AHRS with it. The FS 510 doesn't have an AHRS. OTOH the 510 doesn't have any installation costs, while the 210 does. The the 510 can do database concierge. The 210 can't. I got the 210 when it came out and followed it with the 510 when it came out.

I'm confused. The airplane listed under your name, N444HK, is an Ovation. Do you have a Bravo, too?

If it is the Bravo engine and not the -A, then except for a Turbo and Wastegate overhaul at about 1,300 hours, it should have made it to TBO from my experience.

I've had my Bravo for 31 years as of next week. During that time I have flown it 4,105 hours. I'm on my 3rd engine. The 1st one went 2,295 hours after the Bravo upgrade at 1,300. That engine never had an engine monitor. The 2nd one went 1,600 hours before an incident that occurred as the airplane was being Annualed presented me with the choice of an engine teardown or sacrificing the remaining 400 hours before TBO and buying a reman. I took the reman route, since I got a $50,000 discount on the engine replacement. All this is to say I know the Bravo engine well. The sweet spot for this engine using the key number of 53 is 75% power at 2400 rpm and 29 inches mp with cowl flaps closed. At that setting you should be using a quart of oil about every 10-12 hours. In 25 hours between oil changes I usually add 2 quarts. Using the MVP-50 as a guide, I run the engine at a maximum of 1595 TIT. At this setting I get 18 gph for the 1st hour and 17.5 gph thereafter. CHTs by the MVP-50 are all below 375°F. IAS at 4,500 feet at that setting is about 165 kts. At 17,000 TAS is between 195 and 205 knots. I do have GAMIs, but run my engine ROP only. Summary: you have a major engine problem and need to get it looked at immediately. No way you should be burning 1 quart an hour. Personally, I wouldn't fly the plane until this issue was resolved.

I had the EDM 700 for many years in my Bravo. It served its purpose at the time. When I decided to upgrade the panel in 2013 I did a lot of research as to which engine monitor I wanted. At the time the choice was between the EDM 930 and the MVP-50. I read numerous comparisons (see PDF below for one). In the end the multiple pages, character size, and added functionality of the MVP-50 won me over. If I had to choose today, even with the addition of the Garmin EIS into the mix, I wouldn't hesitate to make the same decision. I've attached the same picture I have shown here in the past, but concentrate on the MVP-50 in the lower left hand corner. The characters are just so much easier to read for me than on the 930, and the multiple ways the engine data can be presented (not shown) make it my engine monitor of choice. If you do decide on it, definitely don't get the fast response probes. They're unnecessary and go bad often. The standard probes work well. MVP-50P vs JPI EDM-930.pdf

Boy do I disagree with your comments. I have had my Bravo for 31 years and flown it over 4,100 hours and there is no way the maintenance is 1-2 hours for each hour flown. If it were that much, I'd have gotten rid of it long ago. And as Top Gun would attest, It gets everything it wants and then some. I don't skimp on anything.

2/10/2022 ORL-FPY-12J-CDH (Almost couldn't get the engine started there)-WDG-COS = 9.7 Hours. Quite a day! Unusual electronic ignition. Lucked out on the weather. Next day we just got to do a few landings before the snow came a calling. Sorry we couldn't do a full transition training. From that flight I learned not to necessarily stop at an airport in the middle of nowhere just because they had cheap fuel. If we couldn't 'have gotten the plane started... The Bravo is an amazing airplane. That plane got us more than half way across the country going westbound in one day--in the middle of winter.

I posted this to Beechtalk. Maybe it will help some here. This relates to Garmin VNAV. I use VNAV on virtually every flight I make now. What a benefit! Recently I found that, although not written up in any manual I could find, when vectored above the VNAV path, by enabling V/S and setting an appropriate vertical speed, VNAV would become armed from active, V/S would intercept the VNAV profile, VNAV would become active again and continue the automatic step-downs on the approach. This worked beautifully on both the RNAV approach at KOAR (Marina, California) and KHWD (Hayward, California) in actual conditions this past week.

I flew to Phoenix Commercial on July 2 to help a new student bring his newly purchased Acclaim Ultra back to Hayward. I knew there was a small window of opportunity to do it in one day. I planned to be off the ground by 11:00. Problems with the airplane shut that down. By 12:00 it was already 108°. The performance Charts end at 110° I let him know we weren't going that day. In the Acclaim accident 4 years ago the temperatures were in this vicinity. Luckily, there was a Best Western across the street from Atlantic and a good, though expensive, restaurant next door. As bad as California is politically, just walking to the hotel and restaurant by Scottsdale reminded me why I wouldn't want to live in the Phoenix area. How do you guys do it? We were off the ground at 6:00 am the next morning in "cool" conditions (that's a joke) when the tower opened and were back in Hayward a little over 3 hours later. Had a nice little tail wind of 10 knots going west and were truing out at around 235 Kts. at 14,000 feet. Went out IFR to avoid the Phoenix Airspace issues. Cancelled at Blythe. Beautiful flight back.

If you want to see what they look like here it is: https://donkaye.com/infamous-1500-back-spring

I've already talked to Don about this, but have not received a response.

We were really looking forward to attending MooneyMax 2023 again this year. We had made it to all the ones in the past. The trip to Texas has always been a great adventure and Maxwell Aviation in Longview has always put on a great show. All reservations were made and up to last week I still thought it was a possibility. At the last minute circumstances changed making it not possible for us to attend. I called Don and Jan with the disappointing news that we couldn't attend. It was then that I found out that the event would be streamed. I downloaded the Whova Application and jumped at the opportunity to attend in streaming mode. The lineup of speakers (including Bob Kromer) and variety of topics is top of the line. The event was extended an additional day this year, so there are still 2 more days of interesting topics. If you want to learn a lot more about your Mooney, avionics, news about the factory, risk management and a lot of other things, then I think it would be definitely worth it to sign up for the last 2 days. All the talks are being recorded so the first day's talks can be seen at a latter time. You can go to: https://www.mooneymax.com to register for the streaming. For the streaming it costs $149 and is a bargain at that price. I'm looking forward to all the talks over the next couple of days.

Time to weigh in. I can't believe it's been 10 years since I did my avionics upgrade. I further upgraded as new products came out. There is probably a reason the accident statistics don't show a relationship between glass and legacy instruments. Approximately 80% of accidents are pilot related and most of those come from poor aeronautical decision making. Whether a pilot has glass or legacy, a poor decision is a poor decision. It is surprising that with such good weather products on board and such good preflight information available today that so many of the accidents are weather related. I admit to really being spoiled with all the advanced equipment I have in the plane, especially the GFC 500. I repeat, especially the GFC 500. Gone are the days of "dive and drive" on a NP approach. Most LNAV approaches have +V now and even the traditional VOR approaches at many airport have +V attached to them. Knowing what to look for, I can brief an approach that I have never flown quickly, and run it to perfection with VNAV and GP. And on the missed approach having the ability to set up another approach to a different airport while still flying the original missed is not something that was available a few years ago. If you read the documentation before getting pro-training from an instructor who knows your systems backwards and forward, and then practice using it until it becomes second nature, then in my opinion the new glass makes for a safer and more comfortable flying experience. There are a couple of areas where I think the legacy instruments makes it easier. For example, for the Commercial Rating lazy eights and chandelles are easier with the round dials. But ATP smoothness and anticipation comprehension that these ratings lead towards comes with experience, and that experience can be gained with glass over time. I've been flying a lot of years and glass has made it possible to accomplish a lot more things in a given amount of time while flying, provides a greater picture of my surroundings for situational awareness, and makes possible better and faster appropriate decision making than ever could have been achieved with legacy instruments.

We are lucky in the Bay Area. Most summer days the Monterey Bay is overcast until about 11:00; if there's a 20°F inversion, then maybe longer. Those inversions are amazing. You sweat at 3,000 feet and chill at sea level on approach. I'll get up early and file from San Jose to Salinas. You can't file multiple airports, but with 4 airports all located within a few miles of each other and the same controller working all of them, it is easy to run multiple approaches to all of the airports by flying the missed approach and asking for an approach to another nearby airport. On the missed the controller will clear me to another airport where I'll do the same thing. I plan to ping pong off of various airports. There are a variety of approaches from which to choose, and I can usually do at least 6 approaches in less than 2 hours. Going into Monterey on the ILS often I'll be the only plane early in the morning when the airport is below minimums with other Commercial planes holding waiting for the minimums to rise. It doesn't hurt that for the moment Marina (KOAR) has the cheapest fuel around, so I plan an approach there as the last approach of the day. Getting out let's me practice Obstacle Departure Procedures and Void Time Clearances.