DaV8or

I saw your plane with that sexy Lo Presti cowl! That cowling is definitely the creme de la creme of Mooney cowls.

I have since done so. I simply posted way back when and haven't been following the thread much. I missed that sign up thing. I did it this morning though.

I guess I screwed something up because I said back on page three of this thread that I would be coming weather permitting but I still haven't made the list. Oh well. I don't know if it's too late or not.

I don't see the problem. Didn't you ever have "sword fights" when you were a kid?

I think the wreckage pretty clearly shows that this was not a CFIT accident. He didn't just fly into a mountain. When that happens, there is a long debris field with parts of the airplane everywhere. The photo shows this airplane literally plopped down on the hillside. I'll speculate that he took off, engaged the autopilot so that he could pick up his clearance in the air, or some other departure task, the auto pilot took him towards the mountain, but he was aware of the mountain and judged that the airplane could out climb the mountain and it probably could... but then the motor failed. The wreckage indicates more to me a stall, or spin type accident rather than just flying into a mountain in the clouds type accident. I suspect he was either trying to return to the airport and spun in, or just tried to land straight ahead like we are told and it didn't work out. Either way there likely wasn't enough time to announce anything to anyone. Possibly the wreckage will tell us the story.

I went flying on Thursday and I remembered to check out the viability of my PVC pipe seat safety idea. It looks very doable and it would be crazy easy to deploy and remove. When I get time, I may make one just for the hell of it and see how it goes... and yes I have cleaned out my seat track holes at annual when I vacuum the carpet.

Yes, I believe so, but it is a very expensive repair as the rails are riveted on with a gazillion rivets. If we had a different kind of FAA, people could devise a better repair. Instead of replacing the rails, one could drill the holes out oversized and then press in steel bushings that have the correct size hole in them. It would be easier, so cheaper and the steel bushings would likely never wear out.

Yes there is. My wife fell in love with the production concept at the LA Auto Show and bought one of the first ones in California. I never cared much for it as I am a car guy. I always called it the "Lumber Wagon". Years later my wife had to have spinal surgery (not due to the FJ) and afterward her doctor told her to get something squishier to drive, so she traded it for a Lexus RX-350. I now call that the "Lumbar Wagon".

Kind of like the lack of attention when you're typing!

Oh, OK. There is no difference. M20F is the official model designation and Executive 21 is the marketing name given to the very same airplane. Much like the Cessna C-172 is also known as the Skyhawk.

Sadly, if the seat slipping was the cause of this accident, we may never know because the post crash fire likely consumed, or severely distorted the seat rails and the seat and what's left of the seat is likely all the way forward rather than rearward due to the impact with the ground. On the topic of seat safety stops- how about taking a piece of PVC pipe, cutting it to to the proper length, then ripping a slot down it so that it easily slips over the rail but also prevents the seat from sliding back. Maybe easy to install and remove each flight, light weight and best of all, super cheap! I don't know how well it would stay in place in turbulence, but my guess is, just fine. The official $60 Cessna clamps look pretty good as long as the Mooney rail is in fact identical to the Cessna rail. My only question there is, what damage do they do to the rail itself by repeatedly driving a thumbscrew down into the relatively soft aluminum seat rail? Do they provide a sort of "brake pad" to go between the steel thumb screw and aluminum seat rail?

There is no such thing as an M20J Executive 21. The Executive 21 is an M20F. Now, there may be some sellers out there that might be advertising it this way because the airplane has enough speed mods that the owner thinks it's as good as an M20J 201. With enough money, an M20F can be turned into an M20J and some have done that, but officially, there are no M20J Executives. The differences between an M20F and M20J are numerous, but if one really wants to, the F can become the J.

Oh yeah, I didn't look close enough and missed that leading edge dent. That does pretty much kill the deal. Part out what you can and then get out the Sawsall and take the rest in for scrap metal. Sadly, I don't see a viable project even if it were free.

Well, the wings alone are worth what he is asking IF they are corrosion and damage free. The tear is a bummer, but I'm assuming could be patched, or I suppose a new skin at that section. It also means he would have to find somebody who needs them. The J cowl is valuable too if it is complete and in good condition. The rest... probably not so much. I guess people always need ailerons and elevators.

Or they're like me, I have the IR, but haven't been current in over a decade.

I'm going to try to make it weather permitting. Dave Ketchpel Mooney N9289M

I have been thinking seriously about trading my Mooney for a Vans RV-9/A. It better fits my mission which is mostly me flying around by myself in good weather with no particular place I need to go. I think it would save me a bit of money in fuel burn, replacement parts and upgrades and it would be newer with not so much history, mechanics, repairs, annuals and the like on it. My ideal Vans would be the 9/A with an IO-320, CS prop and either a tip up, or slider, I haven't decided. It would also have to have a nice, standard layout panel with at least two axis auto pilot, dual coms, WAAS GPS, engine monitoring and a good audio panel. ADS-B in and out and a 406 ELT would be great too. Unfortunately there are four serious things preventing me from pursuing this plan. In order of seriousness- Safety. I like the 9 because it has the lowest stall speed and that means the slowest touch down in an off field landing scenario, but it seems that if you land a Vans on anything that isn't hard and prepared, you end up upside down, hanging from your harness and most times trapped by a stuck canopy. Ditching a Vans in water sounds like suicide, or at least very, very slim chances of a good outcome. I feel much more confident in the Mooney's ability to land off field and in water. I also feel very confident of the Mooney's strength in the airframe. I'm not so sure about the Vans. The wife. I mentioned in passing that I was thinking of trading the Mooney and she was ho-hum about that... until I told her I was thinking of an experimental! She was pretty strongly against that idea! It will take a lot of convincing that it is just as safe and I first have to convince myself. The wife. The cabin in the Mooney is tight, but I think the Vans cabin is even tighter. It feels very narrow to me. As we get older, neither of us is getting any skinnier. There is also poor baggage area access, or capacity. While it has only occurred three or four times in the last seven years, it would be nice to keep the ability to take the wife along for a weekend. I'm not so sure how well the Vans can handle this job. Money. I don't think I can get anywhere near enough money for my Mooney to get a nice clean, well built RV-9 configured the way I want it and then do all the things that will need to be done to make it mine. I will have to sell my Mooney and then likely pony up even more money. While I have the money and could do this, right now is not a financially great time for me to do it. What do you guys think? Maybe this is thread hijacking? I can make my own thread if it's annoying here.

Yes. If you're itching to make these yourself, it really says you crave a new shop project more than anything. You cannot defeat the power of China. These are easily accessible and basically dirt cheap, partly due to the power of China.

Harbor Freight is all about China, so the one I bought for my hoist ram was metric. The collars come in inches and metric. I measured my ram with a caliper that can read both. Anyhow, Amazon had that metric size, but I don't remember what it was. The Alpha Aviation jacks came with locking collars.

Seriously, $10 on Amazon. You need to mic your ram though. They are all different sizes. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0026GZQVY/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Here's some pictures of my rig- The straps I had made- Alpha Jacks and the awesome new Harbor Freight ram () in my 30 year old hoist- The jack stands and steel bar in the nose gear is just added safety for when I'm not swinging the gear. Don't forget to remove when I do swing the gear!! The locking rings- My modification to the pipe stand. I made it so I can also put the original V back on and use it as a pipe stand if I need to. Rock solid! About $80 on Amazon. I have since modified this rig so I can now lift just the nose with a bottle jack and take just the front wheel off if I need to.

Yes. The engine loop was not designed to lift the front half of the plane. In addition I think it's hard on your rubber motor mounts. Lift it with lifting straps around the motor mount. I had to have some custom made, but it was only $80 I think. I also have the Alpha Aviation jacks and they have been great. Yes, you can make them yourself and save maybe $150. I didn't find that project very exciting and I really don't need another project. Make sure you get locking rings for all of you hydraulic rams! I have them on the wing jacks and on my engine hoist. I had to replace the 30 year old Japanese ram when it gave up and because I needed to get on with the project, I bought a new ram at the only place I know where you can grab one off the shelf... Harbor Freight. True to form, the new ram leaks a little, so the locking ring is absolutely required! The rings are about $10 a piece on Amazon. My tail stand is a pipe stand I modified for the purpose. Overall, the rig is excellent and solid.

Mine too. The point was, they chose not to follow the plans, or instructions.

Funny thing about my plane. A previous owner back in the '90s bought and installed the SWTA 201 windshield mod and chose not to include the little access panels. They installed it as per the LASAR install. It must have been a money thing. The owner must have really preferred the LASAR mod, but the SWTA mod was cheaper. The only real problem was, there was two little holes punched in the piece that goes from the firewall to the windshield and the people that installed it never bothered to fill them in any way. I called Russel at SWTA when he was still alive and asked him about the holes. He said they were fixture holes that were there for the manufacturing of that sheetmetal part. That sheetmetal was supposed to be removed when the access panels were fabricated and installed. The weird thing was, nobody since the time of install in the early '90s did anything about them! These were two holes straight through to the back of the avionics that were unfilled and the plane had even gotten repainted since then and still no filling, or plugging. When I had the panel redone and all the avionics were out, I had them finally set two neat, flush rivets there to plug the holes. Just another weird story about my quirky '66 F. Here's what the holes used to look like-

I love their home page! It shows a toy bobbling around like a wayward balloon (I bet the "cabin" is filled with helium!) and printed on top is all the usual outlandish performance claims. How a prospective investor is supposed to reconcile the truth vs. the fiction is beyond me, however you have to give it to them. They have presented both the truth and the fiction and it's up to the viewer to decide. What contradiction! They seemed to have skipped the now customary computer animation phase.