Sector95

This is a pretty awesome crew, didn't think I'd get this many people telling me to go for it! David, I think I'm going do just that! It sounds like I should be fine, but obviously rather be safe than sorry. I'm in the Portland, OR area.

Oh great... Now I'm back in that mindset again! I guess I have a lot of pondering to do...

Thanks everyone for your input! I really appreciate it! I'm from the Portland, OR area, and usually rent from 7S3 out in Hillsboro. The more math I do, the more I agree with you guys that a partner probably makes a lot of sense. The point about the "unexpected stuff" is a good one: I can plan all I want, but I probably won't be able to plan for everything. A partner would at least lessen the blow. Any tips on finding a co-owner? It seems to me that it is basically "luck of the draw" on finding a good partner... Or finding a partner at all! That seems particularly true for the Mooney scene; I don't feel like I see many of them around.

Hi Mooniacs, long time lurker here... Doing some research. I'm sure you are all very sick of these kinds of questions, but I'm a low-time pilot with a soft spot for Mooneys. I earned my pilot's license just under two years ago, but didn't get to fly much last year due to school (just 10 hours ). Most of my experience is in 172's, with a few hours in a Sport Cub. I'm at a point where I've decided I'd like to spend my hard earned money on an airplane of my own. It's not cheaper than renting for me, but there is something about being able to get up and go to the airport on a whim, fly anywhere I want, and stay as long as I want that is unbelievably attractive to me. Plus, now that I've graduated I will finally have the time to fly again. Right now I've done some math on a mid-60's 172/PA-28, and it came down to roughly $12,000/year for ownership of one of those aircraft, which I can afford (that includes hangar, loan, annual, TBO, insurance, and 50 hours of flight time). I'm curious if anyone has any insight into maintenance cost comparisons between a 172 and something like a M20C. A little bit of a non-sequitor, but believe it or not, in spite of my interest in them, I've never actually had the opportunity to ride in a Mooney, except for cockpit cameras on YouTube. I know that the cabins are a bit smaller on Mooneys than 172's, do you think a broad-shouldered 6'2" oaf like me would be able to fly comfortably with someone in the right seat with me? Thanks in advance for your insight, and for helping a poor aviation nut actualize his dream of aircraft ownership and self-inflicted poverty.

How do you guys like the interface on the Xoom? Motorola interfaces on Android phones have always bothered me. I'm not sure why, but they always felt a bit clunky. I always considered the HTC phones and the phones with "clean" Android OS' to be much quicker and attractive. The Xoom is very attractive for it's performance and potential, but I haven't gotten my hands on one yet to find out if it's "more of the same" from Motorola. This is just my opinion though, I know several people who are very happy with their Moto Androids.

Jeeeeze... I better hurry up and get my private before more kids like this raise the age at which you can get your PPL!

Sorry if this is a silly question, but why are there what looks to be 3 GPS moving maps on the panel?

That's awesome... Looks like they would be a blast to fly! I love that this engine says "Mini Merlin." http://www.titanaircraft.com/suzuki_2.7.php Although, I find it hard to believe that it actually has "24 valves per cylinders."

It sounds like this guy is pretty well known around here... Other than the securities bit, what other things has he done (or been rumored to do)?

Good to know! If you don't mind me askin', what's the reasoning behind this? It sound to me that either I have found a glitch in the aircraft, my computer is goofing up, and/or I have my mixture set wrong. If I go for peak EGT in this particular flight model, the RPMs shoot up to redline... Is this normal? None of the other aircraft in the simulator display this phenomenon.

Heyyy I just got that Carenado M20J for FSX recently! It flies much differently than the stock Mooney does. I also like how you actually have to select the fuel tank in the Carenado version, in the stock one it burns from both tanks evenly. I have an interesting phenomenon that I'm not sure is accurate or not. When I come back to cruise, I usually set 2500 RPM and 20" of manifold. However, after a bit of time, no matter how far I pull the prop out, I cannot lower the RPMs. I can bring them back up to full, but not below 2500 RPM unless I pull back the throttle. Is this true to life? Or is this an error? Could it just be how I have the mixture set (I noticed that if I leaned out a lot the RPMs would shoot up)? Anyway, back to topic. Considering I don't fly in real life (YET!), the sim is all the training I get... So I'll take it! :-P

Quote: KSMooniac Generally speaking, the 6-series laminar flow airfoils have a "drag bucket" where there is a range of lift coefficient that has a noticeably lower drag coefficient. It could be that climbing at the higher airspeed reduces the lift coefficient (b/c of lower angle of attack) enough to slide into the drag bucket compared to climbing at a lower airspeed and higher angle of attack. I think that might explain the phenomen, but I haven't looked up the drag polar for the Mooney airfoils and calculated lift coefficients for various airspeeds... (I'll leave that as an exercise for the students. /professor)

Was looking over Carson's 1.316 theory. Was basically just trying to justify in my own mind, using that theory, why a 10-15kt faster speed would result in the same climb rate. I imagine that L/Dmax is the same (or very similar) with the engine on or off as the drag of the prop with the engine off would add the same amount of drag pretty evenly across the lift/drag curve (I'm going to qualify this by saying that this is purely an assumption, if someone knows differently, I'd like to know!). This would make it so that a fully-feathered prop with the engine off would travel further at the same speed than the props that don't fully feather since it can glide in a flatter trajectory due to overall less drag (which makes sense). If this is true, one could then assume that best glide is going to be the most efficient speed across the board (which is essentially what Carson's theory says). I think the L/D graph of these planes would be pretty interesting to have a look at, particularly since it would seem, based on the experience I'm reading here, that there is a flat spot around the 100 to 120kt range. Does anything my mind is grinding out make any sense? Or am I missing a large and important chunk of information?

What is the L/Dmax on these aircraft?

Quote: GeorgePerry Richard, I’d like to know what research or facts you have to back up your claim that a Mooney with electric gear costs more to maintain than one with a Johnson bar. If anything it’s the other way around. If you check the NTSB statistics for inadvertent gear up landings in early Mooney aircraft, you’ll find that Johnson bar planes belly in (albeit, just slightly) more often. Now that’s expensive.