kortopates

Engine monitors pay for themselves over time, assuming we learn how to use it. And most often an engine monitor will alert us to a problem before the fan stops and very often giving us enough warning to save the engine. That's pretty priceless in my book.

You both are essentially correct, but there is no rule about how much blockage we see. It can be minimal such that we would refer to it as dirty just causing a greater than normal gami spread. But from there it ranges to all degrees of partial blockage. The worst and most obvious ones are those that are just blocked enough to put the cylinder at peak at full power, since if ignored it can burn up a cylinder in short order. But there are all degrees and its not uncommon to be looking at a cyl that is actually running LOP from the blockage while all the all the others are ROP. Those that do run LOP are more likely to notice a partial blockage since even of they don't notice their leanest cyl has changed they'll surely notice new roughness if running moderately to deeply LOP. But then they might mistake misfire as an ignition issue when its really premature misfire from that one cylinder just running overly lean. With the more insidious ones its critical to look at downloaded data to verify what's going on and this is when real diagnostic data in the form of our Savvy Test profile enables eliminating the guess work and seeing what's really going on. For example, if it mixture, CHT will always follow EGT in either direction, but an induction leak can also appear to be a partial blocked injector with a MAP significantly lower than ambient pressure. (Thought I posted the above yesterday but it didn't go through - so this is bit late now....) exactly right Teejay!!

Personally I'd take your backup attitude a little more seriously because your two AHRS aren't entirely independent. What I am referring too is that a failure of your pitot heat in icing will bring down both AHRS entirely; showing nothing for attitude, airspeed or altimeter making that backup attitude instrument more important. I went with the ESI-500 for my panel so that I also have backup nav functionality as well as IAS, Alt & VS, but an electric gyro with it own backup battery should do the job for you Ok.

You don't really want to convert as much as you want to add a LEMO plug right next to your standard 2 plug jacks. Your avionics shop should know exactly what to do - or can provide the supervision if you want to tackle this yourself.

Personally, I think the Tanis with dual CHT/ heater element probes and oil sump pad are the very best option. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Indeed, the Sheriff Judd knew the pilot very well: "Judd said he has personally known John Shannon, the President of the Republican Club of Lakeland, for years. Shannon had filed a flight plan this morning to fly to Key West for an apparent Christmas Eve day trip." In one video, I thought I recall Judd saying he had a hangar near where the crash occurred too. But regardless I also remember him saying he knew the pilot for many years, as in more than decades, and we also know that the pilot was licensed in 2010 per the news. But can't really trust the news at this point as that could have merely been just the last recorded update to his certificate. Anyway, if all true, I got the impression Judd viewed the pilot as a less experienced pilot. If true that only 7 years from private to Cessna 340 with very busy career is pretty fast for a recreational pilot. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The speed brakes require an extra kit to close out the speed brakes. This is all sheet metal work followed by sealing the new fuel bay. What you would do under the supervision of your A&P is best addressed between the two of you. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I know someone personally that lost their electric boost pump trying to drain a mere 12 gals! Maybe it was on its last legs anyway but @jetdriven Byron's caution is very valid.

Good for you Matt. I hear that all the time from other long time pilots that are so ingrained with the habits. I've given up trying to correct them, plus when I have tried to its usually only minutes later and we'll hear a professional airline pilot doing it too - perhaps the biggest offenders setting a poor example. Perhaps I am overly anal but the sign of true professionalism on the radio is sticking to proper phraseology.

The risk isn't limited to defueling/refueling the plane. You also have the storage issue to consider next. Fire ordinances and the like typically prohibit storing fuel in the hangar that is not in the plane. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

http://artcraftpaint.com/ is very good and fairly priced at ~12K. They're booked well in advance too.

Great write up and good for you practicing this. Very good points too about not yanking the cord too hard - we had one guy do this at a MAPA PPP years ago on the west coast and broke the cord! You don't want to see that happen One point of clarification though on the gear being down and locked when the light comes on since you bring up an excellent point of what will happen with a total electrical failure. Absolutely right about the light coming on to indicate the gear is fully down, but you have the light on the floor where the football; besides the lighted annunciator and afterall the floorboard football and light are the primary means of verifying the gear is down and locked rather than the annuciator. But its not really true the gear didn't lock down till the light came on. The gear actually locked down into place a good pull or more before the light actually came on. The Mooney light isn't triggered by a microswitch on the gear down link like some airframe are, but a single microswitch on one of the two the main gear tubes directly below the cockpit. After the gear is over center, its takes approximately another pull or more to compress the springs further to the desired pre-load. Its the pre-load on the springs that will prevent the gear from folding back up if it you side load the landing gear from imperfect cross wind landing technique or you take a turn off with too great of speed. The click you heard could only be the micro-switch clicking which was directly below you in the cockpit. But I doubt you could hear or feel this click in the air. So what does this all mean when lowering the gear with a total electrical failure? Without the light, you wouldn't be able to know precisely when you are at the proper pre-load setting. All we really have to rely on besides seeing the football centered is feeling the cord tension get much harder when the gear is down and we are compressing the springs with the final pull(s). But the springs aren't fully compressed when the gear is at the proper pre-loads either so its possible to keep going till the one of the springs reaches its limit first and is fully compressed or until the gear motor screw reaches it's limit. Which is beyond what you really want to do. So with no light to tell us (thankfully we have two bulbs) , be careful, go until the indicator shows the football is in place and stop after the pull that all of a sudden got real hard. Then land very gently being very careful not to side the load the gear any more than necessary till it can be properly inspected on jacks or at least re-cycled electrically on jacks to the proper pre-load. And there you have another reason of the importance of practicing this in the hangar on jacks to help get a sense of that last pull with the increased tension as the springs compress so you'll have an idea of what to expect should you have to do this for real with an electrical failure. If you watch Mike's video of the gear extending by hand I think you'll be able to see the gear stop moving and then hear one more pull as the springs are compressed into the proper pre-load tension and close the microswitch.

I fit two high end 29er high end mountain bikes into the back of mine, along with luggage for week get away. Wheels and seats come off and the frames go into bags and the wheels go into wheel bags which go on top of the bikes. A bit of a hassle but being serious about our single track mountain biking I wouldn't even consider a folding bike. We've flown them as far away as Alpine Tx from Southern Cal to ride by Big Bend in the winter. There are a few other threads on this that include pictures.

Thanks Paul! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Wow- that's another one I have never seen and I am in an early J every week. I'll have try to see we what I can find in the early J POH. Thanks for sharing. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You were the first to educate me on this. But it seems to be limited to just the last couple years of the F model production (from others that have also said they have one). But that is speculation on my part - and you have seen more of them than I have (zero for me!). I can't tell, but do these models with the push button test also have a Gear Safety Bypass switch too?

You really need jacks to test the gear horn since it’s tested with the gear up. There is also a airspeed switch or squat switch to test that prevents the gear from being raised while on the ground as well as a bypass switch on the modern birds. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

No it varies for every approach and is depicted in the profile view. Unlike the government charts though there may be a calculated descent angle even though its not depicted on the gov chart. But it is always depicted on Jepp charts if the TERPs guys provided one. Consequently, you never know for sure with government charts if you'll get +V on a non-procession approach if one isn't shown, you might fly it and find it does. But with Jepp you always know by seeing if one is depicted or not.

Not really true as long as you are referring to step down fixed inside of the FAF to MDA. Those step down fixes will be right at the computed descent angle as plotted on the chart and you'll be able to follow the +V glide slope angle to MDA. But you should not be following the glide slope through step down fixes outside of the FAF because those could have mandatory altitudes or maximum altitudes that are below the glide slope. You're not going to have a problem following +V crossing intermediate step down fixes past FAF before MDA. The biggest mistake is following any non-precision approach glide slope during the visual portion of the approach beyond MDA or DH without the required visual cues of 91.175 - this includes LNAV/VNAV, not just +V. Specifically anytime there is not a Visual descent point (VDP) plotted on the profile view, you should be alert for obstacles that penetrate the 20:1 slope between the TCH and the MDA or after descending below MDA. Only if a VDP is plotted are you relatively safe of descending without finding an obstacle penetrating the slope in the visual segment. But this intended to help you fly a stabilized approach to landing - not bust minimums. The key point is to level off at MDA and not descend before we have the cues required by 91.175. It wasn't that long ago, when Garmin provided +V on every non-precision approach with a computed descent angle and then the FAA started zero'ing the computed descent angles out when the FAA discovered pilots where not paying attention and trying to follow them to the runway despite a note that read "VGSI and descent angles not coincident". That note is to warn us that the Visual glide slope/VASI etc angle is not the same as the approach descent angle and therefore the need to level till we pick up the VASI before descending to the threshold because of obstacles. So for quite some time we lost +V on many approaches until Garmin made some updates. The FAA seems to be relaxing their constraints again and is allowing computed glide slopes on approaches that have the coincident issue but lets not forget that these end at MDA.

There are separate 100hr and 500hr inspections. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The article mentions the cell phone ping data placed them by Rogers Pass. I hope they have a better idea than just the vicinity of the pass, but that makes sense. The pass would make sense for anyone following the main highway traversing the range since it goes through at about 4400' in Glacier National Park. But right at the pass, the highway and lower terrrain jogs to the north to get around 3 high peaks just further east of the pass from 9400' to almost 10,800 with the higher one being Mt Sir McDonald which is just a little south of the pass. Wiki says even the pass gets an average November snowfall of about 65" and December gets another 85". Looks like searches will have the same challenges they had finding Steve Fossett due to the snow which preventing his discovery till the the following September - a year later. Of course we all hope the missing couple and plane are found soonest.

In the limitations section and you are correct it says the "selected" tank making you a test pilot because of the concern of unporting the fuel pick up. Of course ferry flights would be the only time most of us would consider flying this way.

Since you bring it up, Stacey mentioned they have cell phone ping data. If so and that was after the crash, that should take them directly to the site. We've seen that to be case a numerous times over the last few years. This was also how a local downed Mooney pilot friend was found after I gave his cell phone to the gal I mentioned above involved in the search. The coordinates took the team directly to the site. I assuming in this case they haven't been able to follow up because of assessility issues given its winter. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Both certified altimeter are quite close to each other and that's what counts considering the G5 altimeter is not certified for primary - only attitude is. So folks might be expecting more than it is? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Good point, I wasn't thinking OEM pickup since Paul has a JPI EDM-900 Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk