LANCECASPER

Ideally it would be nice to have one GI-275 somewhere toward the center of the panel rather than way over to the right where the three steam gauges are.

The biggest advantage where you are now, approaching overhaul, is with a factory rebuilt since by the time you need it - a couple years, it should make any easy swap with a week or two or downtime. Sending an TIO-540-AF1B (you mentioned TIO-540-AK1A, which isn’t on a Mooney, but an -AF1A was originally in the M20M, now it’s an -Af1B) There is not a lot of difference in price between doing this engine at Lycoming and having a custom shop do it. It’s one where I would want Lycoming to do it. @donkaye, MCFI has the most experience of anyone on here with this engine.

2007 https://www.flyingmag.com/pilot-reports-pistons-mooney-ovation3/

Not an unusual request - it happens on the average once a month on here

Starting in 2000 the Ovation 2 had a two blade prop from the factory to achieve a higher cruise speed. That’s what the “upgrade” was from the Ovation to Ovation 2. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2000/february/pilot/mooney-ovation2

All Ovation 3s have 310hp and the G1000. Not all 310hp Ovations are Ovation 3s. Many are Ovations and Ovation 2s that have the 310hp STC.

It's either the speed brakes or you've landed in Moscow, Russia instead of Moscow, Idaho.

I was in a partnership on an early 2003 Meridian with the gross weight increase. I loved the pressurization and the reliability of a turbine, but with the range and figuring in a needed fuel stop on the Meridian, a Mooney Bravo or Mooney Acclaim with Monroy tanks, or a Piper Mirage (M350) with long range tanks will sometimes beat the Meridian to destination. Obviously comfort is greater in a turbine pressurized airplane. Everything is a trade-off in aviation.

I'm out of town, but when I get back I'll look in my hangar. I might have one.

Personally I think with Mooney's situation now they should have gone the other direction and should have opened up their online ordering system that the MSCs use now and started selling any parts that they sell at full retail price to any customer that orders. Mooney Service Centers make the vast majority of their money on labor, that's not going change. MSCs could have still marked the parts up further. But Mooney needs to make more money, not less by selling everything through a Distributor. They are giving up the margin between distributor cost and retail. That would require capital to carry some inventory, but with a well-written business plan they could have pulled together the money for that.

Completely incorrect They are still in the same buildings

That's great. What shop do you represent?

In some cases it makes sense to buy it back from the insurance company and have it repaired rather than starting the whole process over of looking, buying, fixing squawks, upgrading, etc.

He's listed here: https://themooneyflyer.com/cfi.html

Yes, and some of his designs pre-date that by quite a bit.

That has been dispelled by Bill Wheat years ago, but he still calls it a roll cage.

I'm about 20 miles from Kerrville and we had a lot of rain where I live. A area of low pressure just parked over us for a day and dumped rain. I'm at an elevation of about 500 feet higher than Kerrville though so I didn't experience any problems at my house. The heaviest rain was from around 12:00 AM to 10:00 AM on Friday - Kerrville got 12 inches of rain during that time. In some areas of the country that may not seem like enough to cause all of this flooding. In the Hill Country however we don't have a lot of topsoil so all of the rain runs off. Before the Guadalupe River crested in Kerrville they estimated that there were 175,000 cubit feet of water moving through every second. What made it so disastrous is that people from all over come here to camp along the river every 4th of July. The heaviest of the rain happened when they were sleeping. There were RVs and cars and trucks washed away. As of right now there are 43 official casualties and many missing. However, I fear the count will go much higher as the water lowers and bodies are found. An area NW of Kerrville in Hunt where there are summer camps got hit very hard. Pavement ripped off of the roads by the water. The Post office in that small town is completely gone, nothing left. Where Brian Kendrick and his family live in Kerrville is quite a ways up higher from the river, but it was a good precaution to leave I'm sure.

Perhaps it was Mooney personnel that kept insisting on referring to the tubular frame as a roll cage: Or maybe Flying Magazine picked up the idea of a roll frame when they toured the factory: https://www.flyingmag.com/photos-mooney-factory-tour/ Or maybe Mooneyspace has been the culprit in the 300 times it's been mentioned on here: https://mooneyspace.com/search/?q="roll cage"&quick=1&updated_after=any&sortby=relevancy Or heaven forbid . . . maybe it was Al Mooney himself:

https://asn.flightsafety.org/wikibase/524456

Since you are an early TLS serial number you may have vacuum speed brakes. If you do have them and you remove the vacuum system you will lose the speed brakes.

Two new clamps.

Yeah that's a total loss. If I was the owner and I walked away from that I would hope the insurance company wouldn't want to rebuild it. Walking away alive they hit the jackpot.

Looks like it. When it hits hard enough for that to buckle, it makes you wonder about the integrity of the roll cage. By the time you add up engine teardown, prop, landing gear parts that are bent, gear doors, belly panel, re-skin - if it's insured for the present value it'll be close to totaled. If it's insured at a low value for sure it's totaled.

Not sure, but there were 149 M20C, 62 M20E, 536 M20F and 4 M22. The F was a huge success. They announced it in 1966 and 3 F models were made, probably for flight testing. They sold 536 the next year! The first two years of the J, 1977 & 1978, they sold 377 and 380. The first two years of the K, 1979 & 1980, they sold 246 and 200.