LANCECASPER

Welcome to airplane ownership. There are a few places remaining that either know the number or know where to to look for the part you needed, but as the generation that knew all of that information is retiring, don't expect that to happen. The age of your airplane is approaching 55 years. If this was a classic car, you as the owner would know more about it than the guy at the parts counter. Even if he could look up what was in there originally, odds are in that many years there may be a different tach with a different cable in there now. If he gave you the original cable - then it's his problem when it isn't the right part number. I don't blame him for wanting the part number from you. This is just an opportunity to learn about your airplane and get familiar with where to source the different parts you will need. I wouldn't burn any bridges with Mooney Service Centers in your area though, since at one point you might need their resources. A point that hasn't been addressed - this might be a good time to ditch the mechanical tach and put in an electric one with no need for a "speedometer" cable. Here's an example of one: https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/inpages/ei-digitalgraphic1.php

Lycoming has three choices: 1 New "Power your aircraft with a new Lycoming piston engine." 2 Rebuilt "Get a factory rebuilt engine that’s built to new engine specifications and comes with a zero-time log book." https://www.lycoming.com/services/rebuilt-engines 3 Overhauled "Update your aircraft’s engine to a Lycoming overhauled engine with the most current features and parts." https://www.lycoming.com/services/overhaul-engines A Lycoming rep explained to me that their Rebuilt has all new internal parts in a used, and if necessary, a new case and a comes with zero time logbook. Their Overhauled engine is within specs in the Overhaul Manual, but if any parts are out of spec, new parts go in. Lycoming had a program for many years that said if your core was within 20 years from time in service since new they would sell you a Rebuilt for the price of an Overhauled engine. The biggest problem I see using anyone else to rebuild the Bravo engine is that not many shops have ever done one. This engine (TIO-540-AF1B) is only used in a Mooney Bravo M20M. Victor has done a few, but probably less than a handful. Poplar Airmotive has probably done the most of any independent- I had one of theirs' in one of the Bravos I owned. Western Skyways have done a few. Airmart has done a few. I can't think of any others, unless you count the shop in Kennett MO which has very mixed reviews even on much simpler engines. The factory engines all come with new or overhauled accessories, fuel systems, etc and many times these aren't included in quotes from shops. If any shops quote re-using the cylinders on this engine, run, do not walk away.

I have done this on a few Mooneys I've owned. Great Lakes (glap.inc) the manufacturer of these will trim them for you free of charge if you buy directly from them and send your old ones to them to be used as a pattern. Our Mooneys are hand-built and every lenses is trimmed to the opening. I highly recommend sending them the lenses since doing it by trial and error cost me a lens before I took them up on their offer. If they mess it up they can go grab another one and start over. I also use countersunk washers and new stainless screws to reinstall. The countersunk washer spreads the load when you are "snugging" the screws up. If you "tighten" them you will crack the new lenses. Also if your Mooney used a metal retainer on the outside of the landing/taxi lenses you do not have to re-install that. Mooney eliminated that sometime in the past 25 years. It looks much better and has less drag. Replacing the incandescent bulbs ONCE with LED will help you to appreciate a major advantage of using "permanent" bulbs rather than having to change them when they burn out every 25 hours of continuous use. Getting your hand up there to do the work is not fun for the four new lights. Knowing that you'll never have to do it again makes it worth it. Putting your phone up inside of there and taking a picture of the retaining rings first and then referencing it makes it easier while your are feeling your way around up there.

With all of the people you've helped over the years, you've earned an excellent reputation from Garmin owners. You will be missed. Since people have grown dependent on you, I would suggest going into the witness protection program upon your retirement. . lol

Most Aspen installations where there is a King autopilot haven't had the Aspen aligned with the autopilot with the King breakout box. This was always necessary whenever the attitude indicator was changed out. There are not a lot of shops anymore that have the King equipment to do that or the techs that have ever done it. Here is someone else on another forum that needs to do the same thing: https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/threads/kts-158-aspen-calibration.144959/ Also this has been discussed on Mooneyspace: https://mooneyspace.com/topic/41296-gi275-pitch-signal-to-kap150-autopilot-pitch-porpoising/

They make carpet kits for the Ovation, which is the exact same carpet kit as it is for the Bravo.

I did that mod to mine a couple years ago after I bought it. I'm only a few miles from the factory. I think I have an extra piece of the ABS you can have to do the RF-friendly panel behind the carpet in the baggage area. If Jeff needs it, Mike K has my number. I also added a passive repeater between the GTX-345 bluetooth antenna area and the cabin and they were ok with it. Mike and Jeff have both seen that as well. My device doesn't drop bluetooth now. They had never seen the LHS system until they installed one on mine.

If you are operating in real cold conditions you could tape over 1/3 of your oil cooler to help keep the temps up, but nothing wrong with 270-290. Mooney made a cold weather kit which effectively did that - it blocked off part of the oil cooler.

@OSUAV8TER will help you out with the long-lasting blue o-rings.

The terrain is dependent on whether you have the Synthetic Vision (SVT) unlock on the G1000, for which you need higher rezolution.

I have a Garmin Aera 760 and with a Garmin OnePak you get one portable database subscription included. If you really want Jepps you will have to buy a Jepp unlock ($2400 I think) for your G1000 - absolutely no need to do that - the Garmin nav data works fine.

This is a great example of "buying" the owner before you buy the airplane. It's not often that you see such a well-maintained airplane come up for sale by a long-time member. If I was looking for a C to buy and fly this one would be at the top of my list. I doubt that this one stays for sale more than a week.

Ah ok - his profile says Rocket - sorry

To get a legal installation on the Rocket you'll need the FSDO to do a field approval on the airplane. EDIT: Even though his profile says Rocket - he is talking about installing it in a F.

Paul, Thanks for contributing your thoughts on here. The decades you owned LASAR provide a wealth of knowledge and wisdom to our forum.

Pull the belly panel and check your connections again. Or the DME part of that VOR/DME ground station may have been intermittent or INOP.

Every airplane you buy the process starts over on finding all of the things that need attention, even with a good pre-buy If it's the Eagle that Jimmy has for sale - it looks like a nice airplane. It will be a 20 year newer airframe. The long body carries some advantages, but you will go through more shock discs due to the weight. The STec-30 is a very basic autopilot though with manual trim. The advertisement says that it has an Avidyne IFD550, but the picture shows an IFD540. The Moritz gauges have been replaced with an MVP-50, so that was at least a $10,000 job by the time you cut a new panel. This one has been upgraded to leather, which is nice, another $4000 at least. The one thing that the Eagle should have had is rudder trim. Originally it had 244hp and it was certified without it. But now with 310hp you will see on the first take-off how far your right leg needs to be buried into the right rudder, and it needs to stay there for 10-20 minutes during the climb. Paint was not a Mooney strong point back when these were made, so a lot of people have repainted their Mooney from this era already (-$20000). The tanks have less capacity than the Ovation but about what you have now (75 gallons) and due to 24 years should be looked at carefully for leaks. The white paint scheme makes them easy to spot though. (EDIT: The STC raises the tank capacity to 89 gallons) Since you didn't put any of the hours on that engine there is some uncertainty on how many more hours you can get out of it. I would budget for a new engine (-$60000 ??) and maybe even order it and then run the engine on condition since it will take probably well over a year to get a new engine - not sure about that timeframe though. Then it becomes a one or two week event when the engine comes in. What will you gain? Useful load for sure. The extra few inches in the baggage area. Speeds will be about the same depending on how you fly it. Climb performance on take-off will be improved, but will degrade after 8000 feet

That's for a 5 pack of them. That's a great deal.

The trim/flaps indicator was inop on an M20M that I bought. A few weeks earlier when I looked at the airplane they were flickering. Not sure if that would fix yours, but I thought I would throw it out there. It might be worth a call to Don Maxwell.

I agree 100% with everything you said - we are all learning - that's why we are here. But the last statement made, that he doesn't know how engines in general work is completely false.

I would definitely re-think your post. Of all of the owners on Mooneyspace I would put @jlunseth in the top ten of knowing how his airplane and engine, and of all of the M20K 231 owners I would put him at the top of the list on the TSIO-360-GB and LB engines. I'm nowhere on either list even though I owned an '83 231 and a '97 Encore. He may not be stating it in a way that you understand, but in following his posts since 2011 and looking back at the posts he's made since 2009, he knows his airplane and his engine very well.

Lycoming specifies 25 hour oil changes, not 50, on the TIO-540-AF1B engine on the Bravo. https://www.lycoming.com/sites/default/files/attachments/SB480F%20Oil%20ServicingMetallic%20Solids%20Identification%20After%20Oil%20Servicing%20and%20Associated%20Corrective%20Action.pdf The biggest issue with this engine is heat. The oil that cools the heads goes very close past the "hot section" (the exhaust valve guides) to wick away the heat from that area into the oil. Lycoming mentioned in a Seminar roughly 25 years ago at a Mooney Homecoming in Kerrville that the tests that they had run on the oil shows that the viscosity was not there as the oil went a few hours past the 25 hour mark. They attributed it to heat in the Bravo conversion and made it clear to those present that the only chance that the engine had to make it to TBO was to change the oil every 25 hours. They put this in Lycoming Service Bulletin 480A and Mooney referenced that in the Bravo Maintenance Manual. SB-480F, linked above still calls for 25 hour oil changes in that engine.

And people that know what they are talking about realize that the G5 can be used as an HSI with the Century III or virtually any other autopilot, or any almost airplane without an autopilot but it can't be used for attitude on the Century III (or Century IV or 41) or any King autopilot (KAP 150, KFC 150, KFC 200, KFC 225, etc) When @philiplane said "You will either need to retain the existing attitude indicator to drive it, or switch to a GI-275. The G5 cannot drive it.", he was absolutely correct. To use it as an HSI you'll need a GAD 29B and a GMU 11 but it will not provide attitude information to the Century III. Admittedly Garmin saying it's "compatible" is confusing, since they are referring to the HSI/GPSS function, but this has been discussed over and over on here since the G5 was introduced in 2016. And to correct another one of your mistakes, you didn't suggest that I google it, you suggested that @philiplane do that. I have nothing against google, but google only provides you a path to the correct answer when you know enough to ask the correct question. https://www.google.com/search?q=can+a+Garmin+G5+eeplace+thw+attitrude+indicator+on+a+CenturyIII+autopilot%3F&rlz=1C5CHFA_enUS1031US1031&oq=can+a+Garmin+G5+eeplace+thw+attitrude+indicator+on+a+CenturyIII+autopilot%3F&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBCTI3MTQwajBqN6gCALACAA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 This post from one of their vendors makes it more clear than Garmin's website: https://sarasotaavionics.com/whats-new-in-avionics/garmin-announces-g5-third-party-autopilot-support Feel free to call Garmin yourself and confirm. 1-866-739-5687

But Lycoming is not ok with mineral oil on the TIO-540-AF1B engine. They say, "All Lycoming turbocharged engines must be broken in with ashless dispersant oil only" https://www.lycoming.com/content/hard-facts-about-engine-break