M20F

What I have noticed after wearing glasses for 47yrs. I can now magically read better without my glasses. This was never the case till maybe 4-5yrs ago. I have progressives. The first set was from a semi witch doctor. The second set was from a top notch ophthalmologist. They work good for a computer and some other things but if I need focus I take glasses off and get close. But mostly I hate them. I thought it was the witch doctor but going to the good guy didn’t make it any better (he was at least honest that it wasn’t going to get much better). I guess my point is all our eyes go wonky (along with knees, backs, necks, etc.) in our 40’s but there doesn’t seem to be a lot of similarities (given we all wrecked our bodies in dissimilar ways). I have a cousin in her 30’s, my brother in his 40’s, and a friend in his 40’s. LASIK and the other varieties of irradiating your eyeballs hasn’t worked great for any of them. In the case of my cousin she is 33 and on round 2 with worse vision than me at 53. Could be a lot of things but my experience has been the alternatives to glasses give great short term results but the long term is not so great.

I couldn’t find the link but GPS was blocked by NOTAM for a big part of the SW last week. I never use a VOR, don’t fly an ILS, and have a G5. That said I make sure my VOR works, my ILS works, and my standby vacuum works. I do one flight a year with VOR’s, paper charts, stop watch, and E6B in part for fun and in part so I can see if I actually still can. Nowhere near PTS (or whatever the new acronym is) but enough to survive. It is sort of fun feeling stupid. I never understand the folks that rip vacuum out to save 20lbs or pull all the VOR’s out. A very small investment in the grand scheme and who really needs the 20lbs.

Nobody has asked the real question which is what is you mission. If you do 3-4 long cross countries per year (which is more than most) this is too much plane logically. Any private plane ownership is largely illogical but no need to compound a bad decision with a further bad decision. I commuted @ 30 times between 47N and KDPA for a year and then danced all over the East coast during the week (200-300hrs which sounds like not much but when you divide by 52 is a lot). Turbos need 3-4hr legs to really show their strength and then they need O2. For 80% of my flying the difference between my F and a 231 was zero and for the rest it was about 30 minutes. That said I bought an F with a RayJay that I rarely use (turbo that is) because it is what I wanted. Turbo planes in spite of what the peanut gallery here will provide to justify their own purchase have a very high maintenance cost per hour flown. Unless a huge compelling need E/J are probably a better option then pile in the cash differential on radios, paint, interior, etc. Buy what you want but know the deal going in.

Buy a Skymaster and your mechanic will marry you.

I got challenged last time I showed my TAS but jealously knows no bounds. 1997 coming out of KOSH and the Concorde and i went tip to tip.

Thanks for the update. I am old. Put 2 ATP’s in the back seat and all set :-)

I believe 4 is actually the answer assuming 1 is CFI of some type and the other is an ATP and we aren’t limiting to PIC. There is no requirement for the CFI to be in the front seat and an ATP can log time to teach somebody for the ATP.

If you got the money, buy the 210!

The main difference is wide deck cylinders cost 4x’s as much.

I keep my transponder set to 7600 for two reasons. One I am a CB and rotating the knobs wears things out. The other thing is it’s football season which is always up on the ADF. I can’t have some controller interrupting the big game.

I got wheels up at 2100 so good for 10-15 drinks prior to that.

This is why I never trust my instruments in the clouds and only trust the seat of my pants. If you want to be safe buy Levi’s 501’s they don’t need any calibration.

Cheers!

Real men run JetA in a torpedo heater with all the doors closed.

Cash has no purpose other than to be used to acquire goods and services. If the goods/services value exceeds the % of cash back it is a better ROI. Each person needs to do their own math to determine the best card for them. For AA a mile is worth about $.017 which is 1.7%. There a lot more multipliers that exist though to earn miles that you are probably getting 4-5% with the right usage. This doesn’t count the free upgrades which are $100-500 a piece or things like SWU’s which when used for the right holiday can be worth $4-5K a piece. I will say any form of airline status even the lowest is important. People fixate on the upgrades but the real value is in determining standby and rebooking when an event occurs. The lowest status is going to push you above 50+% of the folks stuck.

Let me be the first to offer $90.00

When you travel 40+ weeks a year you will notice the differences. The biggest being when there is an event, I get on a new flight and you camp in the airport for two days.

Fly Safe Senator

https://rajay.aero/ Make sure you have all the right hoses and connections. The original installs can be Frankenstein at best. I bought new hoses for mine particularly the small rubber hose going from alternate air box on lower cowling to the airbox which is a real pain to get on even with 2 people (I had to cut mine a bit to fit but works great and is highly durable). Previously it was scat tubing and leaked quite a bit. Tubing can also collapse if old or weak, somebody else posted that issue awhile back Easiest check if you haven’t yet is ensure that you are getting waste gate fully open and closed using the control.

Where you live and where you fly has a high impact on your dispatch rate due to icing. I have a very short window in the South East where icing might be a problem. I had a slightly longer window when I lived in the Midwest. I will say over the years very few days when I couldn’t make it work.

A 337 isn’t exactly complicated to file. Why split hairs. I love the internet in my opinion @philiplane answered this in the first reply. Then we all like to debate silly stuff for 2+ pages after that (and my response will get the troops going).

This comes up all the time, the ROI on a hanger is negative. This can be proven with very simple math. You can repaint the entire airplane every 6 or so years for what a hanger will cost. Most airplanes get repainted every 15-20yrs thus no issue. Hail is covered by insurance. I have often had 2 hangers because I commuted and having tools, spares, etc. was useful. I have 1 hanger today. That though has nothing to do with the airplane. Hangers are like engine monitors (I have a MVP-50) where people swear without one you will destroy your airplane. I disagree both with the engine monitor and the hanger portion of this argument (even though I have both). If you can afford a hanger it is great but not imho necessary. I find an engine monitor less useful but I had the cash and I like the flashing lights. With both engine monitors and hangers you will never have a logical conversation. People will tell you what they “feel” or talk about some very bizarre one off. For the most part though park it outside and use stock gauges, has worked since the Wright Brothers. I do like my hanger though, it has a freezer which I keep ice cream in.

Agreed if the piston isn’t leaving the barrel it is the same as if it was on the plane, no need to change anything here.

I go to KTOR 1-2x a year. Nice airport and FBO not much else other than Rocky Mountain oysters and the sugar beet mill.

Having been based out of 47N for 18 or so months not a lot of options and not the greatest set up. Good people though and cheap gas. I spent more than a few nights sleeping at KMMU when it was dark and scary when I shuttled back and forth to KDPA every weekend. Glad it turned out ok.