FloridaMan

12k/yr should easily cover owning an m20f. In my opinion, they’re one of the cheapest airplanes to own if you plan to use it to go places. You’re getting similar gas mileage to a Cessna 152. The only year I spent more than 12k on my m20f in maintenance was when I had my engine overhauled, and if I amortize that across all the other years, it’s still well under 12k. Hell, I think I spend less on my Rocket than friends that got talked into buying new pickup trucks loaded with options.

Where are you located? Vintage Mooneys are inexpensive to own and operate if you have a good shop to work with. Don’t rush into your purchase, but take your time and buying the airplane is the correct decision.

2 miles for every 1000ft at 100mph. I use it for approximation and planning only. If you know you can make a field and aren’t sure about the airport, take the field.

According to the article, it’s for monitoring narcotics and homeland security threats, because we all know that both of those consistently originate over the heartland or so-called “flyover states”.

Yup. It can be tricky to dislodge things in flight too, but with well over 1000 J-bar Mooneys having been produced, I’m sure some pilot may have caught the full brunt of not having the J-bar stowed fully for gear up while leveraging the handle over the door and steel bar that the compass is attached to for bringing his date into the “mile high” club.

There was a thread a year or so back talking about insurance companies pulling data plates. Theres a guy based at KLQK in Pickens, SC who had two Porsche Mooneys and is somehow connected to the museum and other Porsche Mooneys. I don’t have his contact info, but I’m sure a call to the shop on the field could find him.

I always laughed when I’d see the name @SpamPilot with the old school monospaced serif font. I always sortof assumed the little tags on the corners of the characters were to aid in readability on things that involved metal typeset and pressing ink. If you had a character that was missing a little ink in the middle of a line, your mind completes the line and you don’t notice. It also may have made casting the typewriter keys, Selectric wheels or press type less problematic. I believe the stories of it having better readability on print has to do with inconsistencies in print that involves ink, pressure and castings. The exception is that I always use some variant of courier for writing software because it’s a universally available monospaced font. I believe the most readable font for CRTs is green sans serif on black, like the old green screen terminals, and for many of the same reasons. CRTs were not always perfectly in focus and staring at them for extended periods was hard on the eyes.

This is what I use as well. You have the added bonus to be able to text your A&P when you’re over the top or crossing a body of water and something weird starts happening.

Sun n Fun had me take off behind a flight of two Wacos years ago. It required significant control input to maintain control and really got my attention.

https://www.taylorcraft.org.uk/bmep-article.doc

I also live 3 blocks from the airport, so there’s that too. I also considered building my own powered towbar before purchasing. The $99 hoverboards supposedly have two motors that put out about 8-10 lb-ft of torque (6.5” diameter wheels) and a 36VDC lithium-ion battery pack.

I considered that and bought a used golf cart on Craigslist and a universal towbar separately for less money. Now I have transportation around the airport. The only challenge was learning to tow a plane. The rudder turns with the steering wheel and you have to lead it a bit.

You may have a failing mag. I had the same EGT indication 7 years ago when the mag was failing on my m20f: intermittent high EGT. Buy once. Cry once. Get an engine monitor. I had an engine failure on takeoff at 200ft after getting mine. The peace of mind it gave me knowing that there was no warning, compared to including it in the potential “what ifs”, especially had it resulted in life changing results was worth it alone. My engine monitor also alerted me to when my engine had spun a main bearing and I would’ve not noticed the intermittent drop in oil pressure otherwise. The shop that did the overhaul said it was one of the worst engines they’d seen and suspected I was close to a catastrophic failure.

Check the wires. I had three failures that I thought were the alternator that were wires broken at the connector. I had all of the power wires replaced when I did the engine and have had no issues since.

Seems the uavionix products are in stock at a lot of places and do avionics shops have to do the installs?

When someone decides to sell their airplane there will almost always be something that’s not done. Take any experienced IA and have them look over a Mooney that has left a MSC and they will find an issue. That one hose isn’t good, and I would never do something like that, but at some point it had to have been replaced and it doesn’t look that old. The correct hose is not cheap. That particular fuel line is rated for 50psi with burst pressure of 250psi. Your max fuel pressure is 30psi and automotive fuel pressure often is in excess of 50psi, hence the placarding. The fuel line is not for aviation use, which should be the concern. Our aircraft fuel injection systems are more like Bosch K-Jetronic constant flow systems that have more in common with carburetors than they do modern pulsed injector automotive systems. I’m not saying that fuel line is acceptable, by any means, but my guess is someone didn’t want to spend the time and/or money for the correct one and took a liberal approach on the “owner produced part” exemption. So long as the wing isn’t corroding away and it’s otherwise airworthy, fix what you need to and move on. Every plane I’ve bought has cost me a couple thousand dollars in the first couple months to address one issue or another, regardless of who did the maintenance and PPI.

Nope. You want to care about and love your plane, but you don’t want irrational emotional attachment that might affect your decision making if shit goes wrong.

If you continue to have issues, upgrade to a slickstart system. If you have a slickstart system, check the connections on the module and the fuse.

How does that work when the feds go to auction it? The lien doesn’t go away.

I don’t agree with civil forfeiture laws when the value of the asset exceeds and is not included with the assessed penalty, especially when the asset goes to the confiscating agency. Such laws are the equivalent of state sanctioned piracy and encourage morally wrong behavior on part of those that society trusts with the application of force and justice.

That fuel line might also go to the panel mounted fuel pressure gauge if it’s the original. There’s a chance the owner may have cut corners in a bind. If the plane has the original fuel pressure gauge in the panel (combined with MP, if I remember correctly), I recommend installing an engine monitor. You will have continued issues with factory gauges that may cost you more than the engine monitor in aggregate. The fuel line that ran to my firewall in my 67F was weeping fuel onto the exhaust. The line on the other side of the firewall that ran to the gauge was original and from 1967.

Every A&P will spot things other A&Ps did that they may not like. Don’t get taken for a ride by this guy that’s inspecting your airplane, especially if this is your first plane. Those brackets on the governors for early Mooneys look like they’re hand-made out of Lowe’s angle bracket. There is a chance the guy who’s looking it over is not exceptionally familiar with Mooneys. You never mentioned who did your PPI, but if it was Phil, I’d trust his opinion over most MSCs. He’s good and he’s the one doing the work.

Mine was just coincidental. If I wanted to go blow a couple AMUs and take some time off there are a number of places way higher on my list.

Contact shops and get estimates. Aero Engines of Winchester did mine on my m20f and you should include them in your runnings. Getting an overhaul estimate for your engine prior to purchase will show you how much you need in the bank.

You should get rid of the wife instead