AndyFromCB

Flight following saved my ass about a month ago. Was on a direct collision course with a Seneca, didn't see it until 30 seconds before what would have been an impact. I leveled off my descent upon a third or so stern warning from the controller. His words were: the targets appear to be merging on my scope. Glad I did, he was about 400 feet below me.

Congrats autopilots central fixed my autopilot today, looking forward to getting my bird back.

The issue with this system is and has always been run back. It simply does not get hot enough to vaporize water unlike a hot wing, so as it brakes the ice, some water always runs back. Even with the two zones, just a little bit each time it goes thru a shedding cycle, so you end up with ice farther down the wing in the boundry layer. Fellow I know had it on his Lancair IV-P, took it off and put TKS on. I get it, 60lb is a lot of weight, but for our puny little singles, TKS can't be beat. Now the system that looks very promising is what they are putting in on Kestrel turboprop.

Rocketman, 1750 is the redline on a Bravo. Both TIT probes are fine. 1750 is the only way to get book fuel burn numbers but I'm kind of attached to my exhaust transition which is a 5K part so I run between 1600 and 1650. The valves guides on Bravo's are oil cooled so running 1750 is not an issue for cylinders or valves, but you'll pay dearly replacing exhaust transitions, waste gates and turbos so I run between 50 and 150ROP depending on how high the power setting.

Byron, So basically we are all screwed in the long run? Andy

You all are probably right, but I'm not going to test the theory in my Bravo. Too many AMUs spent. My airplane was always run 100 ROP TIT and the cylinders /valves looked brand new when we took it apart. If I was running a IO550, I would run LOP too, but with my TIO540, it's not worth the loss of speed.

Well, I've got about 50 hours or so on my TIO540AF1B installation and only in the last 10 hours or so was I able to start closing the cowl flaps fully during cruise. Prior to that I had a hard time keeping them all under 400. Now, on my last run to Lincoln to drop the plane off for an annual, they are all staying between 360 to 380 even with aggressive leaning to 1650TIT with cowl flaps closed at 75% which in my airplane is about 30/2400. So my experience is very similar to yours, Becca/Byron. Andy

http://www.hrd-aerosystems.com/ has PMA kevlar tanks, all tanks are made by the same company anyway, but HRD has a PMA tank for Scott/Zodiak with same part number.

Correct, but when attempting to lean from ROP to LOP at a high power setting, one will be moving thru the dreaded danger zone, hence my comment. No LOP for me over 65% power, actually no LOP for me at all, I fly a Bravo and didn't buy the damn airplane to go slow ;-) Actually, I don't fly, I just stop by the shop everyone now and then, drop another check. 88AMUs so far this year.

I'm not quite sure I'd place my bet on speed resumption as more ice builds up. Maybe it happens, maybe not depending on how the ice builds but I'd rather have TKS. An inch of ice is about what I've ever had on a Arrow or a 172 and while I didn't exactly feel like I was falling out of the sky, it was not a pleasant experience, especially in the 172. Never had any ice on the Mooney because TKS works so damn well and I seem to have gotten brighter about that stuff as I got older. Andy

Enjoy, Take her on a long cross country, like 5 hours, keep the manifold pressure up around 28, keep her cool (I don't know if Acclaim has cowl flaps, but if so, keep them open). Enjoy. My Bravo is down for an annual from hell, but I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. Andy

Ever heard of detonation? It's quick and it ain't pretty.

I'll take that too, as long as it's not pulp fiction Zed's basement style ;-) Quick shotgun blast I'd take.

Keep on laughing, but a smoke hood and helmet go a long way to dealing with two most common M20M emergencies. 3 M20M have gone done because of smoke in the cockpit and countless others would be alive if they had a helmet on both motorcycles or in the airplane. I was wearing a helmet when my Super D went down into the river, as I always do when I fly upside down, and trust me, my face, not already pretty to begin with would be in a lot worst of a shape if I wasn't. I credit wearing a helmet with staying conscious and not drowning in 12 inches of water when the plane flipped on touchdown.

Just found out a friend's sister starting feeling ill last Friday, got diagnosed with acute leukemia on Tuesday, died this morning, 29, the sweetest person ever. As they say, only the good die young as I'm sitting here enjoying a cuba libre in my office at 1PM in the afternoon aka being bad. I don't know why but that photo really hits home like no other airplane wreck I've ever seen.

Looks to me like he rolled over at least once, I cannot imagine the kind of G force on one's head slamming around the cabin and hitting the roof and side windows. Will make me think twice about any sort of cross wind correction in an event of forced landing. Wings level, gear up. Like I said, better lucky than good. RIP. Everyone's luck runs out some day. A lot of there crashes are survivable for younger folks but as we get older, our arteries harden and they simply snap from G force. All and all, not planing on quitting flying quite yet, having have witness multiple people die of cancer, I'll take plowing the ground with my propeller any day over that. Still hoping for a heart attack at 85 in the arms of some younger lady and maybe her friend ;-) BTW, I keep a smoke hood and two motorcycle helmets in my back seat. If I'm going down and there is time, a helmet goes on. I've wrecked more bikes than I care to remember and there is no better feeling while still sliding down the racetrack at 80mph than your head bouncing up and down the pavement and you're just smiling because of an inch of foam between you and the pavement.

I agree to a point. You don't want to hit the ground in a twin with a 80knot stall, that's fore sure. You're considerably more likely to be dead than in a single with 61knot stall or less. Hence my comment about flying a 414A 500lb under gross. You then actually have a fighting chance of climbing on single engine with a decent gradient because at gross they are all pigs until you move on up to Blackhawk King Air 90 where you can still get 600fpm at gross on one engine. But a 414A, 500lb undergross still gives you honest 400fpm on a single motor. At gross, it's sad. Plus with a single engine ceiling of about 20K, an engine loss in flight is a non-event. I don't do night flights or ceilings less than 700 on cross countries in my Mooney. I'll do local practice at night and 200 foot ceilings at my airport but that's because I know the terrain and have my turns preplanned in event of power loss.

If anyone ever wanted to design an airplane grater, I don't think they could improve on this specific formation. It pays to be both lucky and good, but I'll take lucky any day over good. This exactly the kind of situation where being in a Cirrus with CAPS would have made it a non-event.

Pictures like that is what seriously makes me consider getting a twin and running 500lb under gross all the time. Or, don't kill me, a Cirrus. Older I get, the less I trust in my skill and luck combination needed for a survivable forced landing anywhere but Iowa which essentially is one giant airport, with mile long runway, thank to rectangular survey system. Been eyeing a 414A with a lot of lust.

I agree. I don't see 8 hours there but then having have spent about 20 swapping a KI256 I could be wrong. Andy

I think you have a bit more faith in the FSDO doing anything than I do. Plus I don't want to piss of the guys at my home field, I'll see what I can do. Stacy from Mooney got back to me ultra quickly, we'll send them some photos tomorrow.

The tube is 2.1mm thick so the allowable depth is 0.20999999999 of a milimeter which is not much. The actual cost of the engine mount repair is not that bad, it's the R&R labor all over again which irks me beyond of possible belief. According to the mechanic who installed the engine, he noticed it, but didn't think it was much, but didn't actually measure and just reinstalled the engine without consulting with me first. Like I said, pisses me off. As far as I am concered, the FBO owes me a 1000 gallons of fuel. At least that's the story as of 4:40PM.

Well, in order to remove the engine mount and ship to Acorn for welding, first the engine will have to be detached from the mount, then the mount will have to be detached from the aircraft, then the mount will have to be attached back to the aircraft, then the engine will have to be attached back to the mount. In the mean time, you're disconnecting a ton of wires, clamps, hoses, turbos, exhausts, etc, etc, etc, etc. By the time you're done with all that, you're looking at 60 hours of labor on a Bravo, trust me, just went thru that and honestly feel I was under billed. I really wish we just took the mount off then and shipped to Acorn for an IRAN. I never try to short change the process but my mechanic never recommended it. These are expensive lessons, learnt 10 AMUs at a time ;-) Bravo restoration process so far has involved writing checks for slighly over 68 AMUs and apparently another 68 to go ;-)

Thanks Byron, I emailed mooney.