robert7467

Lets just say he charged his normally hourly rate, and it took him about 4 hrs since mine was really bad.

as the plane was banking right, and downwards when the wing leveler was deactivated. Don spent several hours rigging the plane since it was really bad. Yesterday I flew the plane on a XC and noticed I had to have about a 5 degree bank to the left to keep her flying strait. With the wings level, she was turning about 5 degrees every 20 or 30 seconds. I am not sure if this is due to crosswind as I do not have much time in aircraft without the wing leveler. We also noticed the rudder has a lot more authority. We are taking her back in October to have a vacuum leak on the wing leveler fixed, and to have her touched up and buffed out by their body guy. At this point, she might need a slight adjustment, but there was a 100% improvement and we are happy with the peace of mind that Maxwell looked over the plane and gave us some pointers as well as a thumbs up on the Mooney. I am going to work on my instrument rating, and my big concern was if the vacuum pump went out in IMC then I would have a major issue with the plane wanting to dive down. That issue has been eliminated. I will provide a report in October when we get her fine-tuned and touched up. Like I said there could have been a crosswind component and I am not used to flying a plane without a wing leveler. Overall, I am happy with using Maxwell.

A lot of times, people are trying to clear obstacles and are in ground effect and think the plane is actually flying. http://robertenfield.com/accelerated-stalls/

Request progressive taxi....

She is not equipped with electric trim. I know some guys are going to bash me here, but I don’t use trim on approach, and it works well for me. The couple times I did use it, I started bouncing. At first, my problem was with flaps. Using flaps maybe 2 out of 3 landings were bad. After not using flaps for so long, I got really comfortable with that configuration, but I knew I needed to learn to fly by the POH. Then I started adding one notch at a time, and for the last 30 hrs, I have been using full flaps on my landings except for windy/gusty conditions where I like the stability of adding a little speed and not using flaps. For some reason I can seem to get over the trim issue just yet since I was trained to handle my approaches and landings "by the stick", which in the event of a go around, that’s one less thing to mess with. My partner fly’s the plane exact to the POH, and is anal enough to have a 20 page checklist, well not that many, but you get the point. We went up, and he demonstrated using the trim, and by the textbook he had a good landing, but maybe since I have more regency and more hrs in the Mooney, my landings are always smooth for the most part. Anyone reading this, don’t not take this as advice, this is just what works for me and obviously I need some more training and practice.

Me personally when it's a little gusty, I go in at 85 with no flaps and she does just fine. If I do start ballooning I sometimes have to finess the yoke, down just a little and the back again. Like I said its finessing, not forcing the nose down, and not yanking back to hard either.Not trying to brag, but for the last 30 hrs, every single landing has been a greaser with no surprises. Prior to that, landings were my biggest challenge, but now that I am comfortable with my plane I find myself getting better and better every time I fly.

Any pictures? I am going to PM you my email address.

That's my little baby. All is good here. Mooney just through extensive annual and everything and she has a clean bill of health

Hope you guys enjoy this!

Or say "good day" after your transmission to really look like a pro and get class B clearence.

Mike, is rigging a complex problem, or something any A&P can do?

Nothing checked out closer to Memphis, and I want to leave the rigging to someone who specializes in it. Since its going to Don Maxwell, I am sure he will be more than happy to look everything over to make sure the Mooney is in good shape, and offer recomendations. Its getting close to annual time, and I might just have him do it.

What is your opinions about GPS heading on the DG?

Taking it to maxwell the legend.

Good question, this is where my inexpierence comes into play. I set the DG to the compass while I am on the ground, check it with the runway heading when I am taking off. And then in the air, I adjust to the heading that foreflight is telling me. So I guess I am going off of GPS direction, which seems to work well.

Just to make it easier, I set my DG to the heading on my ipad.

Any other suggestions? How about the msc on Nashville?

Sounds like a Lambert's run to me... Thanks for the info

Does anyone know of someone who does Mooney Rigging close to Memphis? Thanks, Robert

I tried loading m20c POH, file too big...

Gotcha.. Run it like you stole it! Our engines were run at full power to determine TBO, just keep an eye on your oil temp and open cowl flaps if needed.

ohhh, and before you guys start bashing me on the rolling runup, I am well aware of the dangers of doing a runup while taxiing, and how you should pay attention to the taxiway, so its not a common practice for me, and my taxiway is over a mile long, and wide and I did it to avoid running it for a length of time on the ground to help break in the cylinder.

Well, could be because your rings are not seated. Are you babying your engine? If so try the following: Clean the plug Maybe try mineral oil (talk to your mechanic) Run the engine hard, and don’t baby it. If the rings get seated, switch back to detergent based oil. Go full power on climb, and climb at 120mph instead of 105 to keep the engine cool (I have a m20c, so yours might be a little different) Also, if you have a long taxiway you can try a rolling run-up to minimize running at low RPM on the ground (might get a little brake wear, and some people on her might not recommend it, but it also works great for busy airports, an instructor taught me this in long beach) Consult with your mechanic before you take my advice. This same thing happened to mine, and I did the above and it worked. On my plane at around 3500-4000 I started running it at 25/26 and 25/25 and it solved the problem.

Did another XC to Nashville this weekend. Really Hazy to the point to where I could see the ground looking our the side window, but had issues seeing the horizon in front of me. The good news, is that I could see traffic, clouds, and if needed I could decend to 3000 or so feet safely if I started getting fatigue scanning my instruments. So in the end, it was good to practice scanning instruments in a safe enviroment. On the return trip I cruised at tree thousand.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_232 Amazing..