About time I fessed up

[Shadrach]

3 hours ago, Raptor05121 said:

Agreed. I am 80 and off the ground well before the first 1,000 foot markers. I flew in a 172 the other day, we weren't even to 60kts as we rolled past the 1,000 footers. I actually got a bit worried. O-300 is a such silky smooth little engine that it's worth a slight performance hit!

FIFY!

[Raptor05121]

I flew in an Ovation not too long ago for the first time. With a three blade, THAT was a SMOOTH plane. It seems all of my time behind O-200 and O-300s is full of nothing but carb heat problems, quick adaptation to carb icing, and plug fouling if you so much as run a mouse hair too rich. No thanks.

[Shadrach]

4 minutes ago, Raptor05121 said:

I flew in an Ovation not too long ago for the first time. With a three blade, THAT was a SMOOTH plane. It seems all of my time behind O-200 and O-300s is full of nothing but carb heat problems, quick adaptation to carb icing, and plug fouling if you so much as run a mouse hair too rich. No thanks.

Back when I was renting out of Martin State outside of Baltimore, they had a number of 172s on the flight line. There was an H model, that I loved to fly. It was smooth and sweet if not a touch down on performance when  compared to its Lycoming siblings.

[steingar]

I thought I would revisit this.  I flew back over to the field where the prop strike happened, 42I, the Parr airport in Zanesville Ohio.  The landing was a non event, except the part where my  hand was so sweaty from the heat that I couldn't grip the bar securely enough to move it.  Still, plenty of room, didn't need the slip or any of the other stuff that caused the prop strike.  What I didn't do was come in too fast.  Struck the prop on the first bounce.  

The other things I didn't do were flying into inadvertent IMC, running out of gas, or CFIT from flying too low.  I didn't do any of the things that get pilots killed.  I had my first ever inadvertent IMC not long ago.  I could have kept going, the aircraft has a  very capable autopilot.  I did the 180, landed, and spent the night in a hotel.

And the avionics installation continues.  First time I showed up, nothing worked.  Next time I showed up the GPS and transponder worked, bu the autopilot was inoperative.  Later I found out that the GSP wasn't communicating with its indicator.  On the latest trip I discovered that the reason the GPS wasn't communicating with its indicator was because I've the wrong indicator.  The hits just keep coming.

My Mooney is off for annual, and after that (and a bit of work on the nose gear) it will be time to get the avionics sorted out at last.

 

[RLCarter]

On 11/8/2017 at 7:32 AM, Raptor05121 said:

I flew in a 172 the other day, we weren't even to 60kts as we rolled past the 1,000 footers. I actually got a bit worried. O-300 is an underpowered dog.

Ive seen 275 ft min climbs on 100+° days......

[Marauder]

I thought I would revisit this.  I flew back over to the field where the prop strike happened, 42I, the Parr airport in Zanesville Ohio.  The landing was a non event, except the part where my  hand was so sweaty from the heat that I couldn't grip the bar securely enough to move it.  Still, plenty of room, didn't need the slip or any of the other stuff that caused the prop strike.  What I didn't do was come in too fast.  Struck the prop on the first bounce.  
The other things I didn't do were flying into inadvertent IMC, running out of gas, or CFIT from flying too low.  I didn't do any of the things that get pilots killed.  I had my first ever inadvertent IMC not long ago.  I could have kept going, the aircraft has a  very capable autopilot.  I did the 180, landed, and spent the night in a hotel.
And the avionics installation continues.  First time I showed up, nothing worked.  Next time I showed up the GPS and transponder worked, bu the autopilot was inoperative.  Later I found out that the GSP wasn't communicating with its indicator.  On the latest trip I discovered that the reason the GPS wasn't communicating with its indicator was because I've the wrong indicator.  The hits just keep coming.
My Mooney is off for annual, and after that (and a bit of work on the nose gear) it will be time to get the avionics sorted out at last.
 

I have had my fair share of avionics gremlins, both man made and cosmic induced. The challenge is finding a qualified excorist to deal with the cosmic items who at the same time won’t introduced man made ones.

The biggest issue I have seen with avionics shops is that the top guy/gal isn’t the one who does the majority of the installation grunt work. It is usually delegated to techs who are still learning the skill or others who aren’t exceptionally skilled. The top tech inspects the work but often can’t see the details.

Case in point. I had a shop run new RG-400 cables for my VOR Navs. I know the top tech was not the one who did the work. The tech made a cable from the splitter to the Navs and installed new BNC ends. When I get the plane back, one of the Nav radios has no range. Find that one of the BNC connectors was not made correctly.

And I do think the problem has gotten worse over the years as the complexity of the installations increases and the demand has pushed these shops to full capacity.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

[steingar]

The boss was doing the installs on mine, and he bolluxed the job at every point.  The kicker was not knowing I had the wrong indicator in the airplane.  I know, I should have looked that up myself.  But the guy should have known!

That said, he's been really stand up about everything, and will keep working on this until its right.  I doubt he's making any money at all on these installations, he's had to spend too much time chasing gremlins.  Word to the wise, if you need stuff done go to big name shops.  It will be worth it in the end.

I would go back to this guy for anything mechanical though.  He stands behind his work, and that's a rare thing.

[Guest]

5 hours ago, RLCarter said:

Ive seen 275 ft min climbs on 100+° days......

Isn’t that about the same rate that the earth curves?

Clarence

[RLCarter]

1 hour ago, M20Doc said:

Isn’t that about the same rate that the earth curves?

Clarence

It’s got to be damn close, luckily the only high terrain down here are overpasses 

[steingar]

A lot of strips here are bracketed by trees that forgot to stop growing when they hit 50 feet.  Doesn't take much room to land an unoccluded strip.  One with big trees off the end is a different animal though.  Ones with terrain off the end another animal yet again.

[mike_elliott]

On 11/8/2017 at 1:24 PM, Raptor05121 said:

I flew in an Ovation not too long ago for the first time. With a three blade, THAT was a SMOOTH plane. It seems all of my time behind O-200 and O-300s is full of nothing but carb heat problems, quick adaptation to carb icing, and plug fouling if you so much as run a mouse hair too rich. No thanks.

put a 2 blade on that C and it will smooth out a bunch, Alex.

[Hank]

1 hour ago, mike_elliott said:

put a 2 blade on that C and it will smooth out a bunch, Alex.

Mike, we need to ride together at Summit, so we can both tell the difference between my 4-cyl, 3-blade and a "smooth" Mooney. My prop was dynamically balanced at install in 2003 by the previous owner, and I had it rechecked at annual last year at 0.01 ips.

EDIT:  after checking the balance, we did nothing other than take off his tools and recowl.

Edited June 4, 2018 by Hank

[neilpilot]

1 hour ago, mike_elliott said:

put a 2 blade on that C and it will smooth out a bunch, Alex.

Very likely, but no guarantee.  Is it safe to assume that the engine mounts are in good shape, and the prop is well balanced?  After balancing, my 64E was very smooth running a 3 blade. 

A 3 blade isn't necessarily going to vibrate on a 4-cyl lycoming.  Recently I has Cody Stallings check the 3 blade on my 65C, and the vibration was so low he didn't need to balance it.

[mike_elliott]

1 hour ago, Hank said:

Mike, we need to ride together at Summit, so we can both tell the difference between my 4-cyl, 3-blade and a "smooth" Mooney. My prop was dynamically balanced at install in 2003 by the previous owner, and I had it rechecked at annual last year at 0.01 ips.

EDIT:  after checking the balance, we did nothing other than take off his tools and recowl.

My first hand experience have only been with my old F model and a new Hartzell 3 blade compared to the same plane with a 2 blade. Hartzells shop in Piqua tried for 3 months to make me a happy camper with the 3 blade. They got the balance down to well under .02 IPS if I recall, but that thing still had a vibration they could not get out. I took their shop super for a lap, and he thought it was smooth, but compared to my old 2 blade, it was horrible. I ordered a new 2 blade and all was well once again. Maybe I am just super sensitive, but Dmax once told me of a gent who swore his 3 blade was super smooth, and when Don flew it, it almost shook him out of the saddle (his words) He had his guys hang his 2 blade ferry prop on it while they went to lunch and the owner flew it, landed and ordered a 2 blade. I was in an F a couple of weeks ago that had a 3 blade I didnt feel was too bad, but still had a slight vibration.  I am willing to acknowledge a 3 blade hartzell/Lycoming 4 cyl combo could be smooth, but the extra 17# hanging in front of the thrust bearing slinging blades 60deg apart on an engine firing 180 deg apart seems to set up a harmonic that is not in balance with nature. The 3 blades sure look cool!

[Raptor05121]

14 hours ago, mike_elliott said:

put a 2 blade on that C and it will smooth out a bunch, Alex.

I've flown/in three C models with 2-blades and none are smoother than mine. Now it can be argued prop balance, carb settings, etc but I really really do love my smooth ride.