Our new Rocket

[Gavin Woodman]

Fresh out of paint, our new to us Mooney Rocket. Mechanically she is sound but she will need some love getting the little bugs out. Flew her a couple of days ago at 12,500 doing 206KTAS. Got to love the speed. Anyway, new to the forum and wanted to introduce myself.

 

Gavin Woodman
CFI/MEI/ATP
AEROCOR.com
FlightData.com

[Danb]

Sweet looking ride Gavin. Good luck with him or her.

[Gavin Woodman]

Thanks. We love her. Another shot from a recent flight to ABQ, some before pics and a panel shot. Obviously she could use some love in the panel department but it’s adequate for now. 

[aviatoreb]

Nice!!!

Go ROCKET!

[LANCECASPER]

10 hours ago, Gavin Woodman said:

Thanks. We love her. Another shot from a recent flight to ABQ, some before pics and a panel shot. Obviously she could use some love in the panel department but it’s adequate for now. 

 

You have a nice panel. 10 years ago this would have been a dream panel and will still do a lot today. Your Century 41 is a good analog autopilot. You have a Garmin GNS480 which I like much better than the GNS 530 or 430. You have Ryan Active traffic and an Avidyne MFD. You have a modern audio panel.

For awhile I'd probably put in a Garmin GTX345 and call it a day.  It will give you ADS-B traffic and weather on the GNS480, the iPad and probably the.Avidyne MFD. Plus it will blend your active traffic and ADS-B traffic before it sends it out to the displays.

Things are changing so fast right now if everything works (especially HSI and AI) I'd leave it alone and see what gets approved in a couple years. The number one thing I would do for sure, right away, if you fly IFR is put in a back-up attitude indicator in case you lose your AI or vacuum. People fly along with a false sense of security thinking if they have a back up vacuum that they are OK. What if the AI goes bad? You could easily put a G5 in place of your turn coordinator or pick up a used Mid Continent Lifesaver electric gyro which has excellent reliability and a battery backup. Don't rely on the AHRS on your iPad to get you back to the ground safely if you lose your AI.

Your airplane checks a lot of boxes. You have a very high quality interior - it looks like it was done by Aero Comfort. You now have new paint. It looks like it was well cared for.

Edit:

Under the GARMIN GNS480 is the King DME and then below that it looks like probably NAV 2 (maybe COM 2). Is there no 2nd COM radio (maybe no 2nd NAV)? I'm hoping it's a 2nd COM there.

[Niko182]

35 minutes ago, LANCECASPER said:

 

You have a nice panel. 10 years ago this would have been a dream panel and will still do a lot today. Your Century 41 is a good analog autopilot. You have a Garmin GNS480 which I like much better than the GNS 530 or 430. You have Ryan Active traffic and an Avidyne MFD. You have a modern audio panel.

For awhile I'd probably put in a Garmin GTX345 and call it a day.  It will give you ADS-B traffic and weather on the GNS480, the iPad and probably the.Avidyne MFD. Plus it will blend your active traffic and ADS-B traffic before it sends it out to the displays.

Things are changing so fast right now if everything works (especially HSI and AI) I'd leave it alone and see what gets approved in a couple years. The number one thing I would do for sure, right away, if you fly IFR is put in a back-up attitude indicator in case you lose your AI or vacuum. People fly along with a false sense of security thinking if they have a back up vacuum that they are OK. What if the AI goes bad? You could easily put a G5 in place of your turn coordinator or pick up a used Mid Continent Lifesaver electric gyro which has excellent reliability and a battery backup. Don't rely on the AHRS on your iPad to get you back to the ground safely if you lose your AI.

You airplane checks a lot of boxes. You have a very high quality interior - it looks like it was done by Aero Comfort. You now have new paint. It looks like it was well cared for.

You have a Garmin box so i'd say throw in 2 garmin G5's. That'll give you an AI with 4 hours of battery, and an HSI and backup AI with 4 hours of battery

[LANCECASPER]

4 minutes ago, Niko182 said:

You have a Garmin box so i'd say throw in 2 garmin G5's. That'll give you an AI with 4 hours of battery, and an HSI and backup AI with 4 hours of battery

Then he can't use the autopilot. The G5 Attitude won't drive the Century A/P.

[Niko182]

1 minute ago, LANCECASPER said:

Then he can't use the autopilot. The G5 Attitude won't drive the Century A/P.

My mistake. I not familiar with how the Century works.

[LANCECASPER]

1 hour ago, Niko182 said:

My mistake. I not familiar with how the Century works.

No problem. The only autopilot that can use the G5 Attitude info is the Garmin GFC500. The G5 can be used to replace a Century HSI.

[CWM20f]

I thought G5 had a list of other brand autopilots they would run including century.  

[CWM20f]

If I read it correctly a GAD 29B adaptor allows G5 heading bug with gpss roll steering for many century,  Honeywell and s-tec. 

[N201MKTurbo]

You can replace your HSI with a G5 and it will supply heading info to your autopilot. If your current HSI is working OK I would keep it until it wasn't then think about a G5. Adding a G5 HSI also gives you a backup attitude indicator. A couple of pushes and turns and it turns into an ADI.

[LANCECASPER]

1 hour ago, CWM20f said:

If I read it correctly a GAD 29B adaptor allows G5 heading bug with gpss roll steering for many century,  Honeywell and s-tec. 

G5 can replace HSI on a Century AP yes, ATTITUDE INDICATOR no

[Niko182]

So what you probably can do is get a g5 to replace the HSI and the turn coordinator. Then switch the places of the turn coordinator and the AI so you have the colum of G5's
and the the old AI to run the century.

[kpaul]

29 minutes ago, Niko182 said:

So what you probably can do is get a g5 to replace the HSI and the turn coordinator. Then switch the places of the turn coordinator and the AI so you have the colum of G5's
and the the old AI to run the century.

That is exactly what I did with my M20F w/ Century 41 A/P

[rbridges]

10 hours ago, Gavin Woodman said:

Flew her a couple of days ago at 12,500 doing 206KTAS.

I do that all the time in my C model.

 

 

[Mooney-Mark]

11 hours ago, Gavin Woodman said:

Fresh out of paint, our new to us Mooney Rocket. Mechanically she is sound but she will need some love getting the little bugs out. Flew her a couple of days ago at 12,500 doing 206KTAS. Got to love the speed. Anyway, new to the forum and wanted to introduce myself.

 

Gavin Woodman
CFI/MEI/ATP
AEROCOR.com
FlightData.com

Awesome airplane! I want one of those when I grow up!

[elimansour]

Hi Gavin.  She’s a beauty.  I’m also at KMYF with a new me ‘98 Allegro.  Looks like we have quite a few Mooneys based at KMYF...hopefully we can do some lunch runs in 2019!! 

[Hank]

1 hour ago, rbridges said:

I do that all the time in my C model.

 

 

Yeah, but the Rocket does that in the air while the pilot is awake. Your C does it in your dreams, mine not even then . . . .    But I've been thrilled the few times I've seen 180+ knots groundspeed in cruise.

[FloridaMan]

What power settings were you using at 206ktas?

[Gavin Woodman]

Thanks guys. I’m not sure if we are going to do anything beyond ads-b at this point. I fly about 700 hours a year so I feel pretty comfortable partial panel. 

 

Loving it it so far. Dropped her off at our normal shop in SMO but it’s becoming apparent that we need to use a Mooney specialist. I’m thinking we will use Lasar. 

 

As for the question about power setting, I think I was using 31” 2300rpm and 18.7gph. 

[201er]

On 12/22/2018 at 2:04 PM, LANCECASPER said:

The number one thing I would do for sure, right away, if you fly IFR is put in a back-up attitude indicator in case you lose your AI or vacuum. People fly along with a false sense of security thinking if they have a back up vacuum that they are OK. What if the AI goes bad? 

Better yet an AOAi. Number of accidents caused by instrument failure? One every few years. Number of accidents caused by stalling the airplane (especially in a turn)? About 100 per year. The information served by an AOAi is far more beneficial than a redundant display to an existing system that already has built in redundancy.

[LANCECASPER]

2 hours ago, 201er said:

Better yet an AOAi. Number of accidents caused by instrument failure? One every few years. Number of accidents caused by stalling the airplane (especially in a turn)? About 100 per year. The information served by an AOAi is far more beneficial than a redundant display to an existing system that already has built in redundancy.

Angle of Angle indicators are excellent and would be a great addition to any airplane. However in IMC if you lose your Attitude Indicator, having another Attitude Indicator is what you need most at that moment. By all means put both in though,

[201er]

48 minutes ago, LANCECASPER said:

Angle of Angle indicators are excellent and would be a great addition to any airplane. However in IMC if you lose your Attitude Indicator, having another Attitude Indicator is what you need most at that moment. By all means put both in though,

I completely agree about the value of both. What I disagree on by far is the priority. The backup AI gives no additional information or benefit. It only serves as a backup to a redundant system that has backup (other instruments and standby vac). Vac pumps/AIs do fail but not all the often. The odds of it happening while in IMC are slim. And there are still additional systems to back you up. However, an AOAi gives you information you don't already have in the cockpit. Although the ASI and stall warning are a poor man's substitute, neither adequately tells you your lift reserve or optimal AOA in a loaded turn at this exact moment's weight configuration. This is why if there's a " number one thing I would do for sure, right away," a backup AI isn't the first thing that comes to mind.

[LANCECASPER]

3 minutes ago, 201er said:

I completely agree about the value of both. What I disagree on by far is the priority. The backup AI gives no additional information or benefit. It only serves as a backup to a redundant system that has backup (other instruments and standby vac). Vac pumps/AIs do fail but not all the often. The odds of it happening while in IMC are slim. And there are still additional systems to back you up. However, an AOAi gives you information you don't already have in the cockpit. Although the ASI and stall warning are a poor man's substitute, neither adequately tells you your lift reserve or optimal AOA in a loaded turn at this exact moment's weight configuration. This is why if there's a " number one thing I would do for sure, right away," a backup AI isn't the first thing that comes to mind.

We're talking about two different things. First you left out the qualifier in my quote. "if you fly IFR". Here's what I said, "The number one thing I would do for sure, right away, if you fly IFR is put in a back-up attitude indicator in case you lose your AI or vacuum." 

Although we practice partial panel and can do it well under the hood, when an AI starts to go in IMC under high workload it can first be confusing and then be very stressful. Whether they declare it or not, losing an AI in IMC is an emergency for most pilots.

While I agree that AOA is valuable, it is definitely not the first thing I would recommend to an IFR pilot who doesn't have another AI in the panel. If you took all single engine IFR pilots and disabled their AI in real IMC (which in most cases also disables their autopilot) how do you think they would do compared to covering up the AOA's for all pilots in VFR? A CFI friend of mine who flew and taught for American for 30+ years won't take on an IFR student who doesn't have a backup AI in their airplane.

But, I may be way off, let's let a few experienced instructors weigh in. Calling @mike_elliott @donkaye

@kortopates