Paul_Havelka Posted April 9, 2020 Report Posted April 9, 2020 So I was asked where and how I’d been. Some of you may remember that I was looking at Mooneys for my first airplane and actually had an e model lined up that the guy wanted to sell half a share in. Well evidently he would rather the plane not fly. My oldest son, 18, finished up his PPL with 41.5 hours in his logbook and we fell into a Piper Cherokee 180. Low time smoh but has a history of sitting. Picked her up for 18k and immediately dropped another 15k to upgrade some avionics. Did the first annual owner assisted and got out for under $500 so we were stoked. While flying with my CFI to a fly in we lost the alternator so I got some real work experience with that. Ended up going with a Plane Power alternator and changed to their regulator for good measure. So what did that 15k get me? Well I bought a freshly serviced 430w, Avidyne AMX240 bt audio panel, Avidyne AXP340 transponder, and a G5 hsi. I also got direct wire harnesses made by Approach FastStack. All of this was sourced from Jesse Saint at Saint Aviation and I was doing the installation myself. I’ve never tackled anything like this but I have modified vehicle harnesses for LS motor swaps, built hand wired tube guitar amps, etc. What we had in the plane was a kma24, kx155 with gs, tray for at50 and a cdi. The plan was to keep the kx155 for com 2. I made sure to take the time and eliminate unneeded wires from behind the panel and with all the distractions of life it took me a little longer than I anticipated but overall I’m very happy with it. The only issue I had was the G5 not receiving rs232 data. After doing some troubleshooting I finally looked at the wiring diagram and figured out I had the 430 programmed to send that data to the wrong channel. Changed it and it works great. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 7
StevenL757 Posted April 9, 2020 Report Posted April 9, 2020 Congrats on your son’s Private certificate. A great plane for what sounds like a motivated family to get into the air. Fly safe, enjoy, and if a Mooney is eventually in the cards, you’re fixing up a really nice airplane for someone else to take forward as you are. Don’t be a stranger. Steve 1
Paul_Havelka Posted April 9, 2020 Author Report Posted April 9, 2020 Steve,The plan is for me to finish up my PPL and get my instrument rating in this plane and for my son to get his CFI and buy this for a trainer. At that point I’d upgrade and I’ll be looking hard at a Mooney. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
MIm20c Posted April 9, 2020 Report Posted April 9, 2020 Ideally your son will not want to own the plane he is giving lessons in FYI.
carusoam Posted April 10, 2020 Report Posted April 10, 2020 Nice to hear the details on both the pilots and the panels, Creek! And great pirep for Mr. Saint! Your son was very efficient in using so few hours to get the PPL! That’s an early accomplishment. Got any LS pics? I saw one of those really nice color panel displays in Mr. Saints shop last year... And a Mooney in there getting some work done... Best regards, -a-
EricJ Posted April 10, 2020 Report Posted April 10, 2020 Nice! They're awesome airplanes and very simple and easy to maintain for the most part. A buddy has a very similar one that he bought a few years ago and has been flying it like crazy. Not a bad choice at all.
Paul_Havelka Posted April 10, 2020 Author Report Posted April 10, 2020 No LS pics, sorry but there for a while people would send their harnesses for me to rework for them. On a side note we flew from KGMJ to KTUL to see the runway with all the AA planes parked on it. Vectored only for 36l coming in from the east and was told where to look for traffic and “caution wake turbulence “. Yeah traffic was a dc10 doing touch n gos. Guessing it was military as ADS-B showed up but no tail number and it was a flat grey color. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 1
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