six gear collapses & gear ups in one week

[mike_elliott]

@philiplane, you will be hearing about another in KFMY, a Bravo, your specialty. Dust off your cleco's and get your motor hoist ready. I just heard about it from a client based there.

[mike_elliott]

..and I just heard that an E got sold today to a guy who has already geared up 2 Mooneys in the last couple of years 

[MooneyMitch]

19 minutes ago, mike_elliott said:

..and I just heard that an E got sold today to a guy who has already geared up 2 Mooneys in the last couple of years 

What..... he doesn’t like owning Mooney’s that have experienced gear up landings?  

[M016576]

On 5/12/2020 at 4:43 PM, whiskytango said:

I don't know if they are still doing it, but when I was living up north and flew into KMRB, a joint civilian and ANG facility, the tower controller would always call "Mooney 6091Q check wheels down, cleared to land".  Although it is not ATC's job to keep us from screwing up, it was always appreciated.

If it’s a joint use field, and a military (ANG) controller is in the tower- he’s required By regulation to say that, regardless of if it’s a civilian or military aircraft.  
 

they are definitely still doing this.

[irishpilot]

If it’s a joint use field, and a military (ANG) controller is in the tower- he’s required By regulation to say that, regardless of if it’s a civilian or military aircraft.  
 
they are definitely still doing this.

It is required for military aircraft to say "gear down" on base for VMC and at the FAF on an instrument approach. Mil towers back us up if they haven't heard the gear down call. Doing the same thing at the same point is how the military offsets the risk of a gear up.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk

[MooneyMitch]

17 minutes ago, 1980Mooney said:

A 2005 Bravo geared-up at Ft. Meyers on Saturday....N66YC.  His insurance company is going to say $ Ouch!

 

Darn!   Hopefully damage is minimal.

[philiplane]

An M20C landed hard in Hillsboro OR, resulting in substantial damage, August 19th.

[steingar]

I did a tortoise rescue flight yesterday, I'll post up about it later.  The gal with the tortoise wanted me to land N43, Braden airpark, which was described as "200 feet, turf and asphalt".  I don't even know what that means.  Normally I think I could do 2K feet, just did 2200 a few weeks ago.  But after a three hour flight, not so much.  Went to ABE instead, and my landing was way less than 2K feet.

 

[mike_elliott]

On 8/18/2020 at 12:19 AM, 1980Mooney said:

A 2005 Bravo geared-up at Ft. Meyers on Saturday....N66YC.  His insurance company is going to say $ Ouch!

 

..and now you have

On 8/15/2020 at 2:21 PM, mike_elliott said:

@philiplane, you will be hearing about another in KFMY, a Bravo, your specialty. Dust off your cleco's and get your motor hoist ready. I just heard about it from a client based there.

 

[gsxrpilot]

To try and balance things out... I made two landings this morning, both on the wheels. And she rolled nicely back in to the hangar. 

[mike_elliott]

Just now, gsxrpilot said:

To try and balance things out... I made two landings this morning, both on the wheels. And she rolled nicely back in to the hangar. 

bounce ? 

[MooneyMitch]

7 minutes ago, mike_elliott said:

bounce ? 

I log those as multiple landings!! 

[Hank]

1 hour ago, gsxrpilot said:

To try and balance things out... I made two landings this morning, both on the wheels. And she rolled nicely back in to the hangar. 

You know you've done it wrong when it takes full power to taxi . . . .

Although that happened to me last summer, landing on a grass strip at the beach after a couple of weeks of rain. Turning around to back taxi to parking was tough, almost bogged down, but full power and a gentle turn kept me moving.

[MooneyMitch]

Just now, Hank said:

You know you've done it wrong when it takes full power to taxi . . . .

Although that happened to me last summer, landing on a grass strip at the beach after a couple of weeks of rain. Turning around to back taxi to parking was tough, almost bogged down, but full power and a gentle turn kept me moving.

For me, that would be a bit of a pucker factor until I discovered I could indeed keep the taxi underway......yikes !!!

[Hank]

1 minute ago, MooneyMitch said:

For me, that would be a bit of a pucker factor until I discovered I could indeed keep the taxi underway......yikes !!!

Yes, it had my full attention! And my wife's, too. I was unaware of how much rain they had received until after arrival. I departed a day early, flying to a nearby Class D before loading baggage and wife for the trip home. Before takeoff, I walked the runway and made note of the driest areas and the spots with shallowest water. My takeoff run was purposely not straight, Takeoff Flaps, solo, then someone had to drive an hour to pick me up. Leaving the next day with both of us, lots of baggage and full fuel from a couple of miles of asphalt was easy!

[jlunseth]

I won’t say how many landings I have on the wheels, that would be tempting fate. So far so good.  Had an interesting one last week during an Angel Flight though. Nose wheel went flat on touchdown, it was not a hard or flat touchdown, the tire just went flat. Hard left pull.  I was able to taxi off and onto a ramp. We had to walk about a quarter mile to get to the FBO. Boy, was I lucky! I stopped at a hangar to tell someone why my plane was sitting there. It turned out to be the guy in charge of the maintenance operation. Went to have lunch while the patient had her appointment. They had a new tire on the aircraft before we got back, plane all fueled up, and we took the patient back home.  The tire looked a little low during pre-flight but nothing alarming and it varies depending on temperatures. Do good things and good things will happen to you, I guess.

[MooneyMitch]

3 hours ago, jlunseth said:

I won’t say how many landings I have on the wheels, that would be tempting fate. So far so good.  Had an interesting one last week during an Angel Flight though. Nose wheel went flat on touchdown, it was not a hard or flat touchdown, the tire just went flat. Hard left pull.  I was able to taxi off and onto a ramp. We had to walk about a quarter mile to get to the FBO. Boy, was I lucky! I stopped at a hangar to tell someone why my plane was sitting there. It turned out to be the guy in charge of the maintenance operation. Went to have lunch while the patient had her appointment. They had a new tire on the aircraft before we got back, plane all fueled up, and we took the patient back home.  The tire looked a little low during pre-flight but nothing alarming and it varies depending on temperatures. Do good things and good things will happen to you, I guess.

Fortunate all went well for you.  What the heck caused that?  Tube, tube stem, nail, screw, etc?  Did you have the opportunity to look at the tire/tube assembly?  Any explanation offered form the maint. folks? 

[jlunseth]

It just went flat. I suppose it was its time. Did not have much time to talk to the maintenance guy unfortunately.  Just felt a mush on landing, it straightened out and felt fine for a moment and then wanted to drive off the left side of the runway pretty hard. Took some stomping on the brake to stay on the concrete and then taxi to a ramp. Wheel looks fine though. I should have held back elevator but did not know which tire it was, if it was a main then I would have been stressing that wheel, so just kept it flat elevator-wise.

[Ghostrider]

On 5/12/2020 at 7:42 PM, aviatoreb said:

Fly a thousand hours and I bet you will have a time that may well break through one or more of your just in case layers of fool proof.  Maybe a go around called by tower.  Maybe a bad day. Maybe a distracting passenger.  Maybe tower tells you to keep up speed in sequence which means leaving your gear until late - don't forget to get that gear down then!  Maybe you are practicing for your commercial license and working a power-off precision landing for the 10th time in a row and these require keeping the gear up until late....but don't forget to get that gear down.  Even though I am 99.999% of the time very very careful, I have found myself to be only very careful...to have found myself on final realizing - wait - my gear is still up.  I could see how it could happen.   Speed brakes btw help slow you down but also can interfere with the need to have gear down to get to flap speed.

Im gonna say, I was flying into Cameron park, CA (basically landing in a fish bowl) within a year or two of getting my Mooney.. i had just taken off a short time before taking a friend for a ride... Coming back to land I was too high and did a go around.  Since as the OP said he basically needs the gear to slow down this is relevant.  I too use the gear as my speed brake from 120mph to 100.. then I can add flaps... Well with the Go around I pulled the gear up but never got above 120.. I turning downwind to base and did one of my "redundant" gear checks and had an "oh Shit" moment because my gear was up and this was no longer a redundtant check... it was then that I realized a Go around was my most likely chance to forget.  I have since made my on final montra change from "Airspeed, Runway, Airspeed Runway"    to now be  "Airspeed, Runway, Airspeed Runway, Gear down and locked as I yank the bar" then repeat... all the way down to over the fence.....  I have had passengers ask why I keep yanking that bar... I said to make sure I have not forgot already.... and the yank is to make sure it has actually locked in... What I suspect the recent E may not have done.

[Hank]

1 hour ago, Ghostrider said:

Im gonna say, I was flying into Cameron park, CA (basically landing in a fish bowl) within a year or two of getting my Mooney.. i had just taken off a short time before taking a friend for a ride... Coming back to land I was too high and did a go around.  Since as the OP said he basically needs the gear to slow down this is relevant.  I too use the gear as my speed brake from 120mph to 100.. then I can add flaps... Well with the Go around I pulled the gear up but never got above 120.. I turning downwind to base and did one of my "redundant" gear checks and had an "oh Shit" moment because my gear was up and this was no longer a redundtant check... it was then that I realized a Go around was my most likely chance to forget.  I have since made my on final montra change from "Airspeed, Runway, Airspeed Runway"    to now be  "Airspeed, Runway, Airspeed Runway, Gear down and locked as I yank the bar" then repeat... all the way down to over the fence.....  I have had passengers ask why I keep yanking that bar... I said to make sure I have not forgot already.... and the yank is to make sure it has actually locked in... What I suspect the recent E may not have done.

I check my gear three times.

VFR:  downwind abeam landing point, gear down; base leg, check the light; final, point at floor indicator; short final, check the light.

IFR:  at FAF, gear down; breakout, check the light; final, point at floor indicator; short final, check the light.

The short final check has saved me twice . . . . . .

[jlunseth]

5 hours ago, Hank said:

I check my gear three times.

VFR:  downwind abeam landing point, gear down; base leg, check the light; final, point at floor indicator; short final, check the light.

IFR:  at FAF, gear down; breakout, check the light; final, point at floor indicator; short final, check the light.

The short final check has saved me twice . . . . . .

I guess I can’t speak for all of us, maybe someone else here has been spot perfect and never has gotten to the last check, but I do pretty much the same thing and my short final check has saved my bacon twice also. When it comes to the gear paranoia and OCD behaviour is your friend.

[Andy95W]

My final check is to point to the runway numbers and point to the green light and say out loud, "Got the numbers, got a green light."

So then there was the time on short final when I said "Got the numbers..." and did a go around because the green light was out.  As I'm swinging the Johnson bar to raise the gear, I was simultaneously congratulating myself for my discipline and thinking why the hell didn't I just check the Johnson bar!?!  Muscle memory from flying different airplane types and needing something more fool-proof than my brain.

[carusoam]

Discipline trumps Conviction!  - J. Cramer

This allows you to not land gear up...

And... invest like Jim Cramer...  Get Rich Carefully...

PP thoughts only, not a finance guru...

Best regards,

-a-

[Ibra]

From AOPA, guess number 1?

 

[philiplane]

An M20K geared up in Oceanside CA on 8-22-20. Returning to land after an electrical failure.