Recommendations for Mooney rigging - central Atlantic states

[AJ88V]

Anybody have recommendations for a Mooney Service Center or qualified shop to rig a Mooney?  I'm located at KCJR southwest of DC.

Thanks!

[Andy95W]

@jetdriven owns a shop near there. Not an MSC, but he owns his own Mooney and works on a lot of them. 

[Pinecone]

I would start with @jetdriven

Next would a nice trip to TX and Don Maxell's shop.  I have heard good things about their rigging services.

[PeteMc]

2 hours ago, AJ88V said:

I'm located at KJCR southwest of DC.

Hmm... Which Airport??     KJCR doesn't seem to come up.

I'd go up to see Dave Mathiesen up at Air Mods.  As a note...  In the recent PPP in FT Worth during the Maintenance presentation, Dave was called out as one of the few really good Mooney Mechanics around.  And NOTHING at all against Don Maxwell (obviously one of the greats).  But Tx vs NJ is quite a difference when Dave is right up there in the same league. 

Air Mods & Repair, Inc.  Trenton-"Robinsville" Apt (N87).  

106 A Sharon Rd.  Hangar A  Robbinsville, NJ  08691  609-259-2400

https://www.airmodsflightcenter.com/

 

 

[AJ88V]

4 hours ago, PeteMc said:

Hmm... Which Airport??     KJCR doesn't seem to come up

 

Ooopppsss!  KCJR Culpeper.  Fixed in my original post.

[PeteMc]

26 minutes ago, AJ88V said:

Ooopppsss!  KCJR Culpeper.  Fixed in my original post.

So even having to get around the DC and Phily airspace, it still would only be about 1:30ish flght.

[Pinecone]

15 hours ago, PeteMc said:

Hmm... Which Airport??     KJCR doesn't seem to come up.

I'd go up to see Dave Mathiesen up at Air Mods.  As a note...  In the recent PPP in FT Worth during the Maintenance presentation, Dave was called out as one of the few really good Mooney Mechanics around.  And NOTHING at all against Don Maxwell (obviously one of the greats).  But Tx vs NJ is quite a difference when Dave is right up there in the same league. 

Air Mods & Repair, Inc.  Trenton-"Robinsville" Apt (N87).  

106 A Sharon Rd.  Hangar A  Robbinsville, NJ  08691  609-259-2400

https://www.airmodsflightcenter.com/

 

 

I have heard other stories about Air Mods. 

[MikeOH]

1 hour ago, Pinecone said:

I have heard other stories about Air Mods. 

Ok, I'll bite: What 'other stories'?

[Pinecone]

Just a few comments made over the past few years.

But all shops are not perfect.

[AJ88V]

I guess rigging is something that doesn't get done very often or more people would have opinions.  Heck, I've owned this airplane for 26 years and never questioned the rigging - flies straight and hands off, and mostly makes book speeds (after several Lasar mods).

Reason behind my inquiry - Plane has always snapped pretty good in an aggressive (rapidly induced) power-on stall.  Did a few hours of dual as I'm getting back into flying since regaining my medical.  My very experienced Mooney (MAPA) instructor did one really hard stall just to see what she would do - we may have rolled more than 90*! (thankfully, we also recovered without entering a spin, or losing much altitude!)

There was a post recently on this forum where someone took their short-body to a shop in Tennessee? Kentucky?  but I can't find the post again.  Said it took a less than a day an his plane was 7kts faster.  One can dream, right?

Finally, it seems like there's not much love for the Mooney Service Centers so far.  Weber in PA used to be a top Mooney shop, but I've heard mixed things lately.

[PeteMc]

On 10/23/2024 at 6:56 AM, Pinecone said:

I have heard other stories about Air Mods. 

What can I tell you.  I've never heard the stories and know multiple people that use him and have zero problems.  ALSO...  As I mentioned earlier, the guy giving the maintenance presentation at the Ft Worth Pilot Proficiency Program actually called him out as one of the few shops you SHOULD be going to.  (He went on to talk about how few good Mooney shops there were these days.)

So I'm sorry if you happened to have a bad experience.  But if you "heard" bad things...  I'll call BS and someone was probably pissed because they didn't fix something and finally got to Dave (or it could have been any good mechanic) and he charged them more than they wanted to pay.  Or if it was a real issue, there is probably is a LOT more to the story that you probably didn't hear.

ADDED:  Just saw your comment about "the last few years" so again, you may be very miss informed.  Over "the last few years" there have been things that have happened to a lot of companies.  Air Mods fell into this when Dave was not at the shop for a few months.  So again, I'm guessing you're spreading stories when you don't have all the details.  But then not having heard the stories, I can only go on my personal experience and what I've personally seen happen with other customers.

 

 

Edited October 25, 2024 by PeteMc

[Pinecone]

Since I posted that, I got a few messages, not public.  All of them had bad things to say about Air Mods.

I am just pointing out that their are mixed reports on them.   Maybe they got their act back together.  That would be wonderful.

[anthony.locurto]

I recently had Air-Mods do a prebuy inspection for me last spring and I can give a first hand account of a recent experience. Let me preface that I am not an AP, this is the first plane that I bought and the first prebuy process that I went through, and Air-Mods worked me into their schedule despite being busy. Also, Dave had to head out of town for a short time to help get a client’s plane back after being stranded. 

Overall I was very disappointed with the experience at Air-Mods. They lacked attention to detail to the point that it was almost dangerous and I would have been better off without doing a prebuy in the first place. 

The prebuy inspection itself did not show any red flags so I agreed to purchase the aircraft and address some of the deferred maintenance; one of these items were replacing the rubber donuts on the landing gear (which in reality didn’t need to be replaced). Since I didn’t have any complex time I showed up with a CFI to start transition training to be able to fly it home.

When we went to start the plane up the battery was dead because Air-Mods cycled the gear off the battery and left a couple of switches on. The tech working that day did not know how to charge the battery, but no big deal we just grabbed Dave to put the battery on their charger.

We finally get in the air after a couple hours delay, and on the second landing of the day our electric gear fails to extend. Luckily my CFI was a Mooney expert and helped me through the manual extension. We gave Air-Mods the squawks to fix but we’re delayed another week.

When I returned, Dave handed me a bill to address the squawks, which I thought was odd, but I was naive with the process. They told me the handshake connection on the brake wiring became undone. I believe 

 what happened was that they didn’t connect it back correctly after the prebuy. And luckily it happened to fail when I had an experienced copilot in VFR conditions.

Additionally, the plane had been running very high at idle which was odd since it ran fine during my demo flight. They couldn’t figure it out so I just said I’d deal with it later. But the issue was that they put the wrong sized bolt to attach the intake tube, set the idle to 900rpm, and they tore off part of the o ring for the #3 intake pipe. All very obvious if you actually checked for the issue. And once fixed the engine ran smooth.

In the end I spent almost $10k to have them deliver the plane in worst condition than where it started. Obviously, there are some things I could have done better and they were busy with other clients. But what actually made me upset was they agreed to the prebuy but couldn’t dedicate sufficient time to it; I wish they were just upfront and told me they couldn’t do it in the first place. I hope this is just a one off event, but either way I will not be returning.