How much does it cost to fix a gear-up?

[AndreiC]

I know things always cost more than you calculate they would. But if I were to buy a plane (J-model) that has had a light gear up (no damage to wings/flaps/ailerons at all, belly scraped but the brackets that hold the belly panels undamaged, prop is done for, engine needs a teardown inspection, need new nose gear doors -- how much would you expect to need to pay for this?

My calculation would be something along the lines of:

-- $8k for a used two blade prop

-- $20k for an IRAN inspection, including the cost to remove and reinstall the engine

-- $3k for nose gear doors

-- $5k for fiberglass repair to the one-piece belly

Is this far off the mark? What are your thoughts/experiences with such repairs?

(I already have an E, so I would not be plane-less while these repairs would be done. The idea would be to sell the E after the J is fixed up.)

[201er]

24 minutes ago, AndreiC said:

-- $20k for an IRAN inspection, including the cost to remove and reinstall the engine

What about when the IRAN opens up a hornets nest and you need to replace this and you might as well replace that while you’re in there. And before long you might as well go all the way and call it an overhaul?

[AndreiC]

32 minutes ago, 201er said:

What about when the IRAN opens up a hornets nest and you need to replace this and you might as well replace that while you’re in there. And before long you might as well go all the way and call it an overhaul?

That was precisely my question. How often is this the case? From talking to a reputed engine shop, they said the crankshaft is condemned only relatively rarely.

[kortopates]

Depends on age and hours on the engine. A young low time engine certainly makes sense to IRAN but not an old high time engine.
Most commonly the insurance pays for the IRAN then the owner just pays to replace the parts to make it a OH if it’s not low time.
Then there will hoses, exhaust and accessories to consider along with cleaning up the engine mount.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[MikeOH]

Heretical question for you:  What is your motivation for doing this?  Is the idea just to get the slightly better performance of the J, or do you need really need the 10 extra inches for carrying 3 or 4 people on a regular basis?  Especially, if your E has the 201 windshield mod.

If you think you can make this work out so that you 'trade up' to a J at no net cost I think you are kidding yourself.  The work, time, hassle, and RISK just doesn't seem worth it to me.  But, good luck; I'm rooting for you

[Justin Schmidt]

My total was ~75k. About 22k for teardown, was an issue with the crankshaft. (Was OH 140 hrs, 8 months prior). 15k for new 3 blade. 30k for airframe, there were some damaged formers and riveted brackets, nose gear doors, retraction tube because the idiot didn't understand how to rig it(can go on and on about that fool, he lurks around here thinking he's a mooney expert), tailpipe, firewall at the hanger, he did miss the 2 cracks in exhaust. 6.7k used actuator (now this was a story).

After 15hrs found crack in case, which to DIVCOs credit took responsibility for missing it so they are taking care of R&R etc.

Now an additional 25k because while it sits decided to upgrade a lot of the panel and do some interior housekeeping haha

[AndreiC]

3 minutes ago, Justin Schmidt said:

My total was ~75k.

Wow. That is exactly what I was hoping to hear, to explain why I should not do it. Thanks!

[AndreiC]

58 minutes ago, MikeOH said:

Heretical question for you:  What is your motivation for doing this?  Is the idea just to get the slightly better performance of the J, or do you need really need the 10 extra inches for carrying 3 or 4 people on a regular basis?  Especially, if your E has the 201 windshield mod.

If you think you can make this work out so that you 'trade up' to a J at no net cost I think you are kidding yourself.  The work, time, hassle, and RISK just doesn't seem worth it to me.  But, good luck; I'm rooting for you

I don't need to carry 3-4 people almost ever. But yes, the thought of trading up to a J with just hassle and relatively little extra money was the main idea. 

My E does not have the 201 windshield, and I would like to have faster and smoother ops from a cleaner airframe and better propeller. Having been in a couple of J's and K's I cannot avoid feeling comparison envy... But I also agree that this is not rational, I have a perfectly fine plane which so far has been ready to go every single time I wanted to go and has given me no surprises. So in some sense the main reason for asking my question was to have guys like you talk sense into me!! Thanks for doing exactly that.

I think to some extent a conversation I had with Jimmy G. when I was picking my plane up has to do with this. He had sold my plane to its previous owner 3-4 years prior to my purchase. I asked Jimmy why that guy had not stuck with it. He said "well, after seeing what a Mooney is like, most people eventually move into a more grown up version". So I feel a bit like I have still the starter version...

[Justin Schmidt]

7 minutes ago, AndreiC said:

feeling comparison envy

 

8 minutes ago, AndreiC said:

feel a bit like I have still the starter version...

Well just think of those with Cessna 150s lol

[Hank]

16 minutes ago, AndreiC said:

So I feel a bit like I have still the starter version...

If your E is the "starter version," then what is my C? Besides, of course, the ultimate Retirement Ride . . .  

[Schllc]

1 hour ago, bluehighwayflyer said:

Man. That 75K repair bill is eye watering!

And that’s if it all goes well….

the incidentals, travel, while you’re there, and “I would recommend”, you’d be lucky to get out for 75!  

[MikeOH]

Another way to look at this "opportunity" is that if it was a 'golden one' why isn't a professional like Wentworth doing it and pocketing all that profit vs. finding a suck.., er,  I mean "investor"?

[Mooney in Oz]

3 hours ago, AndreiC said:

Wow. That is exactly what I was hoping to hear, to explain why I should not do it. Thanks!

There would also be the issue of parts availability.

[McMooney]

shrug, i'd change the numbers to include new prop and a complete engine overhaul, i'd guess that would approach 100k. 

if purchase price + that is < cost of equivalent working bird, go for it

 

 

[AndreiC]

2 hours ago, MikeOH said:

Another way to look at this "opportunity" is that if it was a 'golden one' why isn't a professional like Wentworth doing it and pocketing all that profit vs. finding a suck.., er,  I mean "investor"?

This is not quite an explanation. Wentworth's business model is buying many airplanes at auction and either selling them without doing anything and making a quick buck on the turnaround, or dismantling them and selling them for parts. They don't sell any ready to go airplanes. They probably bought this plane for $25-30k at an insurance auction, sight unseen, and hope to make a quick $10k for the risk they took. This is their business model. This does not mean that buying the plane from them and fixing it up you would not end up ahead of buying a working airplane. You would also be taking a calculated risk (that the engine is still in relatively good order, that there is no hidden damage, etc.) and if things work out well getting some return on your investment for taking that risk. Of course you would also risk ending up spending more than the plane is worth, and that is what risk is about. I was just trying to gauge the risk.

I am not so concerned about the engine and the prop side of the expense. More concerning for me would be how hard it is to fix the belly (something I know nothing about), how worrisome is the fact that the plane flew relatively little (730 hours in 20 years) since overhaul, and that it has the evil Dukes gear actuator.

[LANCECASPER]

1 hour ago, AndreiC said:

This is not quite an explanation. Wentworth's business model is buying many airplanes at auction and either selling them without doing anything and making a quick buck on the turnaround, or dismantling them and selling them for parts. They don't sell any ready to go airplanes. They probably bought this plane for $25-30k at an insurance auction, sight unseen, and hope to make a quick $10k for the risk they took. This is their business model. This does not mean that buying the plane from them and fixing it up you would not end up ahead of buying a working airplane. You would also be taking a calculated risk (that the engine is still in relatively good order, that there is no hidden damage, etc.) and if things work out well getting some return on your investment for taking that risk. Of course you would also risk ending up spending more than the plane is worth, and that is what risk is about. I was just trying to gauge the risk.

I am not so concerned about the engine and the prop side of the expense. More concerning for me would be how hard it is to fix the belly (something I know nothing about), how worrisome is the fact that the plane flew relatively little (730 hours in 20 years) since overhaul, and that it has the evil Dukes gear actuator.

A one-piece fiberglass belly on a 1977 tells you two things: 1) that part will be relatively easy to repair, 2) this is not the first gear up in this airplane, whether it's logged or not.

Wentworth does not have a reputation of leaving any money on the table. And yes, they have sold salvage, rebuildable and over the years some rebuilt, airworthy airplanes. They have more salvage experience than everyone on Mooneyspace combined and twice the years in business that BAS has. You can be sure that they completely evaluated the airplane before pricing it to buy, and pricing it to sell. After closely looking over the airframe and engine they already have calculated what it would take to get it back in the air with their in-house labor and parts availability. With all of that information and experience they have made the decision to sell it as-is. For an individual who doesn't have in-house labor, parts access and experience it will likely be an expensive lesson in airplane economics. They bought it right and probably paid $20,000 for it and already know that they could get $30,000 out of it by selling it wholesale to another dismantler. They are trying to "retail" it for $42,950. They probably have the reserve set at $40,000.

Airplanes are getting totaled every week because retail parts availability and prices, and retail shop labor prices, make it too expensive for insurance companies to pay to rebuild airplanes on the agreed-upon insured value. Where this could possibly make sense is if an A&P/IA called them up, bought it for $30,000 or so and invested his sweat labor and scrounged around for used parts to get it back in the air.

[MikeOH]

@AndreiC

See @LANCECASPER's post above

[AndreiC]

@LANCECASPER interesting point of view, and I surely trust that what you say is true in 95% of the cases. But I may be one of the few lucky ones that got a good deal from Wentworth. I bought my previous airplane from them back in November 2012, a Cherokee 180. 

It had an interesting story, at least according to Wentworth. It was owned by a guy in a remote part of Texas who for a while kept it in very good shape and flew it a lot, and then lost interest. For about 6-7 years the plane sat, with only pencil-whipped annual inspections and virtually no flying.

Somehow it was overinsured. A hail storm passed over the field, and the owner made a claim to the insurance company which bought the plane off him in full. All this happened sight unseen. Wentworth bought the plane from the insurance company also sight unseen, but when they went to look it over it had no signs of any hail damage. Only exactly one dent in the upper surface of one wing (not an airworthiness issue), which could easily have been a tool falling on it. They felt bad about dismantling it, and instead sold it through ebay; I actually missed out on the auction, but told them that if the deal falls through I am interested, and they contacted me afterwards and we closed on the purchase.

It was an excellent deal. The plane served me very well for over 10 years and 700 hours with literally zero surprises. All for about half of what a Cherokee 180 in good shape would have cost at the time. When I sold it in 2023 in order to buy my current E I got for it an embarrassing  multiplier of what I had paid for it. (But the prices were crazy back then because of the pandemic.)

[icurnmedic]

If your E is in good condition, and where you want it mechanically, no way I would change. I too, had the idea to “upgrade “ a few years back. While it was a significant improvement in performance, I realize now, that what I had, a F model, fit my 95% mission requirements just fine.
Also the old saying comes to mind, The Devil that you know.

[Hank]

"How much does it cost to . . . " with an airplane has just one answer:  How much do you got?

[47U]

44 minutes ago, Hank said:

"How much does it cost to . . . " with an airplane has just one answer:  How much do you got?

She’s made me a deal that I cannot refuse.

[PA24Lvr]

On 5/2/2026 at 11:13 AM, AndreiC said:

I know things always cost more than you calculate they would. But if I were to buy a plane (J-model) that has had a light gear up (no damage to wings/flaps/ailerons at all, belly scraped but the brackets that hold the belly panels undamaged, prop is done for, engine needs a teardown inspection, need new nose gear doors -- how much would you expect to need to pay for this?

My calculation would be something along the lines of:

-- $8k for a used two blade prop

-- $20k for an IRAN inspection, including the cost to remove and reinstall the engine

-- $3k for nose gear doors

-- $5k for fiberglass repair to the one-piece belly

Is this far off the mark? What are your thoughts/experiences with such repairs?

(I already have an E, so I would not be plane-less while these repairs would be done. The idea would be to sell the E after the J is fixed up.)

Your guesstimate seems to be missing labour, unless you’re doing the work yourself?

Clarence

[PA24Lvr]

On 5/2/2026 at 6:53 PM, AndreiC said:

This is not quite an explanation. Wentworth's business model is buying many airplanes at auction and either selling them without doing anything and making a quick buck on the turnaround, or dismantling them and selling them for parts. They don't sell any ready to go airplanes. They probably bought this plane for $25-30k at an insurance auction, sight unseen, and hope to make a quick $10k for the risk they took. This is their business model. This does not mean that buying the plane from them and fixing it up you would not end up ahead of buying a working airplane. You would also be taking a calculated risk (that the engine is still in relatively good order, that there is no hidden damage, etc.) and if things work out well getting some return on your investment for taking that risk. Of course you would also risk ending up spending more than the plane is worth, and that is what risk is about. I was just trying to gauge the risk.

I am not so concerned about the engine and the prop side of the expense. More concerning for me would be how hard it is to fix the belly (something I know nothing about), how worrisome is the fact that the plane flew relatively little (730 hours in 20 years) since overhaul, and that it has the evil Dukes gear actuator.

Mooney airframes actually survive gear up landings fairly well.  There is a steel structure behind the gear doors that get damaged and will need welding to repair or replace. Most of the sheet metal parts can be reproduced if a smooth belly kit isn’t available.

Clarence

[Hank]

3 hours ago, PA24Lvr said:

Mooney airframes actually survive gear up landings fairly well.  There is a steel structure behind the gear doors that get damaged and will need welding to repair or replace. Most of the sheet metal parts can be reproduced if a smooth belly kit isn’t available.

Clarence

My C survived a gear up by the previous owner ~ 2003. Got a nice 3-blade Hartzell and one-piece belly upgrade out of it, and an engine overhaul.

[Parker_Woodruff]

In the claims I've seen the past few years, the numbers seem to come in around $62,000 to $75,000 for a 4-cylinder Mooney gear up landing.  Keep in mind there can be other costs within or maybe even in addition to these, such as pilot services, logistics, etc.