first TBone annual

Today I dropped off the TBone for it's first annual under my watch.  The first annual is always a little nerve wracking... I'm a stickler for aircraft condition so I want everything made right.  Here is my squawk list:

Twin Bonanza - Annual Squawks

• Gear light didn’t come on one time (near max extension speed) - check gear actuator springs
• Oil on top/bottom of left nacelle, misc oil leaks on left engine
• Minor pushrod leaks on right engine
• Leaking fuel sump in wheel well (both sides), replace o-rings
• Seeping fuel drain in right wing - replace quick drain
• Looks like fuel flow is too high on left side with the boost pump on
• CHT gauge inop left engine Cylinder #6
• Check #4, #5 EGT probes right side (seemed flakey on one flight, rising up and down rapidly)
• Check prop alcohol system 
• Check swamp cooler - AC 
• Door hinge pin - seems like it’s out too far
• Oil Change
• Lube entire airframe
• Clean/grease landing gear motor?
• Wing bolt AD  

I ordered the wing bolts and they were not cheap!  

(qty 2). MS20014-29 wing bolts

(qty 4). 50-105011 washers

(qty 2). EB-144 nuts 

All in nearly $900 for those bolts and washers... wtf!  

Here she is in the maintenance hangar.  I hitched a ride home from my buddy Aaron in his perfect D50E.  Good fun.

Back in black

I love how the tbone has those huge nacelles and when you pop the open the engine just looks so badass. So I've been slowly cleaning up my engine compartments. First, I stopped all the drips with the geebee gaskets, but when I replaced them I was thinking it would be cool to have the rocker covers chromed for some engine bling. As I thought about it though, it seemed like it might look even more bad ass to get them powder coated in black metallic. Back in black baby.   

I bought a new set of 6 rocker covers, and got them done so I could do the swap with no downtime, so now I've got an extra set... maybe I'll sell them if someone wants to do the same. Here is the before and after.

Next I'd like to get a high temp coating on those exhausts, and maybe powder coat the intake tubes too, and maybe blue or black for those ignition wires.

TBone takeoff

Oldie but goodie... earlier this year departing full loaded off KSEZ.  Love that airport!

Twin Bonanza can haul a lot

Today I had 6 in the plane, plus an 85 lb dog. With the fuel load we were as close as I've been to max gross. I was surprised she still climbed out at 1000 fpm. Felt a little different landing but otherwise the ole girl didn't bat an eye. These wonderful old planes can really haul a load.

I've also been flying the Cessna 421 golden eagle.  I really really like the 421.  It's a complicated old pressurized piston twin but man does it run smooth.  The plane comes in faster than the T-bone but has a similar operating modus, since both have geared engines.

If I were to get a pressurized twin this plane would be top of the list for piston.  It's very quiet and powerful, feels more like a turbine than a piston.  Love this airplane. 

Small improvements

Other than install the IFD550 and 540, I've done little to the plane other than change the oil a few times.  It takes some time to get to know a plane and figure out what you want to do with it, and so I've gathered a small list of small things to make her better.  First up, SVT and AOA on the Aspen!

AOA still needs the calibration flight and I'm looking forward to doing that and getting it working.  I still need to update the GDL-69A software to get that working with the IFD... but I have no clue how to do it and neither does the avionics shop.  Apparently you're supposed to update it through your GNS-530 and I no longer have one.  I suppose I should have updated before swapping the units, but I didn't know that!  Maybe Avidyne knows..   Another thing to do is wire the JPI-760 to the IFD to use the fuel calculation functions.  Enough of avionics.  On to the engines...

Yuck... cork rocker cover gaskets.  Those won't do...  so I ordered silicon ones from GeeBee.  

The valve covers came off and I used a scotch bright to clean up the metal and remove the stuck bits of cork.  It cleaned off the jug really quick, but cleaning the cover itself was another story.  I had to scrub it for an hour to get it totally clean and cork residue free.

Two down, ten to go!  Took me 2.5 hrs to do two...   makes me wonder if it's worth just dropping some dough on engine bling and going with new chrome plated valve covers.  Hmm..   Also have some plans to clean up the metal exhaust shroud and make that shine.  Otherwise its looking good in there.  

Love working on the T-bone.

La Paz

Had a great little trip down to La Paz Mexico which is just north of Cabo San Lucas on the southern tip of the Baja pennisula.  We went with two families, and it's 1050NM so I decided to leave the T-bone at home and take the Pilatus.  Tough love!  I was slightly trepidatious about going to La Paz because it's on the US State Dept watch list for drug crime/murder...  but we never felt the slightest bit unsafe.  It's all Mexican families having a good time.  It was dry and hot but an easy flight and they were very accommodating.  Just make sure to file your EAPIS and it's definitely a bit easier to go IFR.

  

Float mania

I took a family trip up to Alaska.  We did a cruise so I didn't fly us up there, but man was it cool seeing all the float planes.  I really got a bug to do the float rating now!  The video above was from the deck of the ship.  There are so many cool little GA float planes flying around up there it's ridiculous.

Way to go Idaho

Had a great trip to McCall Idaho to attend a big BBQ pig roast my buddy puts on.  The more I go to Idaho, the more I love it there.   We departed out of Concord VFR and headed GPS direct straight to McCall airport KMYL.  You need to cross the Sierra Nevada mountain range so flying high is a good idea.  Winds were smooth and no major bumps at 11.5 so I leveled out there.  Once you cross the big rocks you're over the Nevada desert and we crossed Black Rock desert and noticed it's actually still flooded from all the rains last winter.  There is about a 50 mile stretch where I lost ATC due to radar coverage.  Total flight was 3 hrs exactly with a minor detour to fly over the lake.  My Twin Bonanza does about 165 kts in cruise so the flight would be about the same time in our 182RG.  

So awesome that in less time than it would take to drive to Tahoe I can load up the airplane and be in Idaho.  Not that Tahoe isn't beautiful too, but Idaho is pristine, cheap and reminds me of Tahoe 30 years ago.  Magical!

The flight back brought some big headwinds and continuous moderate turbulence at 12,500 ft.  The return flight added about 30 minutes to the flight time, but 3:30 still isn't bad and we still made it home in time for lunch and faster than we would have on the airlines.

Mr Avionics Shop

Yowza, these IFDs are RAD. I did the install myself, no issues. The guide that comes with it walks you through it step by step. I think I could do it now in < 10m. I went out for a little test flight this morning and I was amazed, everything *mostly* just worked right out of the box. Even the AHRS is perfectly aligned. How did they do that? 

As for the *mostly*. It's not reading my GDL-69A. Apparently I need to update it to the latest firmware 4.1..  need to be an avionics shop to do that part. Also I couldn't get the boxes to go into track up... they seem stuck in North up. I went to the user settings in the aux page and set it track up but still showing north up. RTFM!  You need to press in on the right knob and change the map orientation.  Duh.

I've got some learning to do to master these suckers but overall it's an awesome addition to the panel at a great price considering my G530w trade-ins and the free ADSB deal.  15k for a 1090ES transponder, 978 UAT ADSB-In, an IFD 550 with built in AHRS and synthetic vision as well as a backup IFD 540.  That's a lot of avionics for the scratch!  Of course I had two 530w's to trade in which are probably worth 8k each.  But the big deal for me was no downtime!  Of course, I need to have a shop install the ADSB stuff and upgrade my GDL69A firmware, but I'm guessing that's a 1 or 2 day project at most.

Garmin guy goes Avidyne

My partners wanted out of the Citabria and so we sold it.  Consequently I had a wad of cash burning a hole in my pocket.  Rather than doing something responsible with it, like put it in the kids college fund, I figured I'd waste it on the airplane and buy some stuff for the T-bone.  Why not!!  I've always, always been a Garmin guy... I'm even a freakin shareholder.  I love Garmin stuff.  But...

The new Avidyne units look really cool.  The IFD 550 has a built in AHRS which would make a nice backup for my Aspen.  I thought about just adding a flight stream 210 to my Garmin 530's, but that would be $1500 at least and an install job.  Besides, the G530's just look ancient at this point.  It's like viewing a CGA display.  For a few grand more I could have a brand new Avidyne unit as an upgrade, with modern technology, hi resolution touchscreen, and a factory warranty.  Truth be told if Garmin had come out with a new G500/600 I'd probably have bought it and ripped apart my panel and done a big new Garmin install with dual 750's etc.  But alas... they left me hanging with their last uninspiring announcement of new audio panels and a bunch of cool stuff for the experimental guys.  I really don't want to spend big bucks for a G600 that already looks ancient by experimental standards.  I might as well look at other options...

The other big factor that weighed into this decision was the fact that the IFD's come with a self install kit, and literally slide into an existing 530w tray.  Since I have dual 530's in my Twin Bonanza, this is about as easy an upgrade as you can imagine.  The thought of ripping out my beautifully laid out panel just bothers me... the IFD units are a slide in upgrade.  Hard to beat that, especially since I'm completely enamored with flying this plane and the thought of weeks of downtime for a GTN install just seems untenable... not to mention thousands more dollars.  So I ordered a new IFD550 and an IFD540 on a trade-in deal from AvionicsSource (Thanks Chase!!).  Add in an ADSB deal where Avidyne throws in a free 1090 ADSB transponder and UAT receiver and it was just too good a deal to pass up.  I'm looking forward to doing the self install and seeing how these suckers work in the real world.  I must admit, part of me just wants to learn something new and these things just look like a fun project to master.

First family trip in the tbone

Well, the 2nd really. The first one was just a 35 minute jaunt so I'm not counting that one. This was a 2 hour flight each way down to Malibu where I got a crazy good weekend deal on an Airbnb on the hill overlooking the ocean.  The family of 4 plus Grandma with room to spare. I could do this mission in my former 55 Baron, but this was definitely a more comfortable trip with the load. When my boy asked for his iPad it was nice to simply say, "go get it from the back, and get me a beer while you're there". Just kidding about the beer part! Loving the twinbo. I'm finding flying her strangely addictive, nothing like it!

So long Citabria

The Champ was getting a little neglected... not maintenance wise, we took great care of her.  In fact she just got a brand new prop.  I was quite surprised to see her gain an additional 15 mph from it too!  It was revealed at the annual that the old prop was a seaplane prop and was actually 1/4 inch too long for the size tires we had.  We either had to get the bigger tundra tires or swap the prop, so we got a brand new Hartzell which seemed to boost the speed.  That plus an extensive annual and we even got a brand new rudder from American Champion.  The plane was dialed in...   the neglect was my partners neglecting to fly it.

One partner who also flies a TBM 850 added up his share of the bill for the year, and divided it by the 1.5 hours he flew the plane and decided it cost more to run the Champ than his TBM.  Long story short, my partners wanted out.  In truth I've gotten quite busy myself with real life, especially work, and so the days of hopping on out to the airport for a turn around the patch and a lunch run have greatly diminished.  In short, it was time to sell.  On the bright side, we got a great price for her and didn't lose any money (other than routine maintenance and hangar, gas etc).  She was a great plane in near perfect condition and I'll miss having a tail dragger to fly now and then!

The Bone is home

It was a long wait but I finally picked up my new plane.  The Twin Bonanza is home at last!

Beauty.  It's hard to put into perspective how big the thing is when you look at a photo, it fills up the entire 50 ft wide hangar.  That nose strut is the same as on a King Air.  It's a tight fit so I'm going to need to be more careful when putting her away.

The ride is sweet.  I'm 6'4" and I can stretch my legs out straight in the pilot seat with no bending whenever I want to.   There is 2 feet of width between me and the copilot passenger.  Passengers can get up and change seats.  I can stand under the outer wing, and it's a LOW wing!  The geared props turn on about a 2/3 reduction so they turn slow and therefore it's fairly quiet for a big rumbling twin.  The engines are smooth as butter and the sound coming from the augmenter tubes give it a deep throaty roar.  I'm still getting used to the avionics and autopilot but slowly getting the groove of the knob twisting on the 530's again.  It will be a few more flights at least before I take her into IFR.

The fuel system is also a bit more complicated than my stone simple Baron.  Now I've got mains and aux tanks to deal with but it's pretty simple once you know how it works.  If you don't understand how it works it's pretty easy to screw it up too.  The D50E is well designed and the return lines return the fuel to whatever tank is selected, which simplifies things somewhat.  Speaking of fuel I'm pleasantly surprised at the burns and the speeds.  I'm about 15-20 kts slower than the Baron on only a few more GPH.  In cruise we were truing out at 160 kts and burning 26 gph after some extra leaning. The pressure carbs do a pretty good job on their own so you don't really need to touch the mixtures, but I found I only lost a few kts to save about 6 gallons an hour.

The plane was in Griffin Georgia and so it was about 16 hrs of flying getting her home.  On the way home the line guy at Santa Monica thought it was a turboprop so I'm going to need to be careful when fueling.  I've resolved to only fill it myself or at least be there whenever it's fueled.

Honda Jet

I got my first 1.0 hrs of dual in the Honda Jet!  Wow, what an airplane.  It's super high tech and totally automated.  I also spent an hour on the ground getting up to speed on the G3000 system which came pretty naturally because, well it's just Garmin.  Think of a G1000 mated up to a GTN 750.  Totally intuitive if you've got Garmin time.

Our flight was only an hour, Reno and back.  The really thrilling thing was the acceleration off the block.  Engines come up with feet on the brakes, the throttles go to the TO position which is full throttle, brakes come off and you launch forward with roller coaster like acceleration.  You're pressed to the back of your seat and before you know it you're through V1 about 109 kts and climbing at 4,000 fpm.  It's also by far, the quietest airplane I've ever been in.  You can barely hear the engines when you power them on.  Headsets are not even close to being necessary for passengers.  At cruise it's just as quiet as can be.

I thought it rode the bumps fairly well.  We had weather up to 13k ft and bouncing along for maybe 2 or 3 minutes before we were on top in smooth air humming along at 380 kts at 24,000 ft.  Up high it goes faster and burns even less fuel, but this was such a short hop we didn't bother to go any higher.  Amazingly, we burned within 20 pounds of what the C90 used to burn for the same trip.  Good fun. The plan is to get 75 to 100 hrs in the thing before going for the type rating and combining that with my ATP ride.

Columbia 400

Today I got my first time and a few landings in the Columbia 400.  To say I really loved this airplane would be an understatement.  The pushrod controls are smooth as heck and the thing smooth and fast like a rocket.   It had been awhile since I've flown the G1000 but it came back quickly.  Awesome airplane with great avionics and autopilot but still fun as heck to fly.  Why are these not as popular as the Cirrus?  With the twin turbo we were getting 170 kts over the ground at 15 gph.  Really cool airplane.  

Mega hangar operational

The hangar is now cleaned up and I'm fully moved in.  All the disgusting crap that was left in there...

is gone, those nasty carpets were the worst.  Underneath was an oil soaked and extremely poor quality asphalt job.  I decided I needed some professional help to fix this and I'm sure glad I did.  It turned out to be an F-ton of work.

First, a trip to dump to get rid of all the old crap, and a power wash.  Wow, looks better already.  Some fill repair on the worst areas of the asphalt leveled the surface and removed the pot holes.  I decided to go with a brand new floor but rather than digging out all the asphalt and replacing with a concrete slab, I went with a less expensive hybrid solution.  The new floor is made from a fiberglass mesh that is laid on top of the asphalt.  The mesh holds a synthetic refinishing product that is basically like a thin layer of concrete.  It's rated to hold 10 tons per sq ft so it should last.

Here is the thinnest concrete layer laid onto the fiberglass mesh.  You can see it's only maybe 1/4 inch thick so no big lip to push the plane up over.

And the final product.  I got to pick the color and I was really unsure.  I wanted something light to brighten the place up, but I didn't want something too white which would show the dirt too easily.  In the end I chose "Mountain" which came out a little more brown than I thought but it looks pretty nice.

A full day of moving crap from my other hangar and finally I'm moved in and I have a suitable home for my new airplane.  Speaking of...  still not ready.  Grrr.  I'm beyond making predictions at this point and resigned myself at this point to call the shop every single day asking for updates.  It's gotten beyond ridiculous.