My IO540 had a prop strike 1hr after aircraft delivery. Shall we start a thread entitled “The earliest prop strike competition” 
It wouldn’t be fair because I would win and I am a mod here…
@Mooney_Driver Sorry to read that! I hope, although it might be difficult nowadays to get the repair done, that your bird will be in the air soon.
Airborne_Again wrote:
I believe it is common that in many (most?) engines some things have to be replaced at a chock load inspection, no matter what.
That is correct. The time frame of an engine overhaul depends in large parts on the availability of parts or lack thereof. Right now it’s nigh impossible to get a factory new (!!) engine with less than a 3-4 months wait time, let alone parts. Nothing to do with the shop. @Mooney’s guesstimate of around 6 months sounds pretty much spot on to me. Incidentally a Swiss friend of mine who owns a Mooney recently had a planned o/h and it took 4 or 5 months to get it all done.
The parts which are mandatory-replacement are not numerous, and a good engine shop will have lots of them lying around.
The rest is labour.
Unless they find the camshaft is shagged… The most likely discovery is spalled cam followers, but every engine shop knows that.
The main issue in Europe is that most people don’t want to investigate the US shop option and are scared of the shipping which in reality is no big deal.
I was very happy with the shop that did my overhaul (Cermec near Lausanne) also because I could drive the engine there and pick it back up. They were very forthcoming and the end result was great. At the time, we investigated pricing in the US. Shipping alone was 2000$ both ways or so. The offer at the time for the complete overhaul with parts was CHF 23k. This was held, with the exception of a 2nd hand crankcase which they organized for about 3k CHF when a tear was found in the original one.
So they are the ones who will do the check. In times like ours, it is quite important to have the people you know and nearby.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
What we will have to find out is what prop to put on, now that options are open. Personally I’d like to get something which gets the plane to a better noise class,
I guess, the insurance will try to have a say in this decision as well.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
It also has the advantage, or so I am told, that in a similar occurrence it breaks off more easily which in some cases made a sudden stoppage inspection unnecessary.
Unfortunately that sounds more like an urban myth than like reality: I have not seen a single engine maintenance manual (neither a STC for a prop) stating that: A prop strike inspection is not required after a prop strike if the following prop is installed and less than xx cm of the blade tip is broken off.
I doubt that anyone ever will finance the testing required to try to get such a STC certified…
btw.:I’m sorry that this happened but happy that the pilot has not been harmed.
Sorry to hear this MD, and the main thing is no-one was hurt. Best of luck with the repairs.
@Mooney_Driver thanks for sharing your experience, and sad to hear about that your Mooney is grounded. However, as long as only minor amount of money and some time is involved and even something good may be obtained out of it, it doesn’t sound too bad in the end.
I was really amazed about the possibility in the Mooney that the gear may be down but not locked properly. I never heard that before, that it’s an issue where more than one incident is involved. Gear issues belong to the things you never want to have, because it’s mostly a hassle only, but grist to the mill of the decades-old discussion of fixed-gear vs. retractables 
Malibuflyer wrote:
I guess, the insurance will try to have a say in this decision as well.
Sure. They will say how much they will pay for a new prop or repair or whatever. I suppose I will be allowed to top off for a better prop if i so choose.
Malibuflyer wrote:
Unfortunately that sounds more like an urban myth than like reality
Looks like this is indeed that. Lycoming has an AD which mandates an inspection in any case a prop is damaged, even if it is not running.
UdoR wrote:
I was really amazed about the possibility in the Mooney that the gear may be down but not locked properly. I never heard that before, that it’s an issue where more than one incident is involved.
This is only valid for the manual gear Mooneys and also there it is comparatively rare. We looked at it in depth this morning and if the procedures we teach are applied properly, chances for it to happen are slim. In the whole fleet there are mabye 1 – 2 a year or so.
The problem is in the locking mechanism itself, which needs to be adjusted so that green light and the snap of the locking pin coincide. In some instances, through wear and other stuff, the trigger switch for the green light can deform or it’s position deteriorate over time, so that you get a green light before the locking pin “clicks” into place. The green light is triggered by the handle vertical position, not by the lockout pin itself, but should only trigger in the position, where the lockout pin snaps in. So a slightly out of adjustment switch may give a green light slightly before the lockout pin engages. However, in that position, the handle actually “wants” to engage, so that it gets stuck in this position is exceedingly rare.
Moreover, the actual locking of the pin is quite loud and you will feel it on the handle itself. You can verify it visually and manually. If the pin is not properly engaged, there is a discernable distance between the receptable and the lever, which you check with a finger. The pin itself has a round end which also must have a visually controllable distance to the receptable in a locked position. And finally, what you do in the final check is grab the handle, push it forward without pressing the locking pin release and try to move the handle up and down. if it was not locked up to then, either the lever will come out and you re-insert it or it locks by the up action.
It sounds much more complicated than it is. Anyone who has ever had a close shave with this will be slightly paranoid checking it but that helps in this case. And whoever operates a Johnson Bar Mooney gets drilled on this during the difference training.
The advantage of the Johnson bar is however that it is quite economical on maintenance, it does not depend on either electrics nor hydraulics and will therefore always work. As far as I know there are no known incidents where a manual Mooney gear has failed to come out of uplock or could not reach its locked position due to physical or technical failure. For a 60 year old design, that is not bad at all I’d say.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
As far as I know there are no known incidents where a manual Mooney gear has failed to come out of uplock or could not reach its locked position due to physical or technical failure
This is what I really like about my Comanche, too. The emergency gear drop handle uses a long bar where you see and feel mechanically that the gear is really down. Makes me confident that in case the electrical system should fail any day it’ll be easy to drop it. Additionally, I do note the wobble whenever the gear reaches the extracted position, so that I’d also be concerned if this would not occur (let aside the green light). Another 60 year old design
I’m still puzzling on how I would react in a gear up incident. Interesting that there still was enough power for the go around. As I’m still bringing to perfection my greaser style landings I might have those seconds to react if anything’s wrong with the gear. However, so far didn’t give it a thought.
