@WhiskeyPapa are you getting interference, or an apparently reduced range, on the radio?
There are some IFR planes (see the SR22 discussion above) which don’t have wicks, but nobody has explained how this works.
Is there any special reason for having a given distance of wire exposed?
Some wicks are much shorter; around 1mm.
Peter wrote:
distance of wire exposed
It has to do with air contact, at best the single wires of the cable should not be braided, but emerge from the shielding like, well, branches of a tree to cover as much air as possible.
Last year I exchanged all wicks on my Comanche because none of them had electrical passage any more. Didn’t have had any problems with my radios, but anyhow, they’re there for a reason. Initially there were two missing (one was torn away by my then 3 y/o son who wanted to stop me moving the plane by hand 
) so I just planned to have these two new from Piper at 70 bucks per piece, but as I measured the others and noted that not a single one (despite the two new ones) had passage, I rebuilt the rest with own parts. There are a lot of wicks on such a plane! And yes, there’s a resistor in every base.
Interesting discussion, my F33A has a rather robust static wick on the port wing, and that’s it. Other Bonanzas I have seen don’t have any static wicks at all? Despite being kitted out with wannabe airline IFR kit (radar altimetre, multiple redundancy to systems)? Perhaps @NCYankee will shed some light on why a lot of Bonanzas don’t have static wicks, or only one static wick?
Robert, the Illustrated Parts Manual shows either 5 or 15 static wicks, depending on the serial number. I installed 12 on my V tail from Dayton Granger. https://daytongranger.com/
Thank you John I had spotted this in the forums. Have had some time in IMC with my lone static wick and haven’t suffered COM issues. The ads on Trade a Plane have a fair few examples that don’t have static wicks, despite being equipped for IFR.
RobertL18C wrote:
Other Bonanzas I have seen don’t have any static wicks at all?
I think it was 15 wicks on the Comanche, 5 left, 5 right, 2 on the stabilator and 3 on the rudder, but maybe “only” 4 on each wing. Now all are installed and “working”. As I said, there’s no difference before/after, however so far no hard IFR, what might make a difference.
Flight in IMC, particularly moisture (water droplets being shed off the aircraft), is where it shows up.
You basically lose VHF comms, although you lose it more with the antenna which is nearer the back of the plane.
This is a related thread. I also had a lot of fun, mentioned here although I can’t find the original thread with photos.
