TKS for Cessna T210R

One person to ask might be @tks although he seems to have vanished…

Worth a read of the TB20 installation. It is quite a big job.

Frankly I would be surprised if CAV were interested in developing a new STC for a possibly very small fleet size variant. The TB20/21 fleet is not small, and has a significant IFR-usage component, but they have made it known that practically nobody has bought a kit for about 10 years. They probably make enough money supplying Cirrus, and looking at some of their videos on youtube they do kits for some bigger planes like Caravans.

I agree that it is not easy to get it approved as an addition to the existing STC: the flying characteristics of the ‘R’ are different from the rest of the line, which implies all of the expensive icing tests have to be done again. Even if they could be skipped, what would be the interest for selling just one or perhaps two units?

This would be a very complex way to solve a problem, that probably there are much more simple solutions to .

Get another airplane or live without the de-ice, I guess.

Many owners of turbocharged aircraft have commented that in x years of ownership, they have only really used/needed the de-ice a couple of times. Whether these couple of times are worth it (life-saving?) is the big question.

They are probably good weather flyers – like most are, including most IR holders.

You would be amazed how many “high social media profile” IR holders fly only say 30hrs/year. This is easy to do if you have nobody to fly with, nobody to meet up with, no business to fly on, and your family is not willing to climb into the 30-40 year old “rattling box”. And of course don’t come to EuroGA meet-ups So their icing exposure will be very small.

Since my installation 1.5 years ago I have got through c. 150 litres of the fluid and have used it on ~10 flights in very definite icing conditions, and on 2 of them the ice accretion on the unprotected areas was so rapid that without question, if I had not had TKS and flew on in the same situation, the plane would have gone down. And I am a relatively careful pilot…

This is worth a read.

So for me it was very much worth doing. But as you rightly pointed out recently, it is best used sparingly, due to the cost of the fluid and the mess it makes.

what would be a simpler solution if TKS and Boots retrofit is no option?

The traditional answer is to sell the plane and buy one with TKS or boots That’s what most TB20 owners have done; bought an SR22 it seems, because even though the TB STC kit exists, almost nobody has the required good relationship with a sufficiently trusted installer to install it, and most don’t want to deal with the sole European agent (Airplus in Germany) due to the company’s reported arrogance, not to mention pricing.

The installation needs a company or a mechanic who is quite competent. Most of it is trivial but there are some bits where somebody needs to use a brain. I had the benefit of photos of other installations done many years previously and examining them closely showed some right cockups (made good with some sheet metal and rivets ) which the 30+ year old STC drawings invite you to do if you just follow them. I was not surprised to see the cockups, knowing who did those installations The range of companies which can IMHO do work at this level is close to nonexistent. Also, it takes a lot longer than you think when you do it for the first time.

The feeling I get is that most TKS retrofits are done in the US.

EDFM79 wrote:

what would be a simpler solution if TKS and Boots retrofit is no option

Well if you want to go 210 ‘R’ model everything mod-wise is difficult. The obvious solution as Bosco points is to buy one with boots already installed.

If it has to be 210, then an ‘L’, ‘M’ or ‘N’ model will deliver most everything the ‘R’ delivers minus the handling and some performance. All of those have TKS retrofit options and many are available with boots in FIKI or non-FIKI versions. The handling difference can be made much less of an issue if you use the electric pitch trim judiciously or fly with an aft CG (either TKS- or aft fuel- tanks).

If your mission fits lesser aircraft types then there are further options.

Peter wrote:

Since my installation 1.5 years ago I have got through c. 150 litres of the fluid and have used it on ~10 flights in very definite icing conditions, and on 2 of them the ice accretion on the unprotected areas was so rapid that without question, if I had not had TKS and flew on in the same situation, the plane would have gone down. And I am a relatively careful pilot…

This begs two questions:

a) Would it have been the same with a turbocharged aircraft? (ie if you have been able to plan your flight at FL200…Bosco’s option on ‘no-deice’ specifically referred to turbo’ed aircraft)
b) You obviously survived through several hundred hours worth of flying your TB20 before TKS…how did you manage it?

a) In some cases yes, FL200-250 would have got me into VMC, but one of the cases was a hold around 4000ft, April, IMC, -5C, so plenty of ice.

b) By cancelling flights with enroute IMC, unless the temp was expected to be colder than about -15C

Of course a turbo helps and this is implicit in the 210 – if you have chosen a 210. However it is not a complete fix by any means. I recall one well known turbo Cessna owner telling me a story of a flight which read like a near death experience, where he collected some inches of ice. So it will depend on how thick the icing layer is / how long you have to stay within it.