WOT and 2400RPM, but note FL090, the FG suffers at bimbling altitudes
@RobertL18C wrote:
I fly a 182T quite a lot and see 145KTAS at F090 on 50lph
145 is really good for a 182T ! It should be WOT and full RPM (2400) ?
Along the years, mine went from 142 to 138 TAS, 2200RPM and peak EGT (42lph), as I added new antennas and, more importantly, VGs (FL90).
C182RGs are great airplanes ! I’ve got about 100 hours in one that I used for touring all over the western US. As has been said, you can almost forget about doing w&b (not that you should!). I didn’t have O2 available at the time, so the highest I ever took her up to was briefly to about 13k or so over the Sierra Nevada here, no probs climbing up there. The one I flew had the long-range tanks and I did my longest ever non-stop leg in it – six hours at economy cruise, landed with a bit over an hour reserve in the tanks! Performance-wise there isn’t an awful lot between that 182RG and the C210L I mostly fly now. IMHO these birds are the perfect personal touring airplanes. Would love to own one.
Slightly less truck like handling than the 210, and while RG parts are expensive not as rare as the early steel landing gear of the early 210 (A through G).
I fly a 182T quite a lot and see 145KTAS at F090 on 50lph, so the late model fixed gear 182 are no slouches. An early 182C with the nose wheel clean up kit will do close to 150KTAS.
So, I have now completed my first real trip in this bird (to the northern Med, brilliant by the way…) and basically, my first impressions have been confirmed:
- it‘s a good, honest touring workhorse. Nothing glorious, nothing shiny, nothing elegant. But a great tool. If you have access to 1.60€/l mogas (as in some places in Germany and Austria), it also has an acceptable DOC
-time will tell how many maintenance headaches it will produce. But it being a relatively simple Cessna, the odds are it will be ok (it‘s owned by a friend of mine).
-with this aircraft, one can really almost forget about weight (3 big persons, lots of luggage and full fuel is fine, 4 average persons are possible with almost full fuel) and balance (very hard to get out of the envelope). Likewise, with the exception of VERY soft fields, one can almost forget about runway lengths – it will have no problem.
-not really possible to get any more than 150 knots out of it at 50 lph. Down low, it is a few knots slower. Investing 55-60lph, one might get 152-154 knots out of it, but it hardly seems worth the effort. This is not far from book speeds – max cruise speed is 156 knots according to the POH
-it climbs nicely. Whilst we did not try to get to the ceiling yet (no need) it climbed to 10,500 feet very quickly.
-we did get what seemed like some occasional carb icing on a humid day. So this has to be taken in consideration.
All in all, a great plane, which is hard to fall in love with. ;-)
At FL95:
Over the Austrian Alps
At Figari, in good company
Climbing through FL65, doing 700fpm at 105KIAS…
VFR below the cloud in France. This is where we got some occasional carb ice, we believe:
Approaching Mosbach EDGM for some cheap SP98. At 615 meters of runway length, this is NO problem, whatever the loading or the OAT..
The only problem I have with the 182RG is how high off the hangar floor I have to get the aircraft to do a landing gear retraction test.
I just think the selling point of a C182 appart from speed and load is it does very well on very very rough ground/air, I can’t see how Mooney or Vans will cope with lot of turbulence/crosswind in both the air/ground?
Talking about VFR capability, IFR is a probably a different topic, setting aside avionics and ceiling, I think even C152 does very well in hard-core IMC as most GA aircrafts ;)
Again, mogas. Take the comparison with the ubiquitous Piper Arrow for example. If you have access to proper mogas, then the fuel cost in Germany (52 litres * 1,80€ on average vs. 38 litres * 2,40€ on average) is the same. But the Arrow is 10-15 knots slower, climbs less well, doesn’t perform as well on short fields, etc.
Any comparison with VFR-only light two-seaters would indeed be absurd.
Thanks for the correction, adapted the text.
You don’t have to recur on ragwings to be way cheaper than a 182 while being not that much slower, if ever. There are twoseaters emerging which cruise in the 130 KTAS range, some even faster, on a Rotax 100HP.
This is not to argue about undisputed advantages of a 182 (sturdiness, roominess, load capacity, IFR legal and sensible) but my honest question was about the selling point versus a Beech, a Mooney, a Vans RV, an IFR-certified Elixir with Rotax 915, a RG Ultralight, you name it. Only the need to transport Family and luggage under IFR came to my mind.
Assume 16 USG for the first hour, and 12 USG for the second hour that’s 106 litres, or €265 in fuel, not quite €500. Although using the rule of thumb of 2.5x fuel for all in hourly costs, then the two hour bimble is closer to €700.
65/90HP ragwings tend to win on the bimble economy stakes, even though per seat miles per gallon actually favour the 182.
