You might remember a couple of weeks ago I posted about my RPM indicator being broken.
Yesterday I went to pick the Mooney up from Hangelar (EDKB). I flew with flybe in a dash 8 from Birmingham to Koln. I knew that the weather issue would be trough /weak occluded front overlying the channel and extending round into the North Sea. The handy thing was that I ran skydemon on my phone on the way out from Birmingham and I was interested that there was quite a lot of cloud from perhaps 5000 feet to 15,000 feet but mostly layered stuff that it might be possible to find a way between. The commercial flight flew level at 22,000 feet and was above cloud at all times.
I was on the ground in Germany for little more than hour, before setting off on the return journey from EDKB back to Teeside (EGNV) up in the north-east of England on a joining IFR plan.
Because the temperatures on the ground were only just above freezing, I had to think very carefully about the strategy (with limits and exits) for crossing this trough over northern Belgium, the channel and the southern part of the UK. Essentially, because I couldn’t be confident in descending to a level at which the ice would melt, I could afford to collect no ice at all, either by restricting myself to flying outside cloud or being reasonably confident that I would pick up no ice within any cloud (probably on the grounds of it being too cold.)
The the first and last 60 or 70 miles where all in VMC with essentially CAVOK conditions. It was the bit in the middle which I knew would be the issue. In the end it turned out to be quite straightforward- I could see the trough / weak occluded front from a long way away and as I got closer to it, became reasonably confident that I could simply overfly the whole lot and to do so I ended up at FL210.
I took a few bits of video just for fun, mainly because I’ve never been so high in my elderly Mooney and I’ve posted them here for anyone interested. Be warned that from the photographic point of view its a bit rough and ready.
My observations at FL210 were these,
1. It was very cold in the cockpit even though the usually very effective heater was at full blast. It was the cold coming forwards from the rear of the Aircraft which was so chilly. Because the aircraft had been on the ground for a couple of weeks outside, it was a bit moist / stuffy with condensation on the inside of the windows when I departed and of course at high altitude this froze giving quite a striking appearance to the rear windows!
2.Even at FL210 I was still able to climb at perhaps 300 ft./min and could probably have made another thousand feet or two -although it was no need to, to overfly the weather. Obviously being fairly lightly loaded helped a lot. The price that I paid was an evil headwind of 40 to 50 kn giving me rather measly ground speed.
3.The OAT Reading that you see on the transponder in the video at -31deg probably represents an actual OAT of about -36 because that particular OAT probe over reads by 5° (the wrong thing for such a probe to do I know). Anyway, I was concerned about fuel icing (which Ive read of) and was particularly concerned at tank changeover and ran the boost pump at tank change time in case this would help but I didn’t encounter any problems and in fact I’m not even sure how cold it needs to be before one starts to worry about this kind of thing. I gather its fairly aircraft specific.
4.As always, Sebastians ADL120 was fantastic. With about 50 miles to go to the front I was planning (if I did have to fly through some cloud) to try where there was a sizeable gap between the cells (some green but no yellow or red) but as you can see from the video, as I got closer to the front, that gap filled in. You can see the aircraft symbol on the iPad just to the south of the middle of the front. By this time however I was confident that I could overfly the entire thing so I didn’t have to probe into any of the nastiness.
5 I planned to descend to perhaps FL150 once past the front to improve my ground speed, and also because undoubtably the aircraft is not comfortable at that altitude (insomuch as it is getting a bit lacking in puff) but in the end on the ADL120 I could see another series of ugly looking the cells in the vicinity of Humberside so I just waited until I had overflown these two before I began the long descent into Teeside.
6. getting level changes from the IFR controllers in response to weather, was no problem at all.
So the combination of oxygen and in-flight weather with the ADL120 and some careful planning about how to respond to each eventuality and with a serious dose of caution, this was my highest flight yet in my elderly Mooney.
Pretty cool flight. Was it a Turbo Mooney? How do you use the ADL 120? Is it constant streaming weather info? How did you use it and what were the costs?
Always nice to see what’s possible when you have the right equipment! What was your TAS up there?
Justin, It looks like your flying a Turbo Mooney E,F with a Rajay Turbo? Indeed interesting to now what your TAS was
Justin nice to hear you like the ADL120 :-)
Indeed interesting to now what your TAS was
Just looking at the video I think the plane is naturally apirated. I see about 13 inches of manifold pressure. This is pretty much the same our old Beech F33A would do in FL200.
Then I see about 100kts indicated which at -36C OAT is about 137kt TAS which is also about the same the Beech did at FL200.
As Justin writes the problem when flying this high with piston planes is often wind. Our piston PA46 will do 200kt TAS in FL200 and we like to go this high to get over the weather. But at those altitudes you often have strong winds. Our worst wind so far was a 100kt headwind. It will slow you down a lot more than a 400kt TAS plane. That said we tried different levels and being a little slower on top in the sun is a lot nicer than being a little faster down low in the bad weather…
And our windows also ice up. Even with aux heating the single pistons just do not produce enough heat for the cabin at -40°C. In the Malibu forum they have tips on which warm shoes to buy…
My windows ice up too and I have plenty of hot bleed air. Short of blowing air on it (which works), the cabin temp would have to be so hot it would be unbearable to stop it when OATs are -30-50.
I was also flying last weekend. It was -31°C at FL180. Our canopy was also icing up on the inside.
The heater in the DA40 isn’t great and with these temperatures it gets really cold in the cabin.
Flying in full sunshine helps a lot in getting some warmth in the cabin…
Here’s a picture of me taking a photo through the storm window.
This was the view I was capturing with my phone:
This is the Brussels area. ATC announced Low Vis procedures in place…
very nice pics Lenthamen!
Yes, Sebastian got it right -its a normally aspirated (injected) IO360 in a stock 1967 M20F.
The ADL120 – you can have it stream constantly (rarely necessary) so I just take single downloads as and when needed. Best use is when quite a way out from the weather so you can do some long distance strategic heading changes to avoid the weather (15deg right or left to avoid when still 50-100NM away kind of thing) rather than any close in avoidance. Cost per download isn’t much – I can’t remember – it depends on the download size – but is <1euro I think. Monthly fees of approx 30 euro and annual DWD subscription of approx 80E. Unit is approx 2000E. These are a rough estimate – Ask Seb or see the ADL website for more info. As a single owner operator (rather than a group) the costs are ermm, ‘enough’ shall we say (though cheaper than the alternatives!) – but removing some of the uncertainty in flight is very valuable.
I did worry a bit about tiny amounts of residual water freezing in control surface hinges and fuel icing -but no issues encountered.
One mistake was that, though luckily I had a fleece on, while on the ground I casually threw my warm coat into the rear (Baggage bay) as I never lacked heat before – a decision I later regretted!
sorry to be a bit vague about the ADL cost – Saturdays flight download cost was 10euro+VAT for 11 (biggish) downloads. Cheap in the scheme of things. Unless there is a lot of weather about, i don’t usually need more than half a dozen downloads in a 3 hour flight.
don’t know why the system put a line thought the text in the last post. [ fixed; you were using a dash ( – ) without a space before+after it, which triggers the strike-through mode in the EuroGA text processor – Peter ]
Justin Thanks for the cost info. Knowing the total cost is important since I am sole wallet for my plane. The fees are a bit confusing so it helps from somebody who has practical experience.
