New Plane Search - Seneca

Henning said:
You can get to 21-22gph at 180 and your engines will just be solid on the pipe, loafing clean and cool. Just sayin, you can take it to TBO with or without a top depending how clean and cool you keep not only the heads but the valves as well. Carbon and lead are the enemies of your exhaust valves, seats, and guides. Your family looks like they enjoy being in the plane, an extra 15 minutes and you can maximize your efficiency from both a fuel and long term maintenance cost standing.
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Henning,

I'm running it deep lop in cruise the vast majority of the time as you're recommending.
 
James_Dean said:
Henning,

I'm running it deep lop in cruise the vast majority of the time as you're recommending.
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I understand where you are just letting you know where they run easiest and most efficient. You're not far off, if you look at it as $1 an hour a knot for those ten knots across the TBO of the engine, it's really cheap as far as a speed mod goes.:D

I'm OCD about getting the best use out of energy and equipment.;)
 
wabower said:
"Compressions in the 70's, uses no oil, makes no metal, I'd fly it anywhere in the country tomorrow without hesitation."
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EXACTLY! It only has 400 hours since overhaul. It was done in 1985, and hasn't flown at all in the last 5 years, but they think they should price it like a brand new factory or reputable shop overhaul. Stop telling me you would fly it cross country tomorrow. I'm pricing it as a run-out.
 
Henning said:
BTW, can anyone tell me why when I check into this thread I get a strange log in authentication? I'm on a brand new iPad Air2, fully up to date.:dunno: this is the second time. dev.aspenavionics.com...:dunno:
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I see the same thing. When I look at the page source for page 1, I see an anchor link to that dev aspenavionics site, that looks like it's pointing to a JPG image. Right before it is the text "Look for more plane than a seneca"

That phrase is on post #2 on page 1, so I suspect that poster (NineThreeKilo) was trying to point to an image file in his post or signature, but the image is on an aspen avionics site that requires a password.

Every time somebody brings up page 1 of this thread, that link gets hit, and the web site throws up an authentication window.
 
James_Dean said:
Well.... Ted won me over. Terms of the deal have been agreed to and prebuy will commence asap. I paid too much, but it has the right bells and whistles and the current owner is moving up to something bigger which is usually a good sign.

Wish me luck getting through the purchase process and the 25 hours of dual the insurance company wants. I'm a pretty excited little camper right now. :goofy::yes::D

And yes, I'm going into this eyes wide open on what it is going to cost to run this thing.

Eggman
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Oh my that has an AMAZING panel. You may have "paid too much" but I bet you paid less than having to do all that work on your own to an older airframe.

What kind of autopilot does it have? I've been all over your panel picture and don't see the autopilot head, but do see some toggle switches at the top, and that the G500 is in GPSS steering mode. Where's the "heading", "nav", "alt" buttons? Is your autopilot integrated into the G500 like the G1000?
 
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TangoWhiskey said:
Oh my that has an AMAZING panel. You may have "paid too much" but I bet you paid less than having to do all that work on your own to an older airframe.

What kind of autopilot does it have? I've been all over your panel picture and don't see the autopilot head, but do see some toggle switches at the top, and that the G500 is in GPSS steering mode. Where's the "heading", "nav", "alt" buttons? Is your autopilot integrated into the G500 like the G1000?
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Has the Cessna 400B autopilot. It talks to the G500 with the GAD43 and it works very well with GPSS mode. It holds altitude perfectly. It will follow vertical guidance, but I usually don't run it that way and prefer to run the trim wheel on the head manually to change pitch. The head is below the throttle quadrant.

The screen on the 530 is starting to delaminate so I'm working on a 750 upgrade. The 750 will replace the 530 and radar display.
 
Henning said:
Yep.:rofl: Although it did maximize ROI.

BTW, can anyone tell me why when I check into this thread I get a strange log in authentication? I'm on a brand new iPad Air2, fully up to date.:dunno: this is the second time. dev.aspenavionics.com...:dunno:

View attachment 37176
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I got it too. Read the explanation about it.
 
James_Dean said:
The screen on the 530 is starting to delaminate so I'm working on a 750 upgrade. The 750 will replace the 530 and radar display.
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Is there an RDR2000 interface to the 750? This could also be a great time for a GWX68 or 70 upgrade. :D
 
Is it just me or should the title of this thread be changed? ;)
 
Ted DuPuis said:
Is there an RDR2000 interface to the 750? This could also be a great time for a GWX68 or 70 upgrade. :D
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Thankfully, the RDR2000 is one of the few legacy radar that will interface with the garmin line.
 
James_Dean said:
Thankfully, the RDR2000 is one of the few legacy radar that will interface with the garmin line.
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That's good. It's a very nice unit.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
Is it just me or should the title of this thread be changed? ;)
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Well..... Since I cut my teeth in a warrior, the vast majority of my time was in a saratoga, I had done multi training in a seneca, and had 0 hours of any type of cessna time in my log book I had thought I wanted a Seneca. Spent quite a bit of time chasing them and actually made four or five offers that didn't pan out.

I reexamined my thought process and took a fresh look at what was available. I considered 210's, Cirrus, Bonanzas, mirage, etc and kept coming back to the thought that I eventually want to be in a cabin class plane which strongly pushed me in the twin direction for experience. That led to looking at 310's, barons, and the seneca. Then I started asking the family and showing them pictures of what I was looking at and, surprisingly, the vote was not in favor of club seating.

I desired FIKI certification due to the kind of flying I was going to do and where home base is. That adds a heck of a premium to the price of a baron. When I started looking seriously at 310's I really didn't appreciate how much useful load some of them had. I have five children and am not a small guy myself so the ability and flexibility to haul stuff and still blast off well under gross was appealing. I found my bird on the twin cessna forum. It had all the things I wanted, the right radar, already had ADS-B, the G500, FIKI, was mid time, has nearly 2000 lbs useful load, and came from a very picky owner who was flying it quite a bit. Ted DuPuis had actually flown in it, knew the owner, and vouched for it.

I just flew my family down to Phoenix. We took the airlines last year and I beat the door to door time by over two hours with this trip. With people, the dog, golf clubs, six suit cases, and a few other bags I had 1050 lbs of load. I departed with 120 gallons(4.5 hours) of fuel and that still left me 200 under gross. I departed with 500 overcast and 5 miles vis and had to punch through a 2000 ft layer with ice. I chose a route with a 13,000 ft MEA and was still climbing very well when I got up there.

For my needs the 310 ended up being a very good solution and the seneca would have been a mistake. YMMV.

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N317U

Eggman
 
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The only time I like club seating is for hauling Mile High rides because it leaves the most open space for foam padded entertainment while maintaining 2 seats with belts.
 
Smart move would have been to send in the slick mags as cores for bendex mags, beats polishing a turd.
 
Henning said:
The only time I like club seating is for hauling Mile High rides because it leaves the most open space for foam padded entertainment while maintaining 2 seats with belts.
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This comment is useless without...:needpics:
 
James331 said:
Smart move would have been to send in the slick mags as cores for bendex mags, beats polishing a turd.
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The team at Savvy would say that is old wives tale territory. They recommended a place that will overhaul for $375 per unit unless it needs an impulse coupler which would push it to $900. The shop said 1/3 of the units they see need a new coupler.

I looked at the bendix route, and with new harnesses I would have spent way more money than years of taking care of the slicks. YMMV.
 
James_Dean said:
The team at Savvy would say that is old wives tale territory. They recommended a place that will overhaul for $375 per unit unless it needs an impulse coupler which would push it to $900. The shop said 1/3 of the units they see need a new coupler.

I looked at the bendix route, and with new harnesses I would have spent way more money than years of taking care of the slicks. YMMV.
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Not in my experience, I hope yours fair better.

One of the slicks on my 185F checked out shortly after prebuy / annual and it didnt have near enough hours on it.

Every working big bore plane I've flown has had bendex, and the cost to repair a bendex is less then a slick, also the quality when you hold the two side by side is not too hard to notice.

After the one low time slick checked out the 185 it is now running two bendex, I ain't playing that game and really don't need to get stuck in some lake in the middle of nowhere, or worse have one crap out in flight.
 
I'll disagree with Savvy about Slicks completely. But that was based on a lot of new units we got in that would be lucky to last 50 hours.

But I also wouldn't switch if the costs were excessive.
 
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I'd rather fly behind a higher time bendex then a new slick.

James_Dean said:
I looked at the bendix route, and with new harnesses I would have spent way more money than years of taking care of the slicks. YMMV.
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That sums it up right there, never seen a guy look into slicks vs overhauling a bendex, it's always people that run slicks that ask if they should swap over :dunno:
 
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James331 said:
Smart move would have been to send in the slick mags as cores for bendex mags, beats polishing a turd.
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We had a Penn Yan overhaul on an IO360 come back with slicks. So far we are on replacement #5 in the first ~300 hours. According to our mechanics new Slick mags are made of flimsy Chinese parts.

I was shown the distributor rotor. To me it was terrifying to see how cheaply this part is made. It's like something you would find in a Fisher-Price airplane. Scary.
 
JimNtexas said:
We had a Penn Yan overhaul on an IO360 come back with slicks. So far we are on replacement #5 in the first ~300 hours. According to our mechanics new Slick mags are made of flimsy Chinese parts.

I was shown the distributor rotor. To me it was terrifying to see how cheaply this part is made. It's like something you would find in a Fisher-Price airplane. Scary.
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My engines are at a combined 1600 hours on RAM overhauls with slick 6310's. The left engine has about 1300 hours and this is the second time the mags have been off for routine service. Nothing in the logs other than those 500 hour overhauls. I have no doubt that others have had bad experiences, but the ones in my installation appear to be doing great. Therefore I have no reason to go spend $6000 to change out mags and harnesses.
 
James_Dean said:
..Therefore I have no reason to go spend $6000 to change out mags and harnesses.
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We never had these problems before the overhaul, our A&P says that the parts quality of new Slick mags has gone way downhill.

I don't know if that's true or now, all I know is all the issues our club has had with these magnetos in a fairly short span of time.
 
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