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 Post subject: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 10 Nov 2019, 21:49 
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Location: KSGR Sugar Land
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From Mooneyspace. Reportedly all Kerrville employees told on last Friday afternoon to stay home for a week and to come back on Monday, November 18. Who in their right mind would furlough a factory, then tell them to return the week before Thanksgiving only to shut down again for the Thanksgiving holidays? Seems like they are not telling the employees the whole story..... probably because it is bad.

https://mooneyspace.com/topic/32198-factory-closed-down/


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 10 Nov 2019, 23:20 
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Location: Owosso, MI (KRNP)
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A company out of money.... and no zero's left to make a mooney...


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 00:12 
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I did a lot of work for Mooney (aka Soaring America on the M10 prototype) after the Chinese purchased the company and they had grand long range plans when Jerry Chen was the CEO. I don't think they are out of money. I think they are starting to see the hand writing on the wall and are going to just cut their losses and move on.

Dave


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 00:36 
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Joined: 06/28/14
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Location: Pleasanton , TX (KPEZ)
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:popcorn:


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 00:45 
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Company: Underground Airways
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It's too bad if it's true, Two doors and a new chrome molly roll-cage surrounded by fibre with bragging rights to the fastest piston single. I wonder what would happened if they had of been able to engineer a parachute.
Loved the new interior also.


https://www.mooney.com/aircraft


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 09:22 
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Username Protected wrote:
It's too bad if it's true, Two doors and a new chrome molly roll-cage surrounded by fibre with bragging rights to the fastest piston single. I wonder what would happened if they had of been able to engineer a parachute.
Loved the new interior also.


https://www.mooney.com/aircraft


Unfortunately they waited about 15 years too late to start innovating again. At this point I doubt they are capable of the complete makeover that would be needed to start chipping away at the Cirrus lead.


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 09:38 
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Username Protected wrote:
It's too bad if it's true, Two doors and a new chrome molly roll-cage surrounded by fibre with bragging rights to the fastest piston single. I wonder what would happened if they had of been able to engineer a parachute.
Loved the new interior also.


https://www.mooney.com/aircraft


I tend to agree on your point about the chute. In my opinion the cat is out of the bag at this point. Anyone building a piston single that does not have a chute is crazy. They will slowly go by the wayside and eventually be no more. I did not understand with all they did to reimagine the Mooney why a chute was not included.


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 09:39 
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Username Protected wrote:
I tend to agree on your point about the chute. In my opinion the cat is out of the bag at this point. Anyone building a piston single that does not have a chute is crazy. They will slowly go by the wayside and eventually be no more. I did not understand with all they did to reimagine the Mooney why a chute was not included.


The aircraft wasn't known for its useful load to begin with. A chute installation would have put it in the 750lb useful territory after topping off the TKS tank.


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 09:45 
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That makes sense Rick... Everything is a comprimise with our birds. In the end I think for new products coming off the line the one thing that can't be left out is the chute. The market has spoken its a must. The new Garmin Auto land might help for some who don't have the chute but honestly they serve two totally different purposes.


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 10:55 
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Username Protected wrote:
I tend to agree on your point about the chute. In my opinion the cat is out of the bag at this point. Anyone building a piston single that does not have a chute is crazy. They will slowly go by the wayside and eventually be no more. I did not understand with all they did to reimagine the Mooney why a chute was not included.


The aircraft wasn't known for its useful load to begin with. A chute installation would have put it in the 750lb useful territory after topping off the TKS tank.


This.

A chute AND a gross weight increase to make it (at least) a two-American airplane when all of the tanks are full would have made it competitive with the #1 selling aircraft on the market today. Short of that, even discounted $200k to an SR-22T, they couldn't sell one for every ten Cirrus does.

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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 11:28 
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Mooney was trying to sell airplanes. Cirrus is selling a lifestyle. O.A. Beech understood that 40 years ago. But like Mooney, nobody has been keeping it fresh. It's only a matter of time before the last Bonanza and Baron are built. And probably not that much time.

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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 11:41 
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Username Protected wrote:
Mooney was trying to sell airplanes. Cirrus is selling a lifestyle. O.A. Beech understood that 40 years ago. But like Mooney, nobody has been keeping it fresh. It's only a matter of time before the last Bonanza and Baron are built. And probably not that much time.


Agree it's only a matter of time. Besides Garmin and the new A/C system introduced a few years ago, how much "innovation" has been applied to either since the 1984 update??


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 11:48 
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Username Protected wrote:
Mooney was trying to sell airplanes. Cirrus is selling a lifestyle. O.A. Beech understood that 40 years ago. But like Mooney, nobody has been keeping it fresh. It's only a matter of time before the last Bonanza and Baron are built. And probably not that much time.

I’ve written about this here before. I wandered around mooney’s booth at Oshkosh and looked at every detail of their display. No one approached me to try to sell me one, and I owned a 201 for over a decade. I’m already 90% of the way to a sale. Even with the best product in the world, if you’re not selling, I am not buying. No point in buying something that isn’t going to be able to be supported.


Last edited on 11 Nov 2019, 16:51, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 12:03 
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I love the speed of the new Acclaims. But the way the market has evolved, pilots want a lot of equipment in these airplanes that adds weight. Turbos, Deicing equipment, air conditioning, parachutes, speed brakes, etc.

Bonanza 36 was built to Utility standards and so there are mods available to raise gross weight to 3800# or even 4024# by putting it into Normal category. So a G36 can carry the equipment and some people and luggage too.

Cirrus did some phenomenal engineering to carve out something like 200 pounds of weight, mainly by replacing traditional composites with lighter carbon fiber. Lighter empty weights than later model Bonanzas. Gross weight of 3600 compared to 3400 for the comparable 4-seat Bonanza or 3368 for the 4-seat Mooney. Cirrus has got the equipment / weight equation solved at the 4 seat level.

Mooney appears to be stuck with a Max gross takeoff weight of 3368 and a landing weight of 3200. There is just no easy engineering change to get 3600 or 3800. Remember this design has roots going back to the 4-cylinder Mooney's of 50 years ago, it has been "stretched" as far as it will go.

Mooney is also stuck high build costs with building the airplane "twice". They have to weld up a steel tube structure, then cover it with sheet metal or carbon fiber. Piper had this problem years ago with the Pipers built in Lock Haven (Comanche, Aztec, etc). Piper solved it with clean sheet designs PA-28 and PA-32 that eliminated the steel tubes and slashed part count and build labor. So Piper solved it only by stopping production of the models that had the problem.

So those are the problems that all kinds of new owners and managers have been unable to fix. It is hard to see that anything but a new clean-sheet design can solve them. And of course, the best niche for a clean-sheet design is already occupied by Cirrus, with companies like Diamond trying to find the other niches around that.


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 Post subject: Re: Rumor That All Mooney Employees Furloughed For A Week
PostPosted: 11 Nov 2019, 12:09 
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Username Protected wrote:
I love the speed of the new Acclaims. But the way the market has evolved, pilots want a lot of equipment in these airplanes that adds weight. Turbos, Deicing equipment, air conditioning, parachutes, speed brakes, etc.

Bonanza 36 was built to Utility standards and so there are mods available to raise gross weight to 3800# or even 4024# by putting it into Normal category. So a G36 can carry the equipment and some people and luggage too.

Cirrus did some phenomenal engineering to carve out something like 200 pounds of weight, mainly by replacing traditional composites with lighter carbon fiber. Lighter empty weights than later model Bonanzas. Gross weight of 3600 compared to 3400 for the comparable 4-seat Bonanza or 3368 for the 4-seat Mooney. Cirrus has got the equipment / weight equation solved at the 4 seat level.

Mooney appears to be stuck with a Max gross takeoff weight of 3368 and a landing weight of 3200. There is just no easy engineering change to get 3600 or 3800. Remember this design has roots going back to the 4-cylinder Mooney's of 50 years ago, it has been "stretched" as far as it will go.

Mooney is also stuck high build costs with building the airplane "twice". They have to weld up a steel tube structure, then cover it with sheet metal or carbon fiber. Piper had this problem years ago with the Pipers built in Lock Haven (Comanche, Aztec, etc). Piper solved it with clean sheet designs PA-28 and PA-32 that eliminated the steel tubes and slashed part count and build labor. So Piper solved it only by stopping production of the models that had the problem.

So those are the problems that all kinds of new owners and managers have been unable to fix. It is hard to see that anything but a new clean-sheet design can solve them. And of course, the best niche for a clean-sheet design is already occupied by Cirrus, with companies like Diamond trying to find the other niches around that.


Mooney could probably be certified in utility category with paperwork only. The airframe is as stout as anything in the air with maybe Cessna TTx being close in ability to handle a G load. Mooney's Achilles' heal is the landing gear and always has been. It's not really capable of absorbing any loads and transfers all of them to the spar. Years ago they should have redesigned it.


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