Purchasing an aircraft which has had a gear up landing

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PilotPaul

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PilotPaul
I am in the market for an aircraft and have been leaning towards a Mooney. I have notice a number of Mooneys on the market have had a gear up landing. What is the general belief concerning these aircraft? Should I stay away? Or are the repairs simple enough it is not an issue?
 
I own a plane that has had a gear up. It's not a Mooney, but the repairs are the same basically. I have no concerns about the repairs, it was more than 20 years ago and if there was going to be an issue it would have shown up by now.
 
Depends what they did. If the engine was torn down and overhauled, the prop replaced, and the repairs all stand up to inspection, no big deal. If they tried doing the return to service on the cheap, well, it's more a buyer's than seller's market right now, and there are plenty of other Mooney fish in the used aircraft sea.
 
Buy a fixed gear.

Cheaper insurance, and no gear up landings to worry about.
 
Find a GOOD MOONEY wrench if your're serious about the plane.

Look at the logs. People who damage an airplane and have it fixed correctly log everything well. A good knowlegable-in-type guy can sometimes walk around a NDH airplane and call BS right away. If he finds repairs of any kind and nothing in the logs then you can consider the airplane/engine logs crap.

Case in point; A couple of years ago our local Beechcraft Guru walked around a recently purchased (and A&P pre-buyed) split-tail and without opening it up noted wrong rivets, folded metal edges and other stuff that was not Beech quality. Opening it up produced lots of problems...long story short; the new owner later found "his" airplane on the web. It was sitting on it's belly on a runway with a curled prop and the pilot standing in front grinning...yet the airplane was sold as No Damage History.

Nothing is wrong with old airplanes repaired correctly. Thats why they make A&P's and aftermarket rivets!.

JMPO

Chris
 
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Try to find one without damage history but if you really want this one and it is appropriately priced then it might be worth the trouble.

DO not assume that because it was annual-ed 20 times that it was fixed correctly. You must find someone to ensure that the repair was done correctly or it becomes a huge unknown future expense.

Even if it is fixed correctly at the time and date of the repair over time FAA repair methods approved might have changed as to where and what type of rivits can be used. So what was legally repaired in 1961 might not be suitable if repaired today however that does not necessarily make it an illegal repair today (unairworthy). Some IA will want to go on a hunting exhibition costing you $10k others will not.

You better know the ins and outs of what is required to do a proper repair. You are going to have to learn it if you buy one, so might as well learn it before you buy rather than afterwards. It could well save you a big unexpected expense.

All these scare stories on buying a plane and first annual being $12k usually have some element of improper maintenance history.
 
A high percentage of the vintage retrac fleet has been gear-upped at least once. Two of my Bonanzas and one of the 210's had such history, the 210D being the one that caused the new saddle design to be implemented. None of the planes had further gear problems during the 15 (combined) years that I flew them.
 
My Bo had fully-disclosed gear up history (once), and the only way anyone could tell was (1) the logs, and (2) when the floorboards are out, you can see that some of the belly skins (the newer ones) have anti-corrosion paint.

If properly repaired, it's a near non-event.
 
I have never owned a Mooney, or experienced a gear up landing, but I would say this.

If an aircraft has had a gear up landing, and got repaired, and has passed every required inspection and had another 20 years of accident/incident free casual use flight, why worry about it? Seems to be a non-issue. I might be hesitant or skeptical if it happened 5 hours ago...
 
ajstoner21 said:
I have never owned a Mooney, or experienced a gear up landing, but I would say this.

If an aircraft has had a gear up landing, and got repaired, and has passed every required inspection and had another 20 years of accident/incident free casual use flight, why worry about it? Seems to be a non-issue. I might be hesitant or skeptical if it happened 5 hours ago...
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That is what I thought too, when I bought my Comanche with 12 year old repaired damage. It had passed 11 annuals with 4 different IA's. So what is the worry, right?
 
No biggie. I would think there are many other damage incidents which are more difficult to repair correctly or could cause more permanent damage. A gear-up generally causes skin damage and engine damage, and hopefully by now you're on a different engine or have had an overhaul. A gear-up probably won't cause any real structural damage.
 
Gear ups are no big deal. If you're buying a Mooney, take it for a good pre buy at one of the recommended Mooney Service Centers. You should do this even with Mooneys that the owners claim have no damage history. A gear up on an older Mooney usually means the plane is even better because it will probably have a new style prop hub, or better yet, a Top Prop and it'll have a one piece belly on it instead of the three piece screwdriver endurance test.

It's good to know about it, but if the plane meets your other requirements, I personally wouldn't let a gear up keep me from buying it.
 
My Mooney bagged its limit of two gear ups in the 60's. You wouldn't know it except for the reports.
 
Get a pre buy inspection with a mechanic that you can trust. Go over the logs and make sure you and they are happy with the repairs that were done. If so then I don't see it as being a big deal. Has happened to a lot of aircraft and they get repaired to fly another day.
 
A lot of people commented that 20 years is a long time. But that time is in reference to another poster's answer. I am thinking more in the line of the last few years. Those usually have a new prop and engine and are reasonably priced.

Are most gear up landings simply cosmetic damage to the aircraft frame (not including engine and prop)?

I really appreciate everyone's reply!
 
Depending on when the gear up occurred and what repairs were done, it's probably a non-event.

The 310 was geared up 20 years ago. It had a new wing spar put in about 5 years ago. It's a fine airplane, and I don't worry about either repair. The Aztec I'm sure has had at least one gear up, but probably 25+ years ago as it isn't in the logs.

The further back the event occurred, the less I'd worry about it.
 
With older Mooneys, a gear up can be a good thing! There are after-market one-piece belly panels that can replace the multi-part aluminum belly skins. One even has built-in strakes that, in theory, can carry a Mooney through a subsequent gear-up with no damage other than to that belly panel (although that is not a recommended exercise.) The one-piece belly skins make future annuals slightly easier and may even add a knot or two.

As pointed out, any damage to an aircraft that us well-repaired is a non-issue in most cases. They are truly better than new in some cases.
 
I was talking with one of the technicians at a large Florida
university that uses Mooney's for Commercial training.
He said gear ups were a easy fix unless the pilot put the gear
handle down after the gear up landing. At that point everything
bent and gear problems for a long time.
Dave
 
Any aircraft with damage history is going to be worth less than the same plane without damage history.
 
LDJones said:
With older Mooneys, a gear up can be a good thing! There are after-market one-piece belly panels that can replace the multi-part aluminum belly skins. One even has built-in strakes that, in theory, can carry a Mooney through a subsequent gear-up with no damage other than to that belly panel (although that is not a recommended exercise.) The one-piece belly skins make future annuals slightly easier and may even add a knot or two.

As pointed out, any damage to an aircraft that us well-repaired is a non-issue in most cases. They are truly better than new in some cases.
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if the repairs are done right, it can be an improvement. especially in older mooneys, you can end up with the one piece belly, newer prop and overhauled engine. Jimmy Garrison does a lot of valuations for mooneys, and I believe he said that gear ups>10 years shouldn't affect the value but it should be looked at closely. About the only down side to a good repair on a gear up is market perception. It will raise questions to potential buyers just like it is doing with you.

btw, my mooney had a gear up in 1966, about one year after it rolled off the line.

If you go to mooneyspace, the first thing that everyone advises is to have a good Mooney Service Center look at the plane if you're serious about buying it.
 
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With so many gear-up landings I'm interested to know under what circumstances these were under? Pilot error or mechanical failure?
 
In theory that's correct, but when most of the fleet has similar history, and when a gear-up is such a non-event to repair, a nice airplane with a gear up won't suffer much compared to the other nice airplanes.
Geico266 said:
Any aircraft with damage history is going to be worth less than the same plane without damage history.
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PBristolJr said:
With so many gear-up landings I'm interested to know under what circumstances these were under? Pilot error or mechanical failure?
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I would imagine 99% are pilot error. I read the incident report on my plane, and the pilot blamed it on being distracted while landing. What few gear ups I've heard about, it seems that the pilot forgot to put the gear down.
 
If you're betting, use the same rough approximation as for all other accidents-- 90-10 pilot-induced.
PBristolJr said:
With so many gear-up landings I'm interested to know under what circumstances these were under? Pilot error or mechanical failure?
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Interesting... Glad I was taught GUMP before landing and "Final gear check" when on short final even in the Cessna one-fiddy.
 
Lack of training isn't usually the problem.

Numerous crash videos include the sound of the gear horn honking incessantly without any apparent impact on the crew.

And many pilots disable the horn functionality by using approach flaps for landing, thereby eliminating a built-in safety mechanism that might otherwise save the day. Go figure.

PBristolJr said:
Interesting... Glad I was taught GUMP before landing and "Final gear check" when on short final even in the Cessna one-fiddy.
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Most people simply fail to put the gear down. As Wayne said, most videos have the pilot ignoring the loud horn indicating "Hey, stupid, your gear is up still." You have certain aircraft that have a higher rate of gear failures than others. Twin Cessna nose gear comes to mind, as does Cessna 182RG nose gear. Then you have David's experience where he burned his hand trying to get the gear down on a rental.

From a training side, one should routinely be reminded what the gear horn sounds like, and have the trained reaction to shove the throttle(s) forward when that happens. I think typically what happens is people get distracted.
 
I was an consultant on a Mooney purchase gone bad once. Performing a pre-buy with a Mooney expert is money well spent. It would have helped the buyer a lot, actually the pictures of the ship were enough for me to form an opinion.

It seems the buyer sent is friend out to accept and pay for this M20C. The friend does a walk around pays the seller and then heads off to the new airport. The friend looses it on roll-out and goes off the runway at the new home field and strikes the prop blades too.

The aircraft goes in for damage repair and an engine prop strike inspection. Turns out that the belly, flap hinges, and step were still ground down from sliding down the runway. The engine tear down revealed far from airworthy repairs completed after something internal came apart. Someone had ground heavy damage off most of the internal steel and aluminum parts. The best part was how they had welded makeshift supports to steady the main bearing journals of the case. What really topped it off for me was the previously installed prop blades at the gear up were 2" longer than called for and they had even ground off the unneeded counterweight lugs on both blades.

A pre-buy would have saved a lot of pain for both parties.
 
PilotPaul said:
Are most gear up landings simply cosmetic damage to the aircraft frame (not including engine and prop)?

I really appreciate everyone's reply!
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I can only speak to the Mooney, other types I'm not sure, but in case of the Mooney, the damage is usually easily repaired and mostly cosmetic. Structurally, there is no damage and the gear is safely stowed in the gear wells. Like others said here, the worst thing you can do is flip the gear handle down after the event. It wrecks a bunch of stuff and doesn't fool anyone.

Typical damage besides engine and prop includes-

Belly pan, or pans.
Nose gear doors.
Flaps if landed with full flaps. (most do)
Boarding step if the plane is equipped.
All belly antennas.
Sometimes the electric gear actuator on some models gets ground.
Sometimes a wing tip.
Sometimes a motor mount.

The damage can also be worse if the landing drops down hard instead of being a greaser without the grease. Of the damage listed above, the majority is bolt on replacements. Airframe damage that requires riveting and sheet metal skills sometimes includes the stringers that support the belly pans, damage to the empennage from the boarding step and the outer win tip.

Now a gear collapse... that's another story.
 
PilotPaul said:
A lot of people commented that 20 years is a long time. But that time is in reference to another poster's answer. I am thinking more in the line of the last few years. Those usually have a new prop and engine and are reasonably priced.
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If you're planning on keeping the plane for a long time, and you get it properly inspected, it may even be beneficial to you - A recent gear up is going to cause a much larger decrease in perceived value than one that was 20+ years ago, so you can probably do well on the purchase price and if you keep the plane for 15-20 years there won't be much of a hit in its value at that point so you'll come out ahead compared to an NDH plane.

I still don't know how anyone gears up a Mooney, though. I can't get the Ovation slowed down for landing without it! I'm usually patiently waiting for the plane to slow down below 140 KIAS (Vle) so that I can extend the gear, or if I'm feeling impatient popping the speed brakes for a bit to get slowed down for extension. I would think that to land at normal speed with the gear up I'd have to pull the power to idle miles away from the runway. :dunno:
 
flyingcheesehead said:
I still don't know how anyone gears up a Mooney, though.
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Distraction from that ice built up on the wings or that thunderstorm you were just flying through come to mind.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
But does that really happen enough for this to be known as a fleet-wide issue? :dunno:
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My point is you say you don't understand it. I'm saying that distractions, lapses in procedure, etc happen. The guy who flies a 172 normally and figures he's just floating longer than normal, etc. I've seen a Cirrus get a prop strike. How do you do that? Nose down too far. It was impressive.

I merely gave a couple more extreme examples. There are plenty of other possible options, and all of them are fleet-wide.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
My point is you say you don't understand it. I'm saying that distractions, lapses in procedure, etc happen. The guy who flies a 172 normally and figures he's just floating longer than normal, etc. I've seen a Cirrus get a prop strike. How do you do that? Nose down too far. It was impressive.

I merely gave a couple more extreme examples. There are plenty of other possible options, and all of them are fleet-wide.
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I guess my point is simply that I would expect Mooneys to be less susceptible to gear-up landings than the rest of the retract fleet, not more, simply because it's so hard to slow them down without the gear that a lot of things would be very abnormal compared to a landing with gear, which should clue the pilot in to something being wrong well before the prop hits the pavement.

Of course, clues only have value if you're paying attention.

Do you have any ideas as to why Mooneys would be potentially more susceptible to gear-ups?

I'm also curious if Mooneys actually do have more gear-ups per fleet size than other retracts, or if this is simply yet another OWT. There are sure plenty of OWT's about Mooneys already.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
I guess my point is simply that I would expect Mooneys to be less susceptible to gear-up landings than the rest of the retract fleet, not more, simply because it's so hard to slow them down without the gear that a lot of things would be very abnormal compared to a landing with gear, which should clue the pilot in to something being wrong well before the prop hits the pavement.

Of course, clues only have value if you're paying attention.

Do you have any ideas as to why Mooneys would be potentially more susceptible to gear-ups?

I'm also curious if Mooneys actually do have more gear-ups per fleet size than other retracts, or if this is simply yet another OWT. There are sure plenty of OWT's about Mooneys already.
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I agree with you about speeds. It helps a lot to drop the gear to slow down enough for pattern speeds. I call the gear my "boat anchors."
 
I'm sure others have seen more stats than me, but I'm not sure that Mooneys are more susceptible to gear ups than other aircraft. I think most complex aircraft have the same general effect of "hard to slow without gear," such that one should notice.

If Mooneys are more susceptible to gear ups than other planes, I would wonder if it's an effect similar to the issues the Cirrus has had, IOW unqualified folks buy them. But my guess would be the retract single fleet is all of similar susceptibility.
 
A high percentage of accidents (some as trivial as locking the keys in the car) are the result of people "getting out of sequence" during some routine process that they normally accomplish without interruption. I think forgetting the gear falls into that same category.

Ted DuPuis said:
My point is you say you don't understand it. I'm saying that distractions, lapses in procedure, etc happen. The guy who flies a 172 normally and figures he's just floating longer than normal, etc. I've seen a Cirrus get a prop strike. How do you do that? Nose down too far. It was impressive.

I merely gave a couple more extreme examples. There are plenty of other possible options, and all of them are fleet-wide.
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rbridges said:
I would imagine 99% are pilot error. I read the incident report on my plane, and the pilot blamed it on being distracted while landing. What few gear ups I've heard about, it seems that the pilot forgot to put the gear down.
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Agree...especially on Johnson Bar Mooneys! There is a single point of failure in the gear actuator assembly of the older electric gears which is subject to a recurring AD for inspection and lubrication. If that fails, the gear is going nowhere, either up or down, even with the emergency gear extension since that, too, goes through the same gear set. But those failures are pretty rare since people are aware of the issue and (at least for me) monitor it pretty closely.

If interested, there's a little write-up here:
http://www.mnaviationpro.com/mooney/gears.html
 
PBristolJr said:
Interesting... Glad I was taught GUMP before landing and "Final gear check" when on short final even in the Cessna one-fiddy.
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Don't forget the S - Safety! (Seatbelts, etc.)

I actually use GUMPPS: Gas, Undercarriage, Mixture, Props, Pump, Safety
 
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