"St Louis Flying Club Newsletter"

St. Louis Flying Club Newsletter - 26 May 2007

From The President - By Todd Michal

Dear Members,

The annual inspection is complete and the airplane is at Executive Wings in Tennessee for the new paint. The WAAS upgrade to our GNS-430 was completed and shipped back to us. We should have a great aircraft with the new paint and WAAS GPS installed. Thanks to everyone that helped out with the annual.

Mike Russell has been working on renewing the insurance policy and received a quote of $3,276 (a little more than 2% increase over last year). We kept the aircraft value at $60,280 even with the new paint and WAAS upgrade as the value of older aircraft has started to decline with the increased production of newer single engine aircraft and the new Sport Category aircraft. When we did an aircraft valuation in Jan 2006, the base retail price for an average time 1975 172M was $49,500 and now it is down to $41,000. We will keep watching the valuation of our aircraft and adjust the insured value as necessary.

Happy Takeoffs!

Todd

Treasurer's Report - by Mike McBride

Many things are happening on the financial front with the club this month. Expenses for the annual are flowing in, most will be reflected on next month's statement. So far, the costs of the annual are about half of what we had budgeted. The charges for the WAAS upgrade to the GPS should be reflected on next month's statement as well. The charges for repainting will be reflected either the June or July statement; adequate funds should be available to cover the expected charges for that. Mike Russell is working with the insurance company to renew the club policy, and I expect that charge to be on either the June or July statement also.

Flight hours have held steady just under 10 hours for the past couple of months, but with the airplane in for paint that will likely not be the case for this coming month. Fuel prices held relatively steady at $5.20 per gallon at JetCorp, so the rate remains at $ 58.00 per hour. I'm just now getting a view of the fuel burn, expect to see more on that in the future; significant variance from the expected 7.6 GPH may result in a slight adjustment to the hourly rate. As a reminder, please continue to indicate on the flight log when you call for fuel, and indicate your call as before and/or after your flight. Matching individual fuel expenses to the flight log notations is not as straightforward as it should be at this point, and it is important that we have good documentation to reconcile any discrepancies with JetCorp.

Our adjusted treasury is very strong now, reflecting the recent assessment. The aforementioned paint and annual expenses will result in decreases to the adjusted treasury in short order, and at that point we will have a clear view of any additional assessment needed to cover the WAAS upgrade cost.

Mike

Maintenance - by John

WAAS Upgrade - We received the upgraded GNS-430W back from Garmin on 24 May. The antenna cable extension for the new WAAS antenna is in work. The new Form 337 and Flight Manual Supplement for the WAAS GPS will be ready for the installation when the plane comes back from paint. The Pilot Manual page has been updated so you can download the Pilot Manuals for the WAAS GNS-430W.

Paint - The airplane was delivered to Executive Wings in Bolivar TN for repainting on 18 May. Shelby did a quick overview of the plane and recommended we change the slot screws in the cowling to phillips head to match the other screws and help prevent the screwdriver from slipping out and scratching the paint and also allow the use of just one screwdriver type. He will send us pictures of the progress as he strips, and preps the aircraft for final painting.

Annual Inspection - The annual inspection was completed on 16 May. Thanks to Mark Rehwinkel, Mike McBride, and Marlin for helping with the annual. In addition to the annual inspection, the following work was accomplished:

Replaced slip washer on the RH Fuel Cap
Replaced RH Main tire and tube and greased wheel bearing
Replaced carb air inlet filter
Replaced worn Carb Heat control and link attach hardware
Replaced Engine worn cylinder oil drain hoses and clamps
Replaced remaining worn baffle seals

The compression test results are shown below.

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