New Paint!
Updated September 2006

My interest in flying began with an introductory flying lesson in a nearly new Cessna 140 in the summer of 1947 at Monrovia Airport in Southern California. That airport, like so many in our country, no longer exists.
My interest in flying remained strong despite many interruptions in training caused by lack of funds, family responsibilities, education, military service and job pressures. I may hold some kind of record for the greatest number of years between first lesson and license, 21 years. In 1968 I decided, with my wife (boss) Robbie's approval, to start my training in earnest. So, for the next 2 years I devoted enough hours after work and on weekends to finish my Private, Commercial and Instrument rating. A Cessna 150 was used to learn the basics of flying and get my Private ticket. We found it advantageous to own an airplane rather than rent for the remainder of my training so we bought our first airplane in 1969, a 1959 Cessna 172. That airplane was a better trainer for my Commercial and Instrument ratings. The 172 was mostly bare Aluminum so many hours were devoted to polishing with Met-all. It always had a mirror finish and we got many compliments. We even got one from an airline pilot at Monterey airport while we both waited in line for takeoff.

We flew the old straight-tailed 172 for about 2 years and then decided to move to a newer 172 with better avionics and full paint. That old "Coffee grinder" was getting to be a safety issue as San Jose Municipal Airport acquired more jet traffic. Yes, it was called San Jose Municipal in those days. We found
a good, low time '66 172 in Stockton and bought it following a thorough inspection. After I accumulated
a few hundred hours in 172s we decided to try a complex airplane so we bought a 1954 E-model Bonanza that had been hangared at SJC it's entire life. It was a stock Bonanza with electric prop and an E-225-8 dry sump engine. The old Bonanza had acceptable cruise performance but very poor climb capability and was very expensive to maintain but it was the quietest airplane we have owned. After nearly a year and
a little over 100 hours we sold the Bonanza and bought a three year old 1972 Cessna 172.

Like our previous airplanes, this one was sheltered at SJC. We enjoyed many hours of flying our newer 172, mostly along the west coast with an occasional trip to Nevada or Utah. Every time we walked from the parking area outside the gate at SJC we walked past a very attractive original 1967 E-model Mooney parked in the same shelter row as our 172. After about 3 years of admiring that Mooney it disappeared from SJC. About 2 months later we were asked to help a friend at Reid Hillview airport with the annual inspection of his airplane. As we drove into the airport we saw the Mooney from SJC on an aircraft dealer's ramp. It didn't take long to decide we should talk to the dealer about price and other pertinent details such as total time, damage history and location history. A thorough inspection of the logs, airframe and engine convinced us that we should get serious about buying the Mooney. The purchase was made easy by the fact that one of the bosses at work had been admiring our 172 for about a year so several days later we sold the 172 and bought our first Mooney, N3235F. That was the best airplane purchase we had made. We took our new airplane back to a shelter at SJC where it came from and enjoyed 7 years and more than 1600 hours of flying all over the country including a trip to my home town of Ithaca, New York. The only serious trouble we encountered while flying 35F was when the engine-driven fuel pump failed during flight on 2 different occasions. Fortunately the electric pump was healthy so all ended well. During the time we owned 35F we met Paul Loewen and became aware of his pioneering work with Mooney mods and upgrades. Several mods were installed and our Mooney became even better with improved performance and low speed handling.

Pressures at work forced us to sell our Mooney in 1985 and we went back to renting when we had time to fly. It took 7 years to get to a family and work situation where we felt we could again consider owning an airplane so we began another search. We considered 182s, Comanches and other affordable airplanes with decent cruise performance. We found Comanches to be delightful flying airplanes but the affordable examples had many ADs and the performance and handling qualities were about the same as that of the E-model Mooney we had owned and the Mooney burned considerably less fuel and is better built. So, after several months of evaluating many candidate airplanes we heard about another '67 E-model Mooney. Shery Loewen had the airplane on her for-sale list. We flew a rented 172 to Truckee to check it out. We were pleased to find a nice corrosion-free, low time Mooney with NMDH and we bought our second Mooney a few days later, N3215F. Apparently this Mooney came off the assembly line 20 units before 35F. The color and general condition were nearly the same as our first Mooney so we felt right at home with 15F.

LASAR installed a factory overhauled engine and nearly every mod available at that time including a gear door extension designed and fabricated by Paul Loewen. We enjoyed taking many cross country trips to the mid west including Oshkosh and several visits to Wichita, KS on business. We also made numerous trips along the west coast. Our modified Mooney gave performance similar to J-models so we had fun flying formation with J-model owners. After about 2 years of flying 15F we took it to Tom and Mark Rouch at Top Gun Aviation for installation of a new J-cowl. This was a good upgrade to the airplane. The engine ran cooler, the appearance was enhanced and the removal of the entire cowl took about 20 minutes; a nice feature at annual time.

At the age of 70 we decided that I should take a more permanent job with a company in Savannah, Ga. that I had been working for as a consultant for a few years so we flew 15F from San Jose to Savannah. We were disappointed to find out that hangars were more scarce in Savannah than we had been told so we had to hangar our Mooney 60 miles away in Metter. There was just no way we were going to leave that beautiful highly modified Mooney with new paint, interior and avionics outside on any ramp. The long drive on Sundays to fly was a bit of a chore but well worth it because we were able to explore most of Georgia and South Carolina during our short stay in the South. One of the positive aspects of hangaring our airplane in Metter was a rent of only $75/month.

Several months after moving to Georgia we decided we had enough of the southern climate so I made arrangements to continue working as a consultant and we planned our return to the west. We sold our home in Georgia and found ourselves homeless when we departed the east coast. Since we did not know where we would find a suitable area to live or hangar space for 15F we sold it rather than risk leaving it outside for extended periods of time.

We had been interested in Arizona for several years so our first attempt to find a home was in Cottonwood, AZ. Robbie was not impressed with the area and shopping so we continued on to Wickenburg, our present location. We had visited Wickenburg several years earlier and we knew it was a nice place to live. We found hangars available at Glendale, AZ, about 50 miles from Wickenburg, and serious plans to build new hangars at the Wickenburg Airport, about a mile from our house. It didn't take long to start looking for another airplane. We went through the usual list of possibilities but we always had Mooney in the back of our minds. It took about 9 months to inspect and flunk several airplanes before we saw an ad for a '76-C on the internet. The airplane was located in Iowa so inspecting was more difficult than with previous airplane purchases. It took many phone calls and email messages with digital photos to determine that we were seriously interested. The current owners had bought a late model A36 Bonanza
so they were anxious to sell the Mooney. With a little bargaining they were convinced to deliver the Mooney to Arizona and put it in our hangar for inspection. The airplane turned out to be pretty much as advertised with low time and no corrosion due to a life in the mid west so we bought our third Mooney, N7048V, and parked it in our hangar in Glendale, AZ until we were offered a hangar at Wickenburg. Most of the mods shown in the picture were already installed when we bought the airplane with the exception of the dorsal fin and tail root fillets installed by Dan Hopper at D&T Aircraft in Cal City. The dorsal fin and tail root installation is among the best we have seen. A new panel and avionics were installed by Advantage Avionics (Aircraft Spruce) in Chino. We plan to do several more mods and upgrades in the next few years including installing an IO-360 A3B6 engine and a J-cowl.

We will continue to enjoy our Mooney for the foreseeable future and to continue our activity helping friends find good used airplanes and to steer them to Mooneys when possible. We always tell them to let us look at the airplane first because we don't charge for our service. If we don't find anything wrong then consider taking it to a real Mooney mechanic for a thorough pre-buy inspection.

Ray & Robbie Hicks
February 2005