Mooney 301
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The Mooney 301 was a prototype aircraft created by American manufacturer
Mooney Aircraft Company The Mooney International Corporation (formerly Mooney Aviation Company, Inc. and the Mooney Aircraft Company) is an American aircraft manufacturer based in Kerrville, Texas, United States. It manufactures single-engined piston-powered general ...
in 1983. It was a low-wing, single-engine, six-place monoplane with retractable landing gear and a pressurized fuselage. The Mooney 301 design team was led by
Roy LoPresti LeRoy Patrick "Roy" LoPresti (June 9, 1929 – August 7, 2002) was an eclectic American aeronautical engineer. He worked on projects as diverse as the Apollo Moon Program and missile design, served as advisor to the US Congress, became known a ...
. It was an attempt to create an alternative to pressurized single-engine airplanes being introduced by
Beechcraft Beechcraft is an American brand of civil aviation and Military aircraft, military aircraft owned by Textron Aviation since 2014, headquartered in Wichita, Kansas. Originally, it was a brand of Beech Aircraft Corporation, an American manufacture ...
,
Cessna Cessna () is an American brand of general aviation aircraft owned by Textron Aviation since 2014, headquartered in Wichita, Kansas. Originally, it was a brand of the Cessna Aircraft Company, an American general aviation aircraft manufactu ...
and
Piper Aircraft Piper Aircraft, Inc. is a manufacturer of general aviation aircraft, located at the Vero Beach Regional Airport in Vero Beach, Florida, United States and owned since 2009 by the Government of Brunei. Throughout much of the mid-to-late 20th cent ...
. Only one prototype was constructed. Further development was carried out by a consortium led by French investors, eventually resulting in the SOCATA TBM.


Development

The Mooney Aircraft Company had previously produced a single-engine pressurized aircraft in 1964 ( the M22 Mustang), which had been a financial disaster and was probably the largest single factor in the company's 1969
bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the deb ...
(although the Mustang continued to be produced through 1970). By the late 1970s the company was again feeling pressure to offer a pressurized product; Cessna's pressurized 210 had been available for several years, and Piper and Beech had announced their own pressurized single-engine projects. To avoid another M22-type disaster the LoPresti design team (he brought in his own engineers, rather than using Mooney company employees)MAOE Newsletter chose to start with a new design rather than a rework of the existing models (i.e. the M20 and its various upgrades). The 301's general configuration was similar to other Mooney models, differing in details such as an aft-sloping vertical fin, as opposed to the vertical leading edge with forward-swept trailing edge M20 fin, a lower-set engine with small cooling-air inlets, and fixed
horizontal stabilizer A tailplane, also known as a horizontal stabilizer, is a small lifting surface located on the tail ( empennage) behind the main lifting surfaces of a fixed-wing aircraft as well as other non-fixed-wing aircraft such as helicopters and gyroplan ...
s with trim tab-equipped elevators, as opposed to the pivoting-empennage M20 design. The tapered wing planform was similar to the M20, slightly longer (37.0 feet vs. 36.42 feet for the M20), and with several differences: the airfoil was a low-drag 15% profile NASA NLF(1)-0315 from root to tip; double-slotted Fowler flaps covering 90% of the trailing-edge length, with slotted
aileron An aileron (French for "little wing" or "fin") is a hinged flight control surface usually forming part of the trailing edge of each wing of a fixed-wing aircraft. Ailerons are used in pairs to control the aircraft in roll (or movement aroun ...
s on the remaining 10%, and with spoilers mounted on the wing's upper surfaces ahead of the flaps to assist the ailerons. The fuselage pressure vessel operated at 5.0 psig, which would provide an equivalent cabin pressure of slightly lower than 9000' MSL when operated at 25,000 MSL. The 301's designation came from its projected top speed, 262 knots, or 301 miles per hour.


Prototype

First flight of the prototype occurred on 21 April 1983.Taylor 1983, pp. 91–92. Some 70 hours of flight testing were accomplished on that unit during 1983. Production of the 301 had been scheduled to start in 1985 but Mooney suffered another financial crisis during that time: its majority owner,
Republic Steel Republic Steel is a Mexican steel manufacturer that was once America’s third largest steel producer. It was founded as the Republic Iron and Steel Company in Youngstown, Ohio in 1899. After rising to prominence during the early 20th Century, ...
, was acquired by
Ling-Temco-Vought Ling-Temco-Vought (LTV) was a large American conglomerate which existed from 1961 to 2001. At its peak, it was involved in aerospace, airlines, electronics, steel manufacturing, sporting goods, meat packing, car rentals, and pharmaceuticals, ...
in July 1984, and the new owners ordered Republic to divest itself of the Mooney Aircraft Company. The company was held for six weeks by a Minnesota-based investment company (The Morrison Company), then sold again to a French-based consortium led by Alec Couvelaire, a Paris-based Mooney dealer, and by Armand Rivard, the owner of Lake Aircraft. The new owners decided the aircraft was too heavy (200 pounds over target) and too slow for the projected market (300 knots should be the target, according to the new owners). Couvelaire proposed a joint venture between Mooney Aircraft and the
SOCATA SOCATA (later EADS Socata and DAHER-SOCATA) was a French producer of general aviation aircraft propelled by piston engines and turboprops, including business planes, small personal or training aircraft, as well as the production of aircraft stru ...
Division of Aerospatiale. After several iterations (in which Mooney eventually dropped out), that venture resulted in the
turboprop A turboprop is a Gas turbine, gas turbine engine that drives an aircraft Propeller (aeronautics), propeller. A turboprop consists of an intake, reduction drive, reduction gearbox, gas compressor, compressor, combustor, turbine, and a propellin ...
-powered TBM 700, in which the "M" stands for "Mooney".Ball 1998, pp. 175–178. The 301 prototype did not fly again after 1983. It rested in the Mooney Engineering Department for several years, then its wings were removed and the remainder was donated to an A & P school in
Abilene, Texas Abilene ( ) is a city in Taylor County, Texas, Taylor and Jones County, Texas, Jones counties, Texas, United States. Its population was 125,182 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Abilene metropolitan ar ...
.


Specifications


References


Bibliography

* * * {{Mooney Aviation Company aircraft 1980s United States civil utility aircraft Low-wing aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft
301 __NOTOC__ Year 301 ( CCCI) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Postumius and Nepotianus (or, less frequently, year 1054 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denominatio ...
Aircraft first flown in 1983 Aircraft with retractable tricycle landing gear Single-engined piston aircraft Abandoned civil aircraft projects of the United States