Great thread, thanks for sharing all the details Mike


I just competed my Phase 1-4 so now I have done all the inspections.

Nothing too bad but brakes and a few smaller items. Brakes are not cheap. $5k per side and $20k core. Apparently they charge some on your core if you don’t send them back perfect. So might be more than that.

Other items also came up like fuel leak $6k and some engine inlet issues that was $10k per side. Haha that one hurt.

But overall it’s been pretty good on maintenance and I am having similar experience as Mike C. The legacy citation can be flown relatively cheap.

I paid as much if not more to maintain my 421. After flying the Eagle II I will never go back to a prop plane, piston or TP.

Mike

Who did you send your brakes to? I want to find the shops that do that work and not pay middlemen.

My brakes are lasting forever. One side since 2012, other side since 2019, and I have a huge amount left on the wear indicator pin (like half an inch).

I land on speed, use TRs, and I am gentle with the brakes. I'll pull a TR on taxi if going too fast rather than drag a brake. You don't have TRs with the FJ44 conversion, so brakes are used more for your operations.


I had a number of leaking fuel panels that I replaced in 2021 plus resealed a few hyloks. Now my plane doesn't leak at all. People who tolerate leaking Citations just don't know how to properly fix them. It isn't that hard, at least it wasn't for me.


You have FJ44, right? So your inlets are not like mine.


Compared to me, you send less on fuel with smaller plane with FJ44, but you spend money on the engine program.

Mike C.

This makes more sense to me. If my math is right, his phase 1-4 is just over $40k.

I'm still blown away by Mike's $10k. I just don't see how an old plane can have nothing wrong.

Edit: Bad math. It was over $40k.

This makes more sense to me. If my math is right, his phase 1-4 is just over $30k.

I'm still blown away by Mike's $10k. I just don't see how an old plane can have nothing wrong.

Agreed. Plenty was found wrong at my phase 1-4. My shop fixes little stuff as they are doing the base inspection so they don't always appear as line items in the invoice.

Plenty was found wrong in the preceding months as well. 2021 was fixing a lot of little things. No brakes, fuel leaks, bad shutoff valve, broken windshield deice modulator valve, improperly setup vapor cycle air conditioner, broken landing light, bad squat switch, etc. I've forgotten half of the things I have fixed.

Having maintenance on the field means I fix things quickly rather than fly around with a partially broken airplane.

The plane also had its innards all out during the avionics refit, and we found and fixed a number of things at that time, too. Any time the plane is apart, I look at everything I can see and check it all out to be right.

The plane is in way better shape than when I got it. There were lots of subtle things broken all over it that I tracked down.

I might go add up 2021 and see what it was like. It was definitely a startup year, I didn't get the airplane until May after the avionics refit, not something I would think is typical operating year.

Mike C.

Mike never said he didn't find ANYTHING wrong. Just nothing major. The way to do that is just fix squawks as they happen instead of waiting for a big inspection (and for the problem to get worse). Airplanes don't wait to break during a big inspection. Like Mike I have maintenance on field so if I notice something wrong I get it fixed.

I'm probably jinxing myself here as I haven't finished my 1-4 (just the gear checks to go - waiting on a new drain plug for the hydraulic mule from TronAir) but so far the only issues have been:
-1 loose bleed air connection in the tail requiring new peri seals.
-Nearly every screw in the door threshold plate was stripped - mechanic installed new nut plates in the floor.
-One piece of ducting from a heat exchanger in the tail to the outside had a few tears in it.
-2 quarter-sized spots with corrosion on my flaps (one on the top of each flap).
-1 slowly leaking fuel drain in the right wing (installed a new o ring).

A couple other maintenance calendar items lined up with the 1-4 like hydro'ing my nitrogen bottle and replacing one of my fire extinguishers (it was due for hydro but my mechanic said having that done was almost the same price as a new one so I ordered a new one and mounted the old one in my shop at home).

So we certainly did find some things and I was able to learn a lot more about my plane. But the idea that you have to pay $50k+ in order for it to be a "REAL" inspection is BS on a well-maintained plane (or you're paying TEB shop rates). To be fair I was an active participant in all stages. I did things like pulling floor panels, removing the aft baggage panels, etc. while my mechanic was checking other things. This definitely saved me a few hours of shop time.

It continues to amaze me how so many people in this industry think that jets have to be expensive because they are jets. Yes, they burn a lot of fuel, but outside of that they are just an airplane. If you take care of them and fix things along the way, your major inspections will be pretty simple, whether we're talking about an annual on a Bo or a Phase 1-4 on a jet.

I completely agree.

If Mike maintained his plane that way, there would be a list of small fixes and the associated expenses throughout the year. We don't see that in the accounting.

Under "maintenance" we see two maintenance entries (not fees) for the entire year.
A "battery and tire check" in August, and a "Phase 1-4 and other inspections" in December.

There are no other maintenance charges for an entire year.

Those don't seem to last, I'm looking into why. I'd love to replace the peri seal with some sort of silicone coupler which would last a lot longer and not leak as much. Leaking peri seal means extra fuel usage on the engine (bleed air leak) and hotter ambient air in the aft compartment that makes the ACM and vapor cycle system work harder.


From the vapor cycle condenser? I have new ducting the replace that on mine. Mine is still "okay" but getting old. A little complex because it is 8 inch ducting and that's rare to find, took me 5 months to get some.

Or from the windshield bleed air heat exchanger? That's simple 3 inch ducting.

I never use CAT/SCAT any more, I pay extra for CEET/SCEET, the double wall stuff. Seems to last longer.


Cool feature of Citation fuel drains is that you can change the o-ring WITHOUT draining the tank. Nice!

[youtube]https://youtu.be/hTkIVsFZimg[/youtube]


I think he is wrong unless you can get fire bottles REALLY cheap. I sent my fire bottle to O'Brien Enterprises (Signal Hill, CA) and they recover the contents, check the hydro test, and put the contents back in, saving a ton of money over new contents or even a new bottle. My bottle check was $425. The painful part is shipping since the bottles are haz mat, but that's true for ordering a new one, too.

Mike C.

You didn't see 2021 which was a lot of things going wrong. It was actually a bit discouraging, always something to fix.

Very little went wrong in 2022.

Mike C.

The Columbia 400/350 have the same fuel drains. A handy feature indeed. So far, haven't needed it.

Although, many pilots including myself, have found the metal probe on a Gatts sampler jar is too big around, and easily jams the drain open. The tester cup supplied with the plane has a smaller metal probe and doesn't cause an issue. It's the same as the ASA sampler cup.

Cool design!

What seals the tank while you're replacing the o-ring? Is there a second o-ring that engages during the replacement of the first one?

Our first year was painful. for the last year its been pretty dang solid.

If I didn't have the engine inlet issue my 1-4 would have been less than $30K

They found a few smaller items that were easy to fix.

I for sure go thru more brakes than I should. I seem to land faster than I should and not comfortable being on speed as it feels too slow. Haha. I am getting better at it. So I am fast and have to use more brakes than I should. Also I have a couple pilots flying my plane that do not pay for the brakes and I am sure they get off the first exit they can. Haha

Also my brakes were kind of worn when I got the plane two years ago.

The last 90 days I flew 50 hours and mostly shorter run ways (5kish) and shorter flights. Never missed a beat. Kept waiting for something to break as with my Prop planes something would have given after that many flights. 40 flights in June-July and not one maintenance issue. They love to be flown often thats for sure.

Mike

What's the base price on a 1-4?

Mine was $17,625 for 1-4

Mike

Mine was $17,625 for 1-4

Mike