Welcome to ownership. If my experience is any indication, after pouring
money into it for a few year to get it the way you want it, the money
flow will lessen except for the inevitable periodic
failures/replacements (e.g. exhaust system).

re the pump; a wet pump without backup still puts you in a life
threatening situation if it happens while in IMC. Assuming you maintain
your partial panel skills, there is plenty of evidence that the failure
to recognize the problem fast enough can be deadly. Clearly the wet
pump reduces the chances but it does nothing to mitigate the risk if it
does happen. The Precise Flight setup does give you that though it is
not perfect. I would suggest that if you do decide to rely on one pump
without backup, you should install a vacummn failure light (perhaps that
is already a Cardinal feature?). That gives you what is arguably the
most important component of the PF system, a warning of the failure. If
you know it failed, you can immediately respond and perhaps avoid the
main problem in such a failure, that is, detecting it quickly.

Also, from a cost perspective, if you don't plan to fly in actual this
year, then don't bother with the pump work. But it sounds like if you
don't do the pump work, then you have the funds to get your IFR. Catch-22

wrote:
Maule Driver wrote:

It all sounds like good stuff but it's more of a set of small

upgrades

than an annual.

MD,

The most likely real annual job is the vaccum pump replacement. With
the expected life of dry pump being 500hrs and the fact that they
sometimes die without any advanced warning steered us toward the
2000hrs-life wet pump instead of getting a new dry pump + the Precise
Flight backup system.

You are right that these are more of a set of upgrades than what
needed for an annual but an annual downtime is a good opportunity to
'upgrade' and fix little things which are not exactly airworthiness
issue but can give us a peace of mind such as adding shoulder harnesses
to the backseat, going with a more reliable pump etc..

When we first looking into buying a plane two years ago, we never
thought of having to continue pumping greenbacks to it. It's almost
like an addiction, you keep having the urge to feed the habit ;-) I had
thought of delaying the paint job until next year so that we could
spend on the IFR trips. Last weekend in seeing little flakes of paint
came off while we were cleaning snow and ice of the poor Cardinal, I
swore that I could hear our pet bird crying "I need a new plumage"!
Hai Longworth