How tall are you? If you are not a very tall person you may be having a hard
time seeing over the cowl. The seats are very low in the Mooney since the
plane was designed for 6' + individuals.
What I like to do with students is to pull onto the runway and sit there
lined up with the runway (make sure the CFI is watching for traffic you have
your back too!). Really take the time to get used to the picture down the
runway with the plane on the ground. Notice where the runway edge intersects
your head (probably above your ears). Although some runways are more wide or
narrow the runway edge will always intersect your head at the same point
(its based only on your hight above the runway).
Also, when landing the Mooney understand that if the stall horn isn't even
going off you are far, far from landing speed. The Mooney will float and in
the begining you can use the stall horn to help determine when you should
allow the plane to sink below 3 feet. Anything faster than 65 knots or so
should be kept above 3 feet. The Mooney gets very upset if the nose wheel
touches first because there are no shocks. Because of the donut's
characteristics the nose will push back rather hard and bounce you back into
the air. You get 2 bounces for free, the 3rd will cost about $15,000.
As long as you control your speed in the Mooney, plan your decents far
enough out, and keep ahead of the plane you will find it a very nice, rather
easy plane to fly. It does not deserve the neg reputation it has for being
hard to fly.

-Robert, Mooney CFI


"Jon Kraus" wrote in message
...
We just purchased a'79 M20J 4443H. I am in the middle of getting my 10
hours with a CFI for Insurance purposes and I have to tell you that this
thing is a lot different to land than a Skyhawk. So far I am glad that
my CFI has been with me because 75 percent of the landings have not been
pretty. They are safe (mostly) but nothing you'd want the wife to film
with the video camera. I've got the speeds down good (100 on downwind,
90 on base and 80 on final) but getting it to the runway smoothly has
been a challange.

I've never flown a low wing plane before the Mooney and I am having a
problem with the sight picture working out for me. Is this a pretty
common issue in transitioning to these planes or should I just resign to
the fact that I'm not going to get as nice a landings in my Mooney as I
did in the Skyhawk .

Right now any stories would help out tremendously!! Thanks.

Jon Kraus
PP-ASEL-IA
Student Mooney Owner
'79 M20J 4443H @ TYQ