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Which model to buy.
Not to ad to the nauseum, on turbo vs NA, but I'm still unable to make the call. I've read just about everything I can find on the subject from Mike Busch's treatise on turbos, to the information found here. I get the cost considerations (I think), and the operational challenges (I think), but not the mission requirements part.
In short, the mission will be 1-3 hour trips (and back) twice a month, and a few $300 burgers ($400 with engine reserves). The base is the NY tri-state area. Destinations are like Quebec, Winston-Salem, Maine--that sort of thing. So nothing a cowboy would refer to as mountainous (though one day I'd like to cross that stuff too--at least once). Steering me toward a turbo is the prospect of stranding anxious passengers far away on a Cumulus-filled Sunday afternoon (say 17k-footers) because I don't have a turbo. (still part 91, to be clear). I don't fancy the choice between stranding them and terrifying them. Then of course there's weather that you really need to climb out of. The turbo could rise above all of that (couldn't resist--sorry). With only a POH to go on, it looks to me like a 71 C-model full of friends isn't making any hasty climbs out of bumpy stuff or ice.
Should I buy a turbo for the occasional cumulus-soaked Sunday? I don't know--a lot of Sundays are that way in northeast summers, and I'm concerned those outings will become more occasional with each stranding/terror.
Thoughts?
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