Evening everyone,

If I have misplaced this post or reposted a topic recently discussed I do apologize for doing so, I looked and didn't see anything posted relating to the Cessna 210 Centurion. I am currently looking for BCPilots who operate Cessna 210's. More specifically the 210T, I am working on finalizing things with a potential pilot job flying a 210 and am looking for a little insight on the 210 from pilots who have good amount of time in it. Anyone on BCP know of someone that they could point me in the right direction to maybe message? Thanks for the help everyone! Stay sharp, and fly safe!

Good machine. I assume you mean turbo 210?

Slippery going downhill, use the landing gear to slow down in turbulence if you're in the yellow arc, late ones have a higher gear extension speed. Nail the speeds so you don't float on landing. Keep the nose gear actuator down locks clean of oil and dirt. Look after the engine like any turbocharged big bore continental. Make sure the maintenance shop has the Cessna gear rigging tools and knows how to use them. Don't leave the fuel on both when parked. Otherwise fly it like any other Cessna and you'll have a ball

T210R... Check out the TAS

onefitty wrote:Good machine. I assume you mean turbo 210?

Slippery going downhill, use the landing gear to slow down in turbulence if you're in the yellow arc, late ones have a higher gear extension speed. Nail the speeds so you don't float on landing. Keep the nose gear actuator down locks clean of oil and dirt. Look after the engine like any turbocharged big bore continental. Make sure the maintenance shop has the Cessna gear rigging tools and knows how to use them. Don't leave the fuel on both when parked. Otherwise fly it like any other Cessna and you'll have a ball

T210R... Check out the TAS

That's correct, the T210.

I took the time to read the book "Flying the Cessna 210 - The Secrets Unlocked by Chuck McGill and it had what seemed to be some great information in there, one of which you mentioned. That TAS is pretty high up there, least for me in the 172 I'm usually in. Thank you very much for your time and insight!

I just sold my T210L. I flew it for 800 hours in the time I owned it. I was very involved in the maintenance. I didn't buy the rigging tools until my last year of ownership. If it goes up and down properly, it doesn't need constant adjustment. If you're flying someone else's airplane, maintenance may not be your perogative anyway.

You need to operate the engine however the owner asks you. Power settings, fuel flows, etc. Should be in the company SOPs. I ran mine Lean of peak, burning 14.7 GPH and making 160 KTS. You can go faster, but I found this to be the sweet spot for my machine. Keep the cylinder temps under 380° always. Add more fuel,, open the flaps, lower the nose, but never exceed these temps and you'll never have to feel guilty about costing the company a cylinder.

As for the gear, it's very strong, but needs TLC. Lay on your back with a rag and wipe down all the workings. Get to know it. Give it some love. Blow the dirt out with compressed air. Wipe down the oleo with some oil, never clean it to the point that it's dry and rolls an O-ring. Pay attention to the condition of the wires going to the uplock and downlock switches. Make sure the switches don't get sticky. If you really want to go the extra mile, read the trouble shooting guide in the service manual, and relate each symptom and cure back to the hydraulic and electrical schematics. Knowing the sequence of the gear operating system will help you to identify quirks before they become problems.

As for the flying, know the speeds, and fly them, as was stated above. The machine will behave exactly as you expect it to if you're consistent with configurations and power settings. The one I had was equipped with Robertson STOL. I won't comment much further about the performance, because it really was not you're standard T210.

If you want more specifics, please let us know which model, and what specific handling qualities you need to know more about. Where will it operate. What's the mission? Whether it was built without main gear doors, or has had them removed, or still has them, is also a major variable.

Pinecone wrote:I just sold my T210L. I flew it for 800 hours in the time I owned it. I was very involved in the maintenance. I didn't buy the rigging tools until my last year of ownership. If it goes up and down properly, it doesn't need constant adjustment. If you're flying someone else's airplane, maintenance may not be your perogative anyway.

You need to operate the engine however the owner asks you. Power settings, fuel flows, etc. Should be in the company SOPs. I ran mine Lean of peak, burning 14.7 GPH and making 160 KTS. You can go faster, but I found this to be the sweet spot for my machine. Keep the cylinder temps under 380° always. Add more fuel,, open the flaps, lower the nose, but never exceed these temps and you'll never have to feel guilty about costing the company a cylinder.

As for the gear, it's very strong, but needs TLC. Lay on your back with a rag and wipe down all the workings. Get to know it. Give it some love. Blow the dirt out with compressed air. Wipe down the oleo with some oil, never clean it to the point that it's dry and rolls an O-ring. Pay attention to the condition of the wires going to the uplock and downlock switches. Make sure the switches don't get sticky. If you really want to go the extra mile, read the trouble shooting guide in the service manual, and relate each symptom and cure back to the hydraulic and electrical schematics. Knowing the sequence of the gear operating system will help you to identify quirks before they become problems.

As for the flying, know the speeds, and fly them, as was stated above. The machine will behave exactly as you expect it to if you're consistent with configurations and power settings. The one I had was equipped with Robertson STOL. I won't comment much further about the performance, because it really was not you're standard T210.

If you want more specifics, please let us know which model, and what specific handling qualities you need to know more about. Where will it operate. What's the mission? Whether it was built without main gear doors, or has had them removed, or still has them, is also a major variable.

Thanks for the information, it is infact someone else plane. I'll be flying between 10 and 17,000 feet I've been told taking pictures operating in and out of paved airports. It's a 1982 Cessna T210N and as far as the gear doors, it was made without. Sorry don't know much more about it, just in the beginning of this gig getting things all set and just looking for insight from others and their experiences in T210s.

Mine had gear doors. I favour them, but no doors has an advantage. You can deploy the gear at a higher speed when you need some drag to slow down or decend. The 310 hp engine is a bit tougher to keep cool in the climb. I flew my airplane with the 285 hp engine, then upgraded to 310. Still manageable.

You're going to get a real kick out of it. I don't miss mine. I had my fun, and am more enthusiastic about the 185, but I'm gratified to see the thrill the new owner is getting from it.

Join the Cessna Pilots Association. A plethora of good info on all the 210 models. Well worth the money.

I had a T210M for a year and put over 200 hours on it traveling all over the country and wish I had it back. What a great traveling machine. I flew LOP at about 12.5 gph and 150-155 knots true. Routinely flew 5 hour legs and landed with an hour of fuel. You can push fuel and get there faster, but my legs rewarded skipping a fuel stop by LOP.

Most of my flights were at 8-10 thousand feet, but we took it higher sometimes. My recollection is that when you get above 13,000 or so, it is harder to run LOP and it is more important that the turbo system really works well. It's been a few years and I don't remember the details (you can get the info on CPA) but the turbo system needs to be well maintained to work optimally.

I was partnered in a T210R for about a year. We bought the airplane new in the Fall of 1985. It was quite a traveling machine, but frankly not a lot of fun to fly. This was back in the day before engine analyzers were common, so running LOP was not common, either.

Here are just some random thoughts, recollections from 30 years ago:
>It was heavy in all respects, especially in pitch with only 2 aboard. With a full load, pitch forces were much less. This brings out an important issue: when you get checked out in it, make sure you fly it fully loaded with aft CG part of the time, because it's an entirely different airplane with aft CG vs. forward CG.
>The flaps on a 210 do not provide nearly the lift of the semi-Fowler flaps of other Cessna singles. You'll notice that there's not as much change in the book stall speeds with flaps extended vs. no flaps, compared to other Cessna singles. Consequently, you can't slow down quite as much on the approach, and it will break ground later on the take off, even with flaps extended 10 or 20 degrees. Using the POH approach speed figures does work quite well, however.
>The built-in oxygen system has many places for leaks to occur, so that needs to be maintained. To save on oxygen, there are now kits which allow the use of Flow-meters and Oxymizer cannulas with the stock oxygen system--highly recommended, instead of oxygen masks, up to 18,000'.
>If you shove the throttle forward too fast, the engine will overspeed a little before the governor catches it. Newbie 210 pilots can be detected by the waaWAAwaa sound when they're first starting to roll. With all that power out front, too fast a throttle will also yaw the airplane to the left enough that the nose tire will wear out much quicker as you apply more needed right rudder. So apply the throttle more slowly, and let the airplane build up some rolling speed before pushing the throttle in all the way. You won't give away your newbie status, you'll save the tire, and the airplane will be easier to control.
>With no gear doors, the gear extension speed (Vlo) and gear down speed (Vle) are the same, and it's pretty high, just below normal cruise. So by reducing throttle just a little and slowing the airplane only about 5-10 knots, you can drop the gear, which acts as a reasonably OK speed brake.
>As with all Cessna single retracts, it's important to understand how the gear extension system works. It's electro-hydraulic, which means that there is a tiny motor which turns a hydraulic pump, which extends and retracts the gear. That brings up several issues:
*If the gear switches aren't working correctly, that little pump can burn out by continuing to run after the gear has reached its full travel.
*If there are any hydraulic leaks, the reservoir will get lower with each cycling, and pretty soon the gear won't go up or down.
*During preflight, it's critical that the landing gear switch is down before turning on the master. But (and this isn't in the POH that I recall) it's also critical that the emergency gear lever is down all the way. It's designed so that the telescoping lever can't be pushed in unless it's down all the way, but there's enough slop in it that it is possible to cram the telescoping lever back without it being down all the way. If that happens, there will be enough bleed through that the electric pump can't develop enough pressure to get the gear down and locked.
*For emergency gear extension, my recollection is that the circuit breaker should be pulled, then put down the switch lever, then extend the telescoping lever of the emergency gear lever, and then pump and pump and pump--it seems to take forever. I've done it during training while shooting an ILS by hand, but if I had a gear problem for real, I'd want to stay out of the pattern, get the gear down, and then come back for the landing.

I think the single hardest thing for most people transitioning from slower Cessna singles is getting used to the speed of a 210. It's a fast airplane, and it will take you awhile to acclimate to that. But there's no reason at all to be concerned, just be prepared. Start letting down sooner, start slowing down sooner, and get it down to the speeds you're used to using, well before you get to your intended landing destination. But don't be surprised if that takes you a good many hours before you're comfortable with it.

Cary

(edit)PS--I just thought of another point. If you're used to the left/both/right fuel valve of a 172 or 182 and you normally leave it on "both", you have to develop a reliable means of remembering to switch tanks, because the T210 has only left or right (and off). For me, that is to switch every half hour. Others use every hour. But especially if you're using the autopilot, you won't notice the wing getting heavy as the other one runs low on fuel. I had a friend who pranged his T210 while doing some lower level "reconnaissance" at about 1000' AGL--he was looking at some rural property to buy--he was slow cruising on autopilot and he ran one tank out. Before he could get it restarted on the other tank, he had no choice but to set it in. Luckily, he found a reasonably flat place to set down and did relatively minimal damage to the airplane.

C

See (edit) PS previous post.

C

Good point. I set up my Garmin 796 with a timer to remind me to switch tanks. That worked the best of anything I tried. Always made sure that the G in GUMP meant fuel on the fullest tank for landing or takeoff.