Friend of mine just bought a 1975 185, got it to my hangar yesterday. Starting research on 550 kit for it. Years ago I put the Bonaire 550 kit on my 185 and was very happy with it. Since I have just been thrust back into the 185 world after not following the type for the last 20 years I need to get spooled back up to speed quickly on a few of the mods and their sources. I understand that Bonaire no longer supplies the 550 kit and it has changed hands. Do any of you know who has it and their contact info? Also, who else has a kit? I think Wipair has one if I remember correctly. What prop are all of you running? Buddy is looking for all around performance in a prop, good cruise with descent pull and as quiet as possible without sacrificing performance, I know, a unicorn. Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated. Cant make calls to vendors until Tuesday and thought it would be great to get input.

I wonder what the going rate is for engine, prop and STC are these days. If I remember correctly it was around $42,000 in 1995 when I did mine. I can only imagine how much these days!
Thanks

Kurt

Call Donna at Davis Aviation. They took over the Bonaire conversion. https://www.davisaviation.cc/cessna-185/

As for prop, I would be putting a new hartzeop voyager on there if the STC allows. From talking with 185 owners and now one 206 owner(just got certified for the 206), they out perform anything else on the market hands down.
Whipaire and Air plains also do 550 conversions.

For my 206, I just received a quote the other day from AirPower for a factory remanufactured I0550-F20B for $46,773. My core is an Io520f, which adds a $3500 to dissimilar core fee.

You can get the STC and an install kit from Donna at Davis aviation, she sells the new Forager prop, currently if you join RAF, you can get $1000 off of the propeller as a member, which puts it in the low $13,000 range, which is more than 7000 less than an MT.

Since you need a new or remarked manifold pressure gauge and tach, I am putting that money towards the new EI engine monitor which replace factory gauges.

G44 wrote:Friend of mine just bought a 1975 185, got it to my hangar yesterday. Starting research on 550 kit for it. Years ago I put the Bonaire 550 kit on my 185 and was very happy with it. Since I have just been thrust back into the 185 world after not following the type for the last 20 years I need to get spooled back up to speed quickly on a few of the mods and their sources. I understand that Bonaire no longer supplies the 550 kit and it has changed hands. Do any of you know who has it and their contact info? Also, who else has a kit? I think Wipair has one if I remember correctly. What prop are all of you running? Buddy is looking for all around performance in a prop, good cruise with descent pull and as quiet as possible without sacrificing performance, I know, a unicorn. Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated. Cant make calls to vendors until Tuesday and thought it would be great to get input.

I wonder what the going rate is for engine, prop and STC are these days. If I remember correctly it was around $42,000 in 1995 when I did mine. I can only imagine how much these days!
Thanks

Kurt

I'm watching a 182 get a IO520 conversion. The bill, with a prop and labor will be 90-100k. Of course, a bit of extra labor going from carburated to injection.

Looks like Texas Skyways, Wipaire, and Davis offer it

P.Ponk offers the paperwork on the IO-550 conversion for a reasonable fee. Like some of their other conversions, the prop option is limited. A friend of mine used this conversion and is very happy with it.

https://pponk.com/engines/

Thanks for the intel guys!

Kurt

I’m running the PPONK STC, and an MT prop. Very satisfied. Pponk doesn’t STC the MT on the Pponk IO-550, but MT does.

Donna ran the show back in the day at Bonaire and still does.
They don't come any better than Donna Jones.
I have purchased several engines and several STC's and they have been awesome. Most recently a 550 for my 61 185.
Total knowledge and customer service.

Thanks guys!

Kurt