Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

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Paughco
Senior Master Sergeant
Posts: 2092
Joined: 30 Nov 2014, 12:27

Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by Paughco »

Guys: This updated file uses the weight & balance data available in the A2A POH to estimate weight & balance for your Bonanza before you takeoff. Use the Shift+4 panel to get empty weights, passenger, fuel and baggage weights, and plug the values into the unprotected (orange background) cells. Check takeoff weight and MOM/100 for your aircraft against the included Moment Limits vs. Weight chart. NOTE: This file has been updated by correcting the calculation for fuel used (forgot to multiply gallons by 6) and a whole new worksheet has been added for the Bonanza with tip tanks.

This file is in my Dropbox, available here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wc8rdxr0xy30p ... n.xls?dl=0.

Please let me know if you find any glitches.

Seeya
ATB
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ClipperLuna
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Joined: 23 May 2014, 12:50
Location: KPUW

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by ClipperLuna »

This looks great, Paughco, thanks. I like the feature that tells you what your balance will be at destination. I gather the Bo has a reputation for (potentially) going out of balance as fuel is burned if you're not careful about this.

triflyman
Senior Airman
Posts: 180
Joined: 17 Nov 2014, 12:56

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by triflyman »

Thanks for the worksheet. Just downloaded the V35B and was going to do a similar worksheet based on the Comanche one I did but then saw yours. Only question is the datum for the tip tanks. I see you used the same as the wing tanks but on the Comanche it is different, as I would expect the V35B to be. I could find no reference in the manual to the tip tanks position and wonder if A2A has this information...or if what you used is accurate.
Again...thanks for this worksheet.

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Jacques
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Joined: 26 Jun 2011, 17:54
Location: West Coast, USA

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by Jacques »

I haven’t had a chance to download this myself, but I saw a small reference in the A2A manual that wing tip tanks increase weight to 3600. Then a V35B manual I found mentions an arm of 90 for tip tanks and a weight of 24 (which makes no sense to me)...if those numbers help either of you.

triflyman
Senior Airman
Posts: 180
Joined: 17 Nov 2014, 12:56

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by triflyman »

Thanks...the arm of 90 is what I was looking for. Have modified the Tip Tank tab of the spreadsheet to reflect this.

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Paughco
Senior Master Sergeant
Posts: 2092
Joined: 30 Nov 2014, 12:27

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by Paughco »

Right after I posted my spreadsheet, I found an app for Bonanza operations for the iPhone: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bonanza ... 38344?mt=8. It has way more features than just weight and balance.

Here are more details on the Bonanza Society web page: https://www.bonanza.org/community/membe ... mance-app/

They also have a web app: http://pohperformance.com/Bonanza/.

I'm not advertising this thing; it's free, anyway. I just like to get into the nitty gritty of flight planning. I just don't want to do a full-on reenactment of "The Day The Music Died!" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_the_Music_Died

Seeya
ATB
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triflyman
Senior Airman
Posts: 180
Joined: 17 Nov 2014, 12:56

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by triflyman »

Great find...remarkable app. I'm going to try it out for my flight planning tonight. I did notice they had the arm for the baggage at 150 where your spreadsheet had it at 180. I double checked the A2A manual and found it at 150 so changed your app.

Again, thanks.

Garry

EnDSchultz
Technical Sergeant
Posts: 504
Joined: 24 Feb 2014, 20:05

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by EnDSchultz »

In my mind, there is little point in doing W&B calculations beyond a very speculative guess when we don't know what the empty CG of the aircraft is. The W&B section in the manual cites an empty weight of 2,088. Contemporary definitions of basic empty weight include full fluids (oil and hydraulic) and unusable fuel. With my Bo empty, full oil, 3 gallons (unusable) in each main tank, and no tip tanks, it shows an empty weight of 2,321. The type of engine installed doesn't affect the weight. So that's over 200lbs of phantom weight in the simulated aircraft from some combination of presumably optional equipment, and all the moments that go along with it.

A2A do all their flight testing in real aircraft, so surely they didn't pull that weight out of thin air? It's too bad the W&B form in the manual is so generic and isn't more closely based off whatever aircraft they derived their empty weight from.

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TatoBean
Airman First Class
Posts: 68
Joined: 27 Feb 2020, 15:16

Re: Weight & Balance Spreadsheet

Post by TatoBean »

Resurecting this topic, because I'm currently swapping out my stock avionics for the GTN6/750's. And like any pilot/mechanic I know that's going to change the empty weight and CG of the airplane.

With a basic FSX airplane (And I'd imagine there's a place to get to this info in other sims too) we can go to the aircraft.CFG file and change empty weight, CG, reference datum, station locations, and the list just goes on and on. Pulling up this file in FSX gives us an empty weight of 2265 lbs and 0.89 feet ahead of the FSX reference point (1/4 Chord of the wing). Would it be possible to just drop a couple pounds here and move the CG back a touch (Calculating reasonable numbers obviously) or is the empty weight of this thing stored elsewhere?
Let the potato rest for 5 minutes.

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