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donshapansky

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  1. Just checked a few panel shots, lowest one I found was 16,500 2450 @ 31 MAP with CDT 93 F some other shots at lower altitudes were all 103 - 105 F.
  2. I flew a Rocket for 5 years and 1000 hrs. I was told to run the 520 at more rpm than you are running. My numbers were 2450 @ 33 MAP LOP at 15.5 - 16.5 gph. TIT was always around 1560 - 1580 F I don't recall my CDT I will check some panel shots to see. I trued 195 Kts at 10 - 11 and 200 at 12.5 to 13.5. Prior to going to GAMI I ran 2450 @ 29 MAP at 22 gph In most cases running ROP or LOP I could usually close the cowl flaps completely, loved the one piece electric control. My hottest was always No. 5 never let it get above 380 F. I figure I paid for a complete engine OH saving roughly 7 gph.
  3. Hey Parker, It has been a while, I sold the business in 2018 and have been travelling a lot doing cruises, motorhome trips and building a street rod. The Aerostar is now in Canadian registry based in Vancouver, BC area.
  4. After the top OH I went back to GAMI and we finally got the jetting tighter and TIT remained below 1600 F and many cases below 1550 even running at 83% power (33"@2450 rpm). I think that in the next 250 hrs. I never ran ROP again because the fuel savings were 7 gph with no loss in speed at the high power settings. The Aerostar was always run ROP because it would not run LOP without exceeding 1650 F TIT unless we ran really low boost. But when both engines were running properly without the cylinder issues they both showed no oil discoloration . If the rings and cylinders are healthy I don't think the oil will turn dark very quickly. Sometimes the cylinder leak down may not show the ring problem as readily as you might think. That was certainly the case with the Rocket, it had been based in Florida when I bought it with only 50 SMOH, looking back I think there were some stuck rings even at that small amount of engine time. If you are based in Florida the humidity levels are a killer for corrosion. I remember working with Conair in BC, they worked with a lot of radial engines, if the airplane was out of service for more than a week or so they would treat the cylinders with preservative.
  5. In my experience with Continental engines first and then Lycoming engines on an Aerostar if the oil is getting dark to black in 10 -15 hrs. you have blow - by (rings are stuck or worn). Worn valve guides do not affect oil color. The Aerostar I bought after the Rocket had 75 hrs. since IRAN, it had not flown much in the past 3 years. I noticed the right engine was using some oil and left was not using much at all. The oil was dark in a few hrs. on the right engine not so on the left. At annual the shop called and saw the plugs on 3 cylinders were dark and the leak down rates had fallen into the mid 60's/80. So we pulled the 3 cylinders and sent them out. It turned out the cylinders had lost the " choke" shape. They resized the cylinders and replaced 2 valve guides. After that both engines oil stayed golden to the next change. These were TIO-540-J2BD 350 hp. engines from the Piper Navajo. 45 " MAP @2575 rpm flowing 45 gph at full power. I was always amazed at the acceleration on takeoff and climb, it would climb at 190 KIAS and 1000 ft./min. to well over 12.000 ft.
  6. I flew a 1988 252 Rocket for 1,000 hrs. in a 4 yr. period. I had lost a camshaft in the previous aircraft, which was an IO-520 (Bellanca Super Viking). Both aircraft were flown weekly with the same care. I used oil analysis with every change (30 - 40hrs.) and cut the filters open at every change. Using a magnet on the paper to look for iron particles. I never had any indication of the camshaft failure prior to the actual event, which turned out to be the loss of the stellite material on the tip of the hydraulic lifter. The EDM showed it immediately with a loss of EGT on No. 5. The cheat sheet I carried identified the problem precisely. The camshaft lobe was destroyed of course, that resulted in a bottom overhaul with only 590 hrs. SNEW After that failure I had read about Camguard and met the designer at Oshkosh and started to use it at every change with Phillips 15W50 all year, due to living in Texas. The Mooney had 50 SMOH when I bought it, it had ECI NIKISIL cylinders, over time the leak downs stayed in the 70's but the oil began to darken much sooner and it started to use a little bit of oil at about 500 hrs. Maxwell did all the oil changes and all the maintenance. At the next annual I decided to have the cylinders removed (750 hrs. SMOH) due to the oil getting dark. The overhaul guys in OK thought based on what I told them that I should not remove the cylinders, when they got the cylinders they called me to say that I was right to pull them. Three cylinders had stuck rings and several valve guides were worn beyond limits. The cylinders were in perfect shape, no taper and no out of round. When we reassembled the engine we put an air/oil separator on and then I could run 11qts. without blowing it out. The oil stayed clean, I could then run LOP without exceeding 1650F TIT. The oil stayed golden right to oil change time and the oil samples came back perfect every time. My experience made me realize the value of cutting filters open and doing oil analysis. I flew in the rocks a lot and at night when I had to, after losing a turbo one evening at 17,500 with a forced approach into Santa Rosa, I lost my appetite for single engine at night in the rocks. The air/oil separator saved the engine on the forced approach, because I was running 11qts. The time from loss of boost to landing was 12 minutes, it had blown out 8qts. in that time!
  7. After 30 years plus of flying I had my first of three failures (2) in my Rocket and 1 in my Aerostar 700. After 200 hrs. of ownership and at least one annual plus monthly oil changes due to my 30 - 40 hrs. per month flying time. At 17.500 at night from Eugene, OR to Ogden, UT I noticed my TIT rising very slowly. Over the next 30 minutes or so I had to keep increasing fuel flow to keep the TIT out of the red on my EDM 930. Once the mixture was close to full rich I declared an emergency into Idaho Falls the nearest to me at 90nm straight ahead. By the time I got close to the downwind position I was holding the prime button in continuously, once I was on final I released the prime button and dead-sticked it in. The airport manager helped me pull the aircraft off the runway to a tiedown position. The next morning we found the EDM fuel pressure sensor fitting had fractured and was spraying raw fuel on the left side engine cylinders! The cowling had been rubbing very slightly and went unnoticed by everyone including me. The next failure occurred at 17,500 eastbound from Farmington, NM to my home base in Granbury, TX, the sun was setting on a beautiful fall evening over Las Vegas, NM the MAP went to 15 inches, I knocked off the altitude hold and initiated a slow descent to Clovis, NM, where I knew a mechanic. Then I looked at the engine oil pressure and saw that it had dropped 20 PSI, I hit my 530 emergency airport list that I had set parameters for 4,000 ft. hard surface runway minimums and it picked Santa Rosa, NM 90 degrees to my right, at 1000'/min would put me straight in with winds down the runway. 12 minutes later we were on the ground safe and sound. The turbo bearing had failed and checking the oil there was no measurable amount left. The next morning we topped the engine up to my normal level of 11 quarts, and found it needed 8 to bring it back to normal. If I had not turned immediately to land and if I had not installed an air/oil separator a few months prior the engine would have been toast, I did hold a thousand feet in reserve all the way to short final in case it ran dry. The Aerostar was less exciting, departing Loveland, CO heading for Granbury through 15,000 the left engine boost was starting to fall and it was obvious it wasn't going to keep producing much power, so I diverted to Montrose, CO. Fortunately there was shop there that the owner was familiar with the Superstar II engine (TIO540J2BD) that is from the Chieftain Navajo. It was a fuel servo failure. So glad it didn't happen the day before as we were in icing conditions and turbulence from Vernal, UT.
  8. I found the key to cylinder life to be in the cylinder material coating called NIKISIL I had over 750 hrs on cylinders with lowest leak downs at 70/80. I operated at LOP at all times in cruise and full power climbs as per GAMI training. There has been a liquid cooled version certified but engine problems limited the application to a very few, it was 350 hp.
  9. I first had this temp issue on a different engine/airframe combo, an IO-520 in a Super Viking Bellanca. I had installed new cylinders, in this case Millenium II's. I noticed that EGT's had jumped quite a lot on climb out and of course CHT's were in the 400's in climb. I had been to the GAMI school just before and remembered that the target EGT's should be 1250 F at full throttle. In my case I was seeing 1450 F across the engine. So we started richening the fuel flow, it took 2 tries to get it correct. We started at 24.4 gph, which is the TCM spec. When I got down to the 1250 F range the fuel flows were at 29.0 gph. My cylinders all dropped in the 350 range even on a hot Texas day. My Mooney Rocket suffered with similar issues, I immediately had Maxwell start twisting the flows up, after 2 flights I've got it to where on a 100 F day everything stays in 350 - 370F and I'm turboed of course. The old formula used was 1 " per 1 gph, it worked exactly on the Rocket. If I owned any of these 4 cylinder Lyc's it would be the first priority to richen up until the EGT's hit the 1250 F range and watch the CHT's fall. It's a very simple relationship I learned racing 2 stroke snowmobiles and dirt bikes, any time we saw over 1250 we knew seizure of the piston was soon to follow especially on a fresh set pistons and cylinders with tight clearances. It beats me why most A&P's don't know this or were never taught this during their education and training. But I can tell you very few realize the importance of air fuel ratios as it relates to engine operating temps.
  10. Mine is mounted to the center post, and it has to pivot up when the glarshield is removed, be sure you don't misplace the little red plastic thingie, it is used to swing the compass. I have 850 hrs plus with it now and it is a great piece!
  11. My research is limited on the Columbia but I get all my avionics work done at Van Bortel since 2002 and spent a lot there upgrading 2 different airframes with better avionics and restoring pitot static intsruments. The pilots' comments are to a man that the 350 is gutless compared to the 400, they say the only appeal now to the Cessna 350 is that it is rare and that may cause the value to hold fairly flat. My bet is that it won't stay close to the Mooney unless you run it at the max end of the power scale, don't forget they performance numbers are shown at 2700 RPM. I guarantee you that annual cost will exceed the Mooney if you do the annuals at a Cessna dealer, they will remove all the auto pilot servos and check them for torque output, just that service will cost you $1,900.00 because the Cessna annual inspection calls for this. Maxwell acknowledges this but can also certify the aircraft as airworthy without this costly procedure. This is just one example, let alone surface cracks on the gel coat, rain errosion of the leading edges and cost associated with paint repairs on fiberglass surfaces, very few shops are capable and the cost is way up there. I think if you fly one the seats are tighter than the Mooney especially larger people have less room than the Mooney, there is no vertical seat adjustment except for different seat cushions, back angle adjustment is very crude, the pedals are adjustable to compensate somewhat, but the Mooney is a clear winner in the ergonomics area. Airframe strength is an unknown yet, the Mooney is well known as extremely strong, just read about the wing loading test, the test rig broke at 9 G's! You can't beat the steel chromoly airframe in a crash.
  12. I had trouble running LOP with high TIT's over 1700F while pulling through peak EGT's and then a rough running engine. Remember the first step is to do the spreadsheet and determine if all cylinders peak within .5 gph. Once you have the spread within spec then and only then will you get all cylinders to run minimum of -50F LOP. After I found a leakdown problem and rebuilt the cylinders, had the spread within .5 gph I could finally run smoothly LOP with max TIT's of 1580F at 70% power, I was able to easily increase 3 " MAP to gain back the power. My leanest cylinder is 85 - 90 LOP and richest -48 LOP. The last change I made was Tempest Plugs and that removed all of the roughness to where there is no sensation of marginal cylinder firing, which points to how critical plug voltages are to smooth LOP operations. You can operate at higher than 70% power on turbo engines if you can keep the TIT's down, because the CHT's will certainly permit high power settings like they do with TN550's. The low compression Lycomings will not run LOP at power settings of 65% and higher due to 1700+ TIT's
  13. If you don't go with the roller tappet mod I believe the Firewall Forward STC is very close to offering the same reliability. My Aerostar has this STC done by the gurus at Lycon Rebuilders in CA. The documents with this STC state that during the testing phase the failure rate of standard cam lobes was established at 35% and the official reduction with direct lube on each lobe after the mod was 2%! The Beechcraft Duke engines were notorius for cam issues and the STC has vitrually eliminated this malady on the Duke engine (380 hp @ 2900 rpm 45" MAP)
  14. Hi Parker; Yes it's very close to being snag free, in the past 3 months I've got 115 hrs time in it and have been to Canada in May for a week of winter like conditions in supposedly spring/summer time.
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