Ratherbflying

And what kind of data plan would be required for your "GSM to access"?

Yetti, all nice things to have, but would require a persistent wi-fi connection which would be, if not available at your hangar, $10-40 month. The nice thing about the cell switch set up is that you can use alarm-system-style plans that are readily available for $3/month. Perfect for a cheap bastard such as I and my partners. If you do pursue, I have a Python code daemon I wrote to get my raspberry pi to do the simple on/off functions that I would be glad to contribute to the cause.

+1. TMobile is the only option left for GSM.

https://www.savvyaviation.com/wp-content/uploads/articles_eaa/EAA_2014-11_prebuy-dos-and-donts.pdf From the article: The purpose of an annual inspection (defined by FAR §43.15) is to identify all airworthiness discrepancies, whether trivial discrepancies that cost $50 to cor- rect or major catastrophes that cost $50,000 to resolve. Once started, an annual inspection must continue to completion of all inspection checklist items, and always results in a logbook entry (per FAR §43.11) that declares the aircraft air- worthy or unairworthy.

Make sure your mechanic knows the proper way to clean fine wire plugs. Treating them like massives could be the reason the plug was damaged. http://www.tempestplus.com/Portals/0/PDFs/Sparkplug Cleaning The Right Way 061212.pdf

Done.

Um... yeah. The reason this keeps coming up is: 1) There are a number of different manufacturers in China getting in on producing these boxes. The later ones appear to have cut corners (e.g. Putting in a wimpy 10 amp PCB-mounted fuse instead of a 20 amp socket mounted fuse) on the boxes they make. 2) Another way they cut corners is to reuse the translated-to-English specifications from the original design. So, no way they can handle anywhere close to 18 amps, but they say they do anyway. 3) 18 amps is more than enough to handle most engine heaters and a small ceramic heater on low/medium setting. 4) We get these boxes and think they can handle 18 amps, and bam... fuse blows. Yes, we lose time and perhaps don't fly on a day we meant to, but we stick it back in the box and Amazon makes good financially. Welcome to Amazon and the "new economy"... globally produced crap that may be true to the design specifications or may not. Fortunately, they are funded by a permanently high stock market and don't have to worry about things like profits and loss, so they happily refund our money or send us a replacement box. If I ordered a new one of these, the first thing I would do is open it up and take a look at the internal wiring, and more specifically the fuse, in order to understand what I really had.

First of all, as others have said, congratulations and great job on getting yourself safely on the ground. I find that any problem is multiplied by 10 in intensity if I'm IMC, and sounds like you handled it like a pro. And I do understand that after a stressful event, anything, especially a brush with the FAA, isn't going to be welcome. But in reading your description of the inspectors actions, and sitting out here in the cheap seats, I don't find this alarming. Your profile says that you are near ATL... did the event happen in/near ATL airspace? If so, as we all know, they are kind of protective of that particular airspace, and they probably have FSDO inspectors sitting on their ass just to chase down things like this when they happen. And the fact that the inspector wanted to check out the repairs gives me the sense that maybe he had prior experience with something like this. Again, fantastic job handling the emergency. You took the right actions, and the investigation being closed without any further action absolutely proves it.

I didn't install a fuse holder. The real estate on the circuit board is pretty tight, and I agreed with larryb that this particular version of the GSM switch was never going to handle the claimed load, so I soldered in the replacement fuse and committed to babying the thing from here on out. Here's the fuse: http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/85-11226

Does your heater have a Low or Medium setting? I ran mine on Low for a good twenty minutes and the relay handled it well.

OK, fuse is fixed. Relay is installed. Works like a champ. Using an old cell phone charger to supply the control signal. Whacked the old connector off, stripped the wires, and attached the relay connector. This relay box is a very elegant design. It is rated for 1440 watts, which is just a titch less than the 1500 watt ceramic heater on high heat, but the relay includes an On/Off breaker switch. If you do inadvertently pull too much, should be able to just manually reset the circuit. And here it is deployed in the hangar. It will be nice to hop in to a warm cabin and not have the gyros screech from the cold when I flip the master on.

I have been looking and looking to find somewhere to buy the optional temperature sensor probe and finally found it this afternoon: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Free-shipping-Accessories-temperature-sensor-for-Smart-Socket-Switch-SC3-GSMT/272468695702?_trksid=p2047675.c100009.m1982&_trkparms=aid%3D888007%26algo%3DDISC.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D38530%26meid%3Da679215657b845f6a624a795f7de32dc%26pid%3D100009%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D1%26sd%3D222047670491

In the picture, on the right hand side, there is a green-ish 2 wire connector. This is the signal voltage and it can accept either AC or DC. So my plan is to take an old cell phone charger, cut the connector off, strip the wires, and input to the relay. Then I can plug the block into the Andoer. Sorry for being so slow to get this done, but I still have guests coming and going for the holidays. Here is how I plan to wire it: 1. Wall outlet to the Andoer. 2. Andoer Socket 1 - to the engine heater. 3. Andoer Socket 2 - modified cell phone charger to the relay. 4. Wall outlet to the Relay. 5. Ceramic block heater plugged in to the relay.

Wow, I am jealous. Mine has a wimpy 10mm fuse, and it's soldered on to the board, not clipped. That is pretty much the exact load I had on it when the fuse blew. I had just added the ceramic block heater this year. It worked for the duration of my test when I set things up, but the first time I used it for real (turning the ceramic heater on 30 minutes before I got to the airport) I arrived to find the fuse blown. I considered trying to modify the fuse to make it a bit more robust, but I'm going to add one of these to the setup instead: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00WV7GMA2/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1