DXB

Unplug it before it turns on us

What you describe is a striking example of the "argument dilution" effect: the human brain erroneously averages the strength of weak vs. strong evidence in considering a viewpoint rather than weighting each piece of evidence based on strength and then treating them additively. I recently learned about this from a fascinating discussion of this phenomenon on the NPR show Hidden Brain - a transformative insight that I now consider when trying to support any viewpoint or assertion. I suspect good trial lawyers know this stuff intuitively. https://hiddenbrain.org/podcast/less-is-more/

Despite the relatively modest hours (5k) on my 55 year old M20C, one thing that worries me about this geriatric bird is that the spar must be inspected annually for continued airworthiness - seemingly a very reasonable requirement. However, there is a portion of the spar that cannot readily be inspected. There was someone here who stripped his tanks for reseal only to find a corroded spar under the sealant that totaled the airframe. That part of my spar is now hidden by bladders, and I'm sure no one looked under the sealant before they were put in.

That's a pretty good idea. And now with so many folks going with a left Surefly that's good for 2000 hours, just having a spare right mag ready to go may be all that is needed.

Trent continues to fight it further in federal court - the pending case puts the suspension on continued hold and further enhances Trent's profile - and whether he ultimately wins or loses, his skill in monetizing his aviation folk hero status on social media will likely more than offset the expense of protracted litigation. I bet his end game is a US Supreme Court case, not a victory in the next round, which would make us forget him far faster And right or wrong, anyone fighting to emasculate federal bureaucrats through legal channels is a bit of a hero in my book

It seems most likely to lead to nothing, but the FAA and other bureaucracies do inexplicably capricious things at times - for instance look up the ongoing Trent Palmer saga. The NASA (ASRS) Report does provide a nice get out of jail free card for one unintentional, non-criminal screw up every five years. Filing is super easy, can be done within 10 days of the incident, and has no downside at all in your situation: https://asrs.arc.nasa.gov/report/caveat.html?formType=general I've probably filed around 3-4 times over the years for my more significant screw ups that ATC brought to my attention, even though I've never been given a number to call.

A few related thoughts: = file the NASA report ASAP - it will get you off the hook in case of an enforcement action since you didn't do anything willful or egregious - Consider that you have 24 hours to make the call after being given a number- it provides enough time to consult AOPA pilot protection svcs, aviation lawyer etc. - probably advice most important for the pros but still may be relevant here - I've had pretty good luck in the past using my iphone with the engine idling to get my release, though it's not fun. Now that I have a Bose A20, I probably should try to get that configured for phone calls by Bluetooth. - Try to avoid using the cellphone for clearance at a nontowered field whenever possible - make use of RCOs etc. - Nontowered plus IFR usually means it's not busy enough to make using the cell phone a problem. - If its easy VFR and lots of traffic, try to pick up the clearance in the air. - The scenario of no cell coverage PLUS no working ground frequency has come up for me in northern Wisconsin once - That particular mVFR departure into hilly terrain had to be planned very carefully, would not care to repeat.

saw this meme, reminded me of the OP's video

Exactly as I was about to suggest You will love having the close option, as long as you are very disciplined in choosing when not to use it. 2764 is pretty short, but 25ft is very narrow!! It's nice that there aren't obstructions however, and your short field skills will progress much faster than they would have otherwise.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2370784-japanese-hakuto-r-spacecraft-seems-to-have-crash-landed-on-the-moon/ I think it just crashed - admin probably should move this thread to the safety and accident discussion section, and please be sensitive in your comments - we don't know yet if anyone on the lunar surface was hurt

Hi - If you have them, I'd like to buy: (1) the complete adjustable cowl flap system (I do not need the flaps themselves) - I have a '68 where they were in fixed position and I want to convert them to adjustable. (2) the metal duct tubes on each side that blow air on your feet on each side and are controlled by a butterfly valve near the end (the butterfly valves in mine a broken).

I truly regret having read the title of this thread and everything that came thereafter. Such Cirrus owner behavior in the Mooney community

Hard to believe a Cirrus pilot would behave that way. That community has an impeccable reputation.

And then I bet there's differences in how water traps and dislodges for those of us who have bladders vs. wet wings... less data on the former perhaps

I can’t say I fully understand your points but do appreciate the helpful discussion. My POH preflight list says to dump some fuel from the gascolator first, switching tanks once during the process, before sumping the tanks. I assumed this was to clear any water and sediment in the lowest part of the fuel system that is distal to the tanks’ low points at the wing tank sumps. As this accident shows, significant water can also persist in the tanks proximal to the wing tank sumps even after pulling out a lot of water and then presumably clean fuel at the sumps. I fail to see how dumping fuel from the gascolator at any point in the preflight process would be much more effective at clearing that water in the tanks than drawing more fuel from the sumps. It would be effective at clearing water distal to the tank sumps in the fuel system, but I suspect that water alone isn’t enough to get me to the runway and kill the engine on takeoff - therefore I don’t follow item 1 on my POH preflight checklist every time and didn’t think failing to drain from the gascolator was a key omission in this accident. What am i missing here?

I only drain the gascolator every few flights, and mainly to clear any sediment that might eventually plug up the screen - I don't bother to collect it to examine for water.

Good reminder that if you find a lot of water when draining from the sump, simply continuing to drain until it's gone is insufficient. Would also draining from the gascolator have made much difference here? I doubt it. What was sitting in the gascolator at startup was already burned off before the takeoff attempt, and continuing to drain through the gascolator using the fuel selector ring may not have been sufficient to clear the water settled in some areas of the tank. People describe a cyclic process of agitating the wings from the tips, high speed taxi, letting the plane sit for >30 min before draining from the sump again several times before being sure the water is gone. I'm not sure I'd even be satisfied with that.

Seems unlikely - perhaps unprecedented, which would make it a very notable event. Perhaps @Greg Ellis could clarify?

Per the narrative, I'm not sure when, why, and how the poster pulled an oil sample here, but most people do oil analysis when changing the oil. Looking at the filter at the same time would have caught the issue earlier with far more definitive interpretation. In this context oil analysis added nothing.

That looks like its leaking from the fitting used to fill the reservoir via the thick tube from the other side of the firewall. The very top has a fitting with a skinny copper tube routed to the other side of the firewall for pressure relief (also apparent in the pic). If the pressure relief line isn't fully patent and the reservoir is overfilled, stuff will leak from wherever it can. Perhaps its leaking around loose threads for the filler fitting now that bottom o-rings are tight. You could try to plunge the pressure relief tube with a wire or something. I don't think it's a big deal though - it should stop leaking at some point when the level in the reservoir drops a bit more.

Which one? It would be fun to dig a little deeper...

And in those instances the issue would have been clearly evident using the standard routine measures - e.g. simply looking at the oil filter medium - which might have been neglected too long based on excess confidence in oil analysis. If it's the oil analysis results after oil change that makes you bother to look in your filter then you're not doing it right.

You are misconstruing my point. I have not claimed that oil analysis has no value because it does not provide clear diagnostic information "on its own" - what I assert is quite to the contrary. I am saying that when used in conjunction with the other standard monitoring strategies that everyone should be doing for their piston aircraft engines, it adds zero value as a routine screening test based on the outcomes that matter - primarily safety, secondarily cost. To prove my point outright, one would need an experiment with owners randomized to two groups with oil analysis vs. no oil analysis while doing all the appropriate routine monitoring similarly and measure safety-related engine events and total expense. I am claiming the likelihood of zero benefit in the oil analysis group in such a prospective experiment simply because screening tests in the medical world with similar properties (e.g. limited sensitivity/specificity) have usually offered no net patient benefit in prospective randomized trials despite integration with all the other clinical information available. People should quit wasting time and (admittedly modest) money on oil analysis - and ignorance is appropriately bliss when it comes to those numbers on your Blackstone report and the company's vague shaman-like interpretative narratives on them. Those who are not already handy with using a borescope, looking at their top spark plugs, examining their filters and screens, tracking their oil consumption, and looking at their engine monitor data should focus on those skills instead. A further risk of oil analysis is that stable numbers on the report will delude the user into thinking no other monitoring is needed.

A very pertinent analogy - much of my seething disdain for routine use of oil analysis in our planes derives from professional knowledge of the history of screening tests for cancer - most of which have done more harm than good by triggering risk-laden invasive testing and sometimes major cancer surgeries on tumors that posed little or no risk. When you do a randomized prospective trial trying to prove benefit of any screening tool in medicine, the answer is usually the same - no net benefit, sometimes harm. The analogy of routine oil analysis in our planes was striking to me when I first started sending it 9 years ago as a new owner and trying to interpret the results in any useful way on top of all the other monitoring I remain diligent about. If one did a prospective trial with oil analysis, I bet the answer would be identical - the odds are heavily stacked against it helping us. BTW, truly useful cancer screening tests can presently be counted on one hand after tons of effort, so the bar for a new one is appropriately high. We all remember the way PSA testing results were applied in the 90's and 00's - it led to impotence and incontinence in a lot of guys from prostatectomies for tumors that would have never caused them a real problem. Those guys wish they never had the test (which is now used in a more nuanced way but still has issues).

Nope. In both cases the owner cutting open the oil filter routinely at appropriate interval oil changes would have provided a more reliable indicator of problems than the oil analysis. It sounds like an owner was sending oil analyses and putting confidence in them rather than looking in his filter - another scenario where oil analysis is actually worse than worthless.