A64Pilot

If you really want to get into the weeds with a Tesla, there is a site called Teslafi that downloads data from your car and you can really get into the weeds, attached are the efficiency of the car vs OAT and speed, speed isn’t efficiency but consumption in watt hours per mile.

Following chart is from here, there are other sources of course, which I guess explains where 33.7 came from, but .4 and .7 are close, look at the KWH / gal column However I believe this is at 100% efficiency and an aircraft engine isn’t anywhere near 100% efficient, the Tesla Model 3 motor is about 95% efficient as is I believe about as efficient as it gets currently. It’s how inefficient a gasoline or any other ICE is that’s a large part of the problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_gallon_equivalent Fuel: liquid, US gallons GGE GGE % BTU/gal kWh/gal HP-hr/gal kcal/litre Gasoline (base)[9] 1.0000 100.00% 114,000 33.41 44.80 7,594.1 Gasoline (conventional, summer)[9] 0.9956 100.44% 114,500 33.56 45.00 7,627.4 Gasoline (conventional, winter)[9] 1.0133 98.68% 112,500 32.97 44.21 7,494.2 Gasoline (reformulated gasoline, E10 - ethanol)[9] 1.0193 98.1% 111,836 32.78 43.95 7,449.9 Gasoline (reformulated gasoline, ETBE)[9] 1.0196 98.08% 111,811 32.77 43.94 7,448.3 Gasoline (reformulated gasoline, MTBE)[9] 1.0202 98.02% 111,745 32.75 43.92 7,443.9 Gasoline (10% MTBE)[10] 1.0179 98.25% 112,000 32.82 44.02 7,460.9 Diesel #2[11] 0.8803 113.6% 129,500 37.95 50.90 8,626.6 Biodiesel (B100)[12] 0.9536 104.87% 119,550 35.04 46.98 7,963.8 Biodiesel (B20)[11] 0.8959 111.62% 127,250 37.29 50.01 8,476.7 Liquid natural gas (LNG)[11] 1.52 65.79% 75,000 21.98 29.48 4,996.1 Liquefied petroleum gas (propane / autogas) (LPG)[11] 1.2459 80.26% 91,500 26.82 35.96 6,095.3 Methanol fuel (M100)[11] 2.007 49.82% 56,800 16.65 22.32 3,783.7 Ethanol fuel (E100)[11] 1.498 66.75% 76,100 22.30 29.91 5,069.4 Ethanol (E85)[11] 1.3936 71.75% 81,800 23.97 32.15 5,449.1 Jet fuel (naphtha)[13] 0.9604 104.12% 118,700 34.79 46.65 7,907.2 Jet fuel (kerosene)[13] 0.8899 112.37% 128,100 37.54 50.35 8,533.4

EV’s aren’t for everyone, I don’t think they work nearly as well in extreme cold and if you live in Montana or other very sparsely populated place there likely isn’t and probably won’t be a charging infrastructure, maybe. In an ICE car heat is free, it’s just taken from the coolant, but an EV has to use it’s battery to provide heat and in real cold a heat pump isn’t efficient, so I’ve read that in real cold that you can increase power consumption by 30%. But for over 95% of people they are fine. If you want to go on a long trip like from Fl to Maine or something you just tell the car “Navigate to Maine” and in a few seconds it calculates every stop you need to make and tells you how long you need to stay at each stop, it also knows from the internet that each stop is operational and how busy it us, and will route you to less busy ones if needed. When you get to the charge point you just plug in, the car is known by the charge point and the card you have on file is charged. Average stop is 15 to 20 min and on average you only charge to 60, maybe 70% or so because the higher the state of charge, the slower it charges, so the cars computer calculates how much needed to get to the next point and frequency of charges to minimize time charging. You don’t have to do any planning, just drive. This “range anxiety” is a figment of the news and I guess cars that don’t have a charging network I guess, but for a Tesla it’s a non issue, really, unless you live in Montana or similar. If you choose to you can stop at Motels with level 2 chargers and plug in so your fully charged when you leave the next day, many are free because on average it’s only costing them 5 to 10 bucks max. I’ve never bothered myself so I don’t know. Usually chargers are located where a convince store or coffee shop is, so by the time you get a sandwich or coffee or whatever it’s time to go. My Wife walks the dog, just enough time for that. You probably do stop about twice as often as a gas car because you’re not using a full battery like a gas car can use its whole gas tank, you only use maybe 2/3. The computer calculates it so you arrive at the next charger with a near dead battery, that makes me nervous so I always charge a little higher than it says to. You’ll make it, but arriving with 5% charge is just pushing it too much for me. If you do a lot of long distance driving then an EV may not be for you, but very few of us actually do, and the advantages of an EV just make it better, like never having to stop at a gas station, the ability to program the car so that the inside is at your preset temp when you leave, or the ability to leave the AC on while your shopping, to be able to leave the dog in the car while your getting groceries etc. I have ours so that the inside temp never goes above 95F, while she is at work the AC runs as necessary to keep it at 95 or so. I think that helps keep the interior in better shape. But really the best part of it is plugging in when you get home and every morning leaving at the % charge you selected, it’s best to not charge above 90% for longevity of the battery, I use 70%. But not having to stop at a gas station a couple times a week on the way home from work is priceless, to say nothing of the fact that it only cost about 1/3 of what it would to drive a comparable ICE car. So in my opinion we are there for cars. Aircraft? Not so much, it’s a much bigger deal to let down out of altitude, shoot an approach if IFR just to charge and go again, doing that would kill trip time, so for an airplane it would need as much flight time as a fossil fuel airplane and with 1.5 gls of gas taking 200 lbs of battery to equal, (I’m taking in the 20% to 95% efficiency difference) still we aren’t even close. Assuming that number is correct then my 54 gls would take 7,000 lbs of battery to replace, and that’s not viable.

The other problem is the Hydrogen required to operate the fuel cell comes from natural gas, and I think it’s more efficient to burn the gas than it is to make it into hydrogen to then burn if you will in a fuel cell. Sure you can take electricity and make hydrogen from water, but it’s more efficient to make electricity and use it directly, than to make it into hydrogen, that then makes electricity from the hydrogen. Nasa uses it because Hydrogen and a fuel cell is lighter than a battery

Nukes are the only currently viable option that make sense to me, maybe in the future we could build Solar power stations in orbit and beam the power down via microwaves or something, but not in my lifetime. Panels help, but the sun doesn’t always shine, except in space, and the wind doesn’t always blow, so what’s the plan to cover when the wind and sun aren’t making power? Light candles? One possibility is your electric car, but it’s not real viable in my opinion because the batteries only have so many cycles in them. Batteries are recyclable, you don’t just throw away all those valuable elements, the cobalt, Lithium etc still is in the battery, it doesn’t go away. Give free enterprise a chance, when it’s discovers that there is money in those batteries they will be recycled, and efficiently too, because that maximizes profits. I don’t touch carbon emissions, not saying it’s not an issue, but in my opinion it’s not THE issue, my belief is that every year fossil will become more and more expensive, and it’s just too valuable a resource to just burn. For some reason we understand we can’t burn our forests for energy, but for some reason we think fossil will last forever. We don’t need to spend our tax dollars on car chargers, that’s short sighted and stupid and I believe there are ulterior motives, there always is when the Government is involved. What we need to do is start beefing up our electrical generation and distribution capability, chargers are easy and best left to entrepreneurs, exactly like we currently do with gas stations. Musk is getting rich on his Supercharger network, there is BIG money there, he sells the electricity at I think about three times what he pays for it and the stations require no human involvement, he pays no one to sit at a register, no building, no bills etc. Locally its 34c per KWH at a supercharger, I pay 17c for residential power and I know Commercial gets a big break, so if he pays 12c then it’s right at a 300% profit, for boxes that sit in the corner of a random parking lot. Why in the world would we think it needs Government subsidies?

Couple of statements, first I think short trips of less than 10 min isn’t really viable, but then your statement of then they recharge between trips. OK so where do they recharge? Do they only fly to chargers or do they fly from a charger to you, then to your destination and from there to a charger? How long does a recharge take? Time interval between recharges, IE how do you dissipate the heat, because anyone who has ever repetitively recharged any kind of battery rapidly will tell you that they get hot, quick and heat is battery enemy #1, so you have to deal with that heat, and that adds quite a bit of weight, Tesla does it with copper tubes filled with antifreeze and a heat pump to cool the battery, run the car hard and when you stop you can hear the heat pump and fans running hard, which takes power of course as well as weight. There are huge problems to solve, current Government promised to spend Billions on electric car chargers, which I’m also against, but where are all these chargers? I haven’t seen any, have you? How many chargers would air-taxis need, and where would these things land and takeoff from? Only thing I can see is roof tops, so then the building is going to have to get a cut of the money. The expense of point to point air transport would be prohibitively expensive for the average Joe I think, yet I wouldn’t be surprised if his taxes aren’t what will pay for it, just like the current subsidies. Solid State batteries have been around for longer than fuel cells have and have the same problem, that is unless your NASA they aren’t affordable, and it doesn’t look like they will be in the foreseeable future. Fuel cells were what was promised decades ago to Government agencies to get them to drop the electric car because the major manufacturers didn’t want to have to completely re-tool etc to build something new, more money in continuing with ICE technology. Solid State is in the group of “magic batteries” when or if the magic battery becomes viable, then sure lots of things will become possible, but I wouldn’t hold my breath

Electrification of transportation is in my opinion a good thing, but not for the reasons many think. I think it’s a good thing simply due to efficiency, our Tesla, a safe, roomy pretty quick car can travel in comfort on the energy equal to 1.5 gls of gas. And by the way the “fuel” cost for us to drive 260 miles is $8.5. I differ from the cultists in that I think the government should have nothing to do with it, if it’s a superior technology and I think it is, people will figure it out on their own. As is and what blows my mind is the system that’s set up by the government, the one that says they are for the little guy is to buy wealthy people expensive Auto’s. I’d love for an electric airplane to be a reality, sea level power at any altitude, tens of thousands of hours engine life, and near zero maintenance. But without a huge increase in battery capacity it just ain’t happening. Don’t get me wrong, nobody is an electric fan more than I am, but until the magic battery exists, it’s just not happening

I’m thinking sticking valve myself, and pulling push rods will make it stop if it is.

Oh, surely long before EVTOL become realistic there will be electric airplanes, because you can fly much further, carrying more weight at a higher speed in an airplane than you can in anything that can hover. There is what’s called the square / cube ratio that explains why you simply can’t just scale up anything and have it work, or actually there is a limit to how much scaling works. Extreme example is a spider can walk on water, but we can’t or an ant can fall from any height and walk away

The HP required to fly with x weight is and has been well known for a very long time. The most inefficient flight is vertical, that’s why helicopters require so much engine power. 300 HP in a helicopter to carry what 100 hp can in an airplane. Yes you can build a quad copter to take a little 90lb girl on a 10 min flight, but you can’t build one to take two 200 lb men across town, not battery powered anyway. Which brings me to one of two conclusions. 1. Either these people are stupid or think that any day now a magic battery will come into existence that will contain 10 times the power of current batteries. 2. These things are scams, and in fact I believe there has been huge amounts of money garnered from big companies, so people of course believe if Honda for example is looking into it, it must be plausible, then the FAA piles on issuing rule making on EVTOL heliports, again making people believe any day now it’s coming. Just look at the numbers. My Tesla battery pack is 50 KWH and weighs in the neighborhood of 1,000 lbs, there is additional weight for cooling, but ignore that for now. So how much gasoline does it take to replicate the 1000 lb Tesla battery pack? Gasoline has 33.7 KWH of energy in it so the answer is 1.5 gls of gas is 50 KWH. 1.5 gl of gas is 9 lbs. I admit it’s not that simple as gas engines are at best about 20% efficient and electric can be as much as 95%, but you just can’t lift the battery, the vehicle and any decent payload for more than a few minutes, ignore the fact that completely discharging a Lithium battery in 10 minutes is hell on its cycle life, generates enormous amounts of heat etc. Until that magic battery is built this is all wishful thinking. Elon Musk has stated years ago that he wants to build an airplane, he’s even done the math and published the results. I think from memory he says it will take a 400% increase in energy density to even become remotely viable. That’s from memory so it could be way off.

Carlos Gann does, as well as port and polish the ports, on his “performance” overhauls but every engine component gets balanced to less than 1 gram 1/28th of an ounce. His engines are known for smooth running and his performance engines make quite a bit more power than average I think but don't know that he was an engine builder for NASCAR before aircraft and assume that’s where a lot of what he does comes from. I don’t have any idea if he would rework cylinders or only does them for his overhauls. I guess you could call and ask https://www.gannaviation.com/engine-overhauls

After having a conversation with Pratt& Whitney I found out that TBO is not statistically driven, it’s not even derived from testing, it’s actually very close to the life limit of medicines etc. almost all meds are effective and chemically unchanged well beyond the date on the bottle, that date is simply a date that the manufacturer has picked quite honestly often arbitrarily as it’s a time line that’s common in the industry. If certain storage conditions are met most meds can be stored for an exceedingly long time. Same with engines. ‘It’s not an hour level where continued operation is deemed unsafe, different things drive TBO, it’s not as simple as it sounds. You think pistons can be flown well beyond TBO? you ought to see what’s done with turbines that are cycled only once a day, that is they are only started once a day, idled during a short lunch etc as start cycles not time is more relevant for them. Hot section inspections are still done and parts replaced if necessary. It’s very common for Ag engine to exceed 10,000 hours or more, I’ve seen one at 15,000. PT6-34A used to be I believe 3400 hours or so, there are a few pretty bogus STC’s that extend its TBO and I believe Pratt extended it to assist marketing a few years ago, but then they brought out single growth crystal turbine blades too. Think about the STC’s for a second if you will. FAA allows a third party to extend the TBO of an engine that they didn’t manufacture, have no liability for and supply no parts for based on oil samples and a vibe check. So what is a TBO based on that? The STC holder has zero liability if the engine doesn’t make the extended TBO, but then Pratt has no liability if one doesn’t make factory TBO either. TBO’s probably came from days gone past in order to try to ensure a level of safety for the flying public, but that’s long gone. Modern big motors used on airliners have no hour limit, but are tracked by cycles often a cycle is one per flight but some are starting or each time an engine exceeds a set speed and components not the engine are traced and inspected or replaced at different cycles, in fact modern big motors are designed to never be removed from the wing. The AH-64 and UH-60 engines for example were tracked flight cycle wise, several different cycles, starts, above a set Ng speed, above a temp set point etc, but the engines had no TBO, they were on condition, they stayed on the aircraft until performance decayed below a limit, then they were removed and sent to the engine shop for inspection and repair, but not overhaul. If you dig into determining what a TBO is with the engine manufacturers as I have you come up with the answer that mostly it’s a point where in their opinion that an engine can be economically overhauled, a point where the expensive parts are still good and the clock can be reset by inspection and replacement of the consumable parts, bearings and seals, valves, guides etc. Go well past TBO and if you wait until it’s making metal etc, it’s likely not to be economical to overhaul, it’s a throw away at that point. Believe it or not but they are driven to keep or achieve a reputation of reliability. As most piston parts anyway are PMA’d they aren’t shortening TBO’s to sell parts. Now big turbines are a completely different business model, they make pretty much no money on sales of new motors, the money is made supporting the engine through its life.

12 years has to be taken with a large grain of salt. First you need to understand what TBO really means, it’s actually sort of a guarantee that if operated IAW the POH and MM that an engine will last at least that long, Hartzell prop is I believe also 12 years as I think many accessories are too. I’d bet average airplane in the fleet was built in the 70’s, possibly the 80’s and average airplane is on their first overhaul. Mine is an 81 I think 2200 TT and 500 hours or so into its first overhaul and I think pretty average. That makes her 41 years old and following calander TBO she would have gone through 3.5 engines. Another way of looking at it is a frequently flown airplane flies 100 hours a year, most significantly less, maybe 50, so 20 to 40 years to hourly TBO and I think that’s pretty common. Many countries enforce TBO, if you lived in one of them your buying an engine, prop and a bunch of accessories every 12 years. Aging is hugely dependent on how it’s cared for and stored, particularly stored.

I think I may wait until the FAA contacted me before I did anything especially if your not an A&P. Plus leaving will be an issue, not sure what required paperwork is but there will be something, way back 40 years ago we had a guy in flight school that dead sticked his Piper into the Super bowl parking lot from fuel exhaustion. That didn’t upset the FAA but him putting fuel in it and taking off did. At least that was the story I heard, he disappeared from Flight School.

Often as a belt wears it gets thinner, that makes it sit further down in the pulleys and is loose of course so you have to tighter it, eventually it hits the bottom of the pulleys and has to be stupid tight or it will slip. ‘Often a new belt as it’s not worn appears shorter than a worn one. If you go the Gates automotive route, pay extra for a green stripe, it’s their best belt and costs more, but it’s worth it. http://www.gatesunitta.com/en/green-stripe®-v-belt

If you want to come down to 97FL we can swing the gear, it’s grass but I have no issues and I have lower gear doors, they do add a couple of kts. I have a hangar that’s sort of airconditioned, sort of as it can’t keep it house cool, but it can hold 80ish and 50 something humidity when it’s 90 and 90 outside. https://www.airnav.com/airport/97FL

I don’t know for a fact, but a few that have visited the factory claim the guides are pressed into place and then drilled out and valves installed, they aren’t even reamed. Reaming is a type of drill, it’s used when only a very small amount of metal is required to be removed but you want a smooth and accurate sized hole. Drill is a sledgehammer, reaming is better controlled, honing is the finest controlled. If you want serious accuracy and a fine controlled finish, but have to have a hole that’s very close to finished size, you hone. Honing is of course what’s done as a finish for the cylinders because boring just isn’t nearly good enough. I have friends that ream every hole for rivets they are so anal for example, then deburr every hole. They even refrigerate the rivets so they fit tight, that’s something Consolidated did to PBY hulls back in the day to get a watertight hull. It’s all about if your willing to spend time on perfection, or does production rate rule. Very good overhaulers like Carlos Gann hone the guides to size, this ensures a hole that’s concentric to the valve seats and size is tightly controlled, a tight fit prevents wobble of course, cools the valve more as more is in contact with the guide and the tight tolerance helps prevent coke build up in the valve guide that leads to sticking valves, but it’s time consuming and time is money.

No Mooney experience but in my limited experience with Turbo Continentals is the cylinder’s life span if flown frequently is directly related to how hard and Hot they are run. If MP and RPM are the same LOP is lower power and that means cooler and that I believe significantly increases life. I think it’s pretty simple, significantly increase power and you run hotter and harder and those decrease life. TANSTAAFL It’s the price of going fast, want longer life? Slow down and run LOP. That’s true for NA engines too. Biggest reason car engines last so long is they are operated at such a low power almost all of their life, it’s not that they are superior to aircraft engines. Run a Sportfisherman at high power and they don’t last long either. Oh and it’s my opinion that if you take brand new cylinders to a GOOD cylinder guy and get them to replace and HONE valve guides and do a good 5 angle valve job that it’s not uncommon for them to go to TBO, but if you take them out of the box and install them it’s very likely they won’t. I think a good overhaul to the above procedures will last longer than new as well.

Just open the flaps as needed. Stay within the allowable range of opening in accordance with the maintenance manual. Those limits are there for some reason, it might be several things like hanging up if adjusted too open if fully opened or even possible they can be opened too much that they don’t work as well or who knows. I think my J’s limits are 1/4 to 1/2” open when fully closed but that’s from memory, point is the MM has limits. I’ve come to the conclusion that especially in hot weather that trailing is normal and desired, that fully closed is a cold Wx thing, and many say you gain a kt or two with them open an inch or so which is trailing for me. It seems to me that trailing is the preferred position, not full closed?

There hasn’t been any loyalty to the company, or for the company for its employees for a long time, I mean decades, the idea of lifetime employment died with my Grandparents, even Japan has lost it I believe. The concept of I’lll work at X for decades and in return they will give me a very good retirement with benefits died decades ago, and I think it needed to go, because there was no guarantee that the company wouldn’t go bankrupt or could in fact pay for your Retirement and I believe by the 80’s many people lost their retirements or they were greatly curtailed, so something needed to be done, that something was to put you in charge of your retirement, and in my opinion that’s better than big brother or big government doling out money. That concept of the company will take care of you was I believe pretty much gone by the time I entered the workplace, even Military retirement isn’t at all what I was promised, it’s seriously degraded, I won’t bore you but it has, and it’s my understanding todays enlistees have very little Retirement if they stay for 20. What replaced all those retirements was the concept that you were in charge of your Retirement and the size etc of it was predicated on how much you put back in 401K’s and other savings plans and investments, and I think that’s the way it should be, we all know how much money we would have if our SS had been invested. Problem is most won’t invest and I hate to be ugly but that’s their choice and well you have to live with the choices you make. However I’ll fight for your right to make those choices. It’s time I think for Social Security to go away as well. The way I think it ought to go away is a gradual reduction in pay and to stop taking it from paychecks, done right then you would receive SS in relation to how much you paid your working life, but in say 40 years to just toss out a number it’s gone. That won’t happen of course because money taken from todays paycheck is what’s used to pay current recipients. But with what’s subsidized etc we could take that money and make it happen

That’s a pretty “Kumbaya” statement, unfortunately it’s not reality and never will be. Then your second statement that I don’t quote seems to fuel the argument that Unions are no longer what they were formed for? I came into the Union thinking it was to protect the workers, and was quickly disabused of that belief. I never had any kind of interaction, just observed and came away with the opinion that they did more harm than good. Example I think the guy that crashed into the Apache was criminally negligent and as a min should have been fired immediately, yet he was so sure he was untouchable he filed a grievance for overtime. So we had a not insignificant number of people who were totally incapable of doing the job, but they were related to a Union higher up or met some hiring “goals” they took up the spot, others simply were promoted to the point they couldn’t perform based on Union seniority rules of upward movement based on time and not skill. Perfect example of “The Peter Principle” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle EXCEPT in the Union they don’t stop at the level of their incompetence, they continue to advance, based on Seniority and NOT competence or performance. The illegal thing I don’t think there is a good answer to, if you don’t hire them, then they either turn to crime or starve? They I assume aren’t eligible for unemployment? How could you be if your not allowed to work? I put myself in their shoes, if I were them what would I want / need? I joined the Army to provide, what option do they have?As I only hire Handymen, I don’t ask, but I’m certain a large majority of the workers installing roofs around here are Illegal for example, because it’s tough, backbreaking work that most Citizens won’t do. Now that they are here, we have a mess. Ignoring it is criminal I think, either we deport them or give them a path to Citizenship. It seems the idea is to almost recreate slavery, but instead of picking cotton I guess it’s picking fruit or whatever migrant agricultural workers pick and any other job a Citizen won’t do?

I’d still do it, but having read this SB I’d inspect for coking and blockage at every oil change. Coking can only occur of course with very high temperatures and that’s at the exhaust pipe. I think if I had an Acclaim I would leave the vent as is and inspect it at oil change. Rarely there are SB’s that you don’t want to comply with

So how would a Union help? Is it for part time workers who work for small business? I don’t think so or at least I’ve never seen it, Unions exist when Employers are at least multi million dollar corporations like Auto manufacturing or Airlines where there are deep pockets Worker would be better off if he took his Union dues money and put it into insurence, if there is a Union he could join which I suspect there isn’t because as I said Unions only exist where there are employers with deep pockets. Union dues are on average about 2.5 hours of salary per month, (Google it) so for that Ft Rucker job that had 5,000 employees I think “International” meaning the big Union received about a half million dollars per month in Union dues, so I asked my rep for a breakdown of where the money went, because we never saw any of it, the Union hall was an old convince store in a mostly abandoned strip mall so I wanted to know what was it spent on, and they got ugly about it. Only thing I ever saw was abuse and some of it mind boggling. When we inprocessed into the job there were of course safety classes, this was an Army contract after all. One I remember well as we got that class more than once and had to sign that we had read and understood it meaning of course that there had been issues with it was for vehicles on the flight line, everyone took it, not just drivers, but the gist of it was to get out of the vehicle it had to be placed in park, emergency brake set, ignition turned off key removed and driver took it with them. There were big yellow stickers on the dash outlining each step, I mean glove compt sized stickers. So one day a Senior Union member was driving a pick up truck on Hanchey’s flight line, he came to a stop threw it into park and got out engine still running, except it didn’t make it to park, it was in reverse so off it went into a tied down AH-64, it open tail gate cut a large hole into the tail boom. Damage exceeded 1 million dollars, which made it a Class A accident, any class A you go to the hospital and pee and bleed, Class A is a death or damage exceeding 1 Million or was 20 years ago. So this guy had the gall to file a grievance. His grievance? Sitting in the hospital took him past quitting time and he wasn’t paid overtime so he wanted his overtime. Normal person would have been praying they still had a job. He got his overtime and wasn’t fired and the taxpayer picked up the over million dollars for repair and went without the aircraft for likely a year, but the Union member got his overtime. Had you had seniority I assure you that your Union would have gotten you that seat as I’m sure you know. Oh, and the Union Retirement which is pretty good, but the Employer not the Union funds it. There it was $1 for every hour we worked was set aside in I assume some kind of 401K

I would say that it’s unlikely that sitting led to cam failure a year and I assume a 100 hours or so after purchase. Problems from sitting show up very quickly. I think your friend fell victim to whatever it is that causes cams to fail on aircraft that are regularly flown.

Cylinder corrosion is easy to find with a borescope and in most cases I’ve found it, low compression is what made me look. I think cylinder corrosion without it affecting compression isn’t an issue as it’s not corrosion that’s the issue, the rings clean it off nearly immediately, it’s the pitting that corrosion causes, but even then it’s not the end of the world unless really, really severe, if flown regularly more often than not I’ve seen motors with poor compression from corrosion recover quite a lot, and even if they don’t you likely have hundreds of hours before you really have to deal with it, so if you know about it and new cylinders are deducted from the sales price I think your way ahead. On the flip side I’ve not seen corrosion so bad that it really dropped compression that could be cleaned up with honing, every time I’ve seen it the fix was new or overhauled cylinders. Lycoming cams are an unsolved issue, a lot of people say it’s lifters not cams, but does it matter?, you’re splitting the case either way and that’s very often what trips the overhaul. While Corrosion certainly could be a cause of cam failure it’s not the only one as flight school airplanes occasionally lose cams too. Bottom line is you do the best you can, I’m not a big fan of oil analysis but I think flying an airplane I was looking at buying for at least an hour and sending in a sample could be helpful as well as cutting the filter and inspecting, but I don’t know how long results take? Can you pay extra for an expedited analysis? You just have to buy the best airplane you can. My advice is don’t fall for pretty paint or glass panels, instead look deeper for a good motor and a corrosion free airplane. Surely by now the market has shifted some and it’s more of a buyers market than it was just a couple of years ago.