Found pesky engine oil leak

[Yooper Rocketman]

I just finished the annual for the Rocket and was hoping to lock in on a pesky engine oil leak.  I had cleaned the backside of the engine really good and ran it pre-annual to warm up for the compression tests, but no leaks developed during the ground run.  I installed a dye we use for finding leaks on big truck engines and flew the plane about 15 minutes.  When I got back and pulled the cowls, I closed the hangar door, turned off the lights, used the special glasses and flashlight to see the dye, and found a small streak of oil on one of my hoses.  I had always suspected we had a hose leak after the turbo failure, as that seemed to be about when the oil consumption and belly oil increased.  Following the oil line back it was dry further up the hose.  I had to pull my heater scat tubing off to see more, and thought I could see an oil drop coming off a bolt on the rear of the starter.  I pulled my intercooler off and sure enough, oil was dripping out of the lower bolt.  Discussing with Chad and John Miller over at Kubick's, they said it was either the seal on the front of the starter, or the drain on the starter drive plugged.  Chad give me his blessing to remove and inspect, and I found the spring on the seal lip had failed.   A few hours later one oil leak fixed.  Sorry I didn't get a picture of the failed seal, but I thought it was pretty neat how the dye worked finding this leak.  Unfortunately I couldn't take the picture through the glasses, but it really stands out with them.

Tom

 

[slowflyin]

It's always so satisfying to finally fix a leak!

[carusoam]

Sometimes, finding the leak is the hardest part.

Thanks for sharing the leak finding technique, Tom.

Best regards,

-a-

[JC252MB]

Glad you found your leak. John has been taking care of my Mooney for the last six years and it's been two since joining the good folks at Kubick. Just did my annual and avionics upgrade there. Great people with all the skill and integrity you could ever hope for. Yeah, John's found some leaks on my airplane over the years. 

[Yooper Rocketman]

Yes, I have seen your plane over there several times over the last couple years.  Very nice looking Mooney!!  You ever get stranded over here, let me know (everybody at Kubicks knows me).  I'll pop you home in the Rocket.

Tom

[Yooper Rocketman]

When I got home from Florida, I was hesitant to put the plane in the hangar (oil drips on my cleaned floor that is still not painted).  So I placed a large pan under my breather drip tube (which has about 5 tubes bundled together from various areas on the engine).  I went back on Sunday to take care of a couple minor squawks and found drips under the plane all over the place.  Checking the oil, I found it down a quart from Florida, a quart in 6 hours.  That's a bit more than usual, so off come the cowls again.  The starter had a drip on it, but it appeared to be oil still working it's way out of the starter from the prior seal leak, as the firewall and all attachments under that area were still dry.  Even the gear well was very dry.

Looking further, the heaviest oil streak was coming back from the breather area.  Oh, oh, I had two cylinders in the 50's, maybe one is going south.  I pulled the plugs and did a cold compression check (the annual one was done hot) and found I had gained 10 pounds and 12 pounds respectively on the two low cylinders (obviously actually flying the thing helps).  All compression's looked great and I could hear no air bypassing during the check.  I looked at my oil separator and vent line coming off the dip stick tube and realized the re-route I did a few years ago (due to rubbing issues) had the line running downhill from the tube to the oil separator.  I performed another reroute, getting the hose to the highest point under the cowl before going to the separator, hopefully collecting some oil in the vent line and draining it back into the dipstick tube instead of forcing the separator to deal with it.  I also took a serious dip out of the oil drain back line off the separator to the #2 valve cover.

While running to get more hose, thinking about the problem, I realized I had filled the oil to near the "full mark" for my trip back (thinking hot weather, long flight, etc.).  I remembered Chad at Kubick Aviation had installed a sticker under the cowl on the Bonanza (turbo normalized IO550, another big bore Continental) saying to not service the oil until UNDER 9 quarts, and then only add one quart.  Seems he did that shortly after the Tornado Alley engine overhaul and turbo installation and our oil consumption really dropped after that.  So.........I marked on my oil door the same oil filling protocol.  Hopefully the belly will be dryer after my next serious flight.  I hate wiping it down and getting oil on the floor.

Tom

[MB65E]

Good luck. On mine, I'm starting to think "well it'd be compleatly normal on a radial engine"

-Matt

[kris_adams]

1 hour ago, MB65E said:

Good luck. On mine, I'm starting to think "well it'd be compleatly normal on a radial engine

My uncle had a Cessna 195 and it truly "marked" its territory everywhere it went.  Beautiful plane though.

[Yooper Rocketman]

Well the pesky oil leak I had was not fixed with the work noted above (well the starter drive no longer leaks anyway).  I found a lot of oil on the belly after my last several flights again and realized it was all coming out of the drain tube bundle.  I had Kubick Aviation look at it so I can stay working on the project plane and they found the waste gate controller was porting oil out it's drain line (tie wrapped with other tubes to the breather line).  Rebuilt exchange waste gate controller will be installed today.

Needed to fly customers to look at a truck over in Mankato MN today, and trip couldn't be delayed until tomorrow.  So... I talked Steve into letting me put some hours on his long sitting E model today.  We went up for a test flight (just came out of annual) and reorientation flight yesterday.  That is one beautiful "E" model that will likely be on the market in the next couple months.

Tom

[Yetti]

Free anti corrosion for the belly is the way I look at it

[Guest Mike261]

i have a leak that we haven't been able to fix...somewhere on the back. New mags and vac pump with associated gaskets hasnt cured it. Im thinking of parking a go pro back there to have a look.

 

[Yooper Rocketman]

On 7/14/2016 at 5:42 AM, Yooper Rocketman said:

Well the pesky oil leak I had was not fixed with the work noted above (well the starter drive no longer leaks anyway).  I found a lot of oil on the belly after my last several flights again and realized it was all coming out of the drain tube bundle.  I had Kubick Aviation look at it so I can stay working on the project plane and they found the waste gate controller was porting oil out it's drain line (tie wrapped with other tubes to the breather line).  Rebuilt exchange waste gate controller will be installed today.

Needed to fly customers to look at a truck over in Mankato MN today, and trip couldn't be delayed until tomorrow.  So... I talked Steve into letting me put some hours on his long sitting E model today.  We went up for a test flight (just came out of annual) and reorientation flight yesterday.  That is one beautiful "E" model that will likely be on the market in the next couple months.

Tom

Steve's plane has no autopilot.  I found out really quick how much my hand flying skills had eroded.  Luckily no IMC until the return leg.  I ended up with a good 45 minutes of IMC (high clouds only) and the hand flying got a lot better in the last two hours (vs. the first two hours).  I will be turning off the autopilot more often after that wake up call.

The waste gate controller showed on Thursday and they shipped the wrong one.  Well, actually, they shipped mine to another buyer and his to my FBO.  Chad asked if I wanted them to ship next day air to cover their mistake (originally ordered second day air).  I said, no............I have nothing planned so no need to be ignorant about it.  Plane should be done on Monday.

Tom