Reliability of IO-360A3B6D

[A64Pilot]

I’m hoping for at least two manufacturers and an established track record. Competition seems to drive both quality and cost. I know want in one hand etc.

In the Military there was a saying, “never fly the A model of anything”. I flew an A for years, later the D model, the D really was much more reliable, so maybe there is something to that saying.

I don’t expect any magic, hopefully reliability and decreased inspections

[802flyer]

FWIW I’ve heard from two different well regarded shops that they’ve had nothing but trouble with the Electroair. Even when working, they reported that it failed to deliver on speed/efficiency improvements (compared to advertised, as well as compared to their experience with SureFly).


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[kortopates]

FWIW I’ve heard from two different well regarded shops that they’ve had nothing but trouble with the Electroair. Even when working, they reported that it failed to deliver on speed/efficiency improvements (compared to advertised, as well as compared to their experience with SureFly).


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In fairness i think those opinions are based on the legacy Electroaire EIS - an opinion that is shared widely. But the new dual mag replacement Electoaire is really an improved system and is doing much better - so far.


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[0TreeLemur]

24 minutes ago, kortopates said:

In fairness i think those opinions are based on the legacy Electroaire EIS - an opinion that is shared widely. But the new dual mag replacement Electoaire is really an improved system and is doing much better - so far.

That's good to hear.  My J is just coming out of annual.  Whomever worked on its dual mag last somehow installed both condensers so that the washers on the retainer fastener had broken, resulting in potentially intermittent contact on them.  The A&P/IA who did the annual told me how that is a really bad thing, and represents a link in the failure chain for that magneto.   I'd feel good about getting into a more robust system.

[kortopates]

That's good to hear.  My J is just coming out of annual.  Whomever worked on its dual mag last somehow installed both condensers so that the washers on the retainer fastener had broken, resulting in potentially intermittent contact on them.  The A&P/IA who did the annual told me how that is a really bad thing, and represents a link in the failure chain for that magneto.   I'd feel good about getting into a more robust system.

You’ll like that the Electroaire Dual mag EIS eliminates the dependency on the distributor shaft to drive both Mags, now you’ll have true independent redundancy in your EIS’s with IMO a well engineered battery backup. Although still very new, so far reports from clients is very positive and the engine data i see also show very good performance. So far they seem to have hit a home run. Compared to the legacy units, it’s a major improvement!


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[jetdriven]

It looks like that the dual electroair system is basically two single electroair sets of hardware to fire both sets of plugs. But I can’t seem to quantify any increase at all from the single electroair installed over a Bendix 1200 magneto, I fail to see how two of them is better as well. It’s actually more complex than a dual magneto. 
It does seem to run a little leaner before misfiring, and it does run a little warmer in the summertime, but the speed, both full rich full speed, LOP cruise, and everywhere else is about the same. Weirdly, it runs warmer in LOP cruise, and when you lean it further to get it cool enough, it’s actually a little bit slower.  

[A64Pilot]

I would be surprised to see any performance increase, unless of course the mag it replaced was weak.

However it’s surely easy to get a much higher amp and voltage spark from an electronic source as it’s not usually self generating, and a much hotter spark will enable a much wider plug gap that will more reliably ignite leaner mixtures and fire plugs that wouldn’t fire on a regular mag.

Look at modern auto ignitions, those things could fire a rusty nail, last essentially forever and failure rate is really low.

I think and hope though that the primary thing we will gain is hopefully an essentially maintenance free unit that is more reliable and has essentially no wear.

 

[A64Pilot]

On 1/5/2024 at 11:24 PM, jetdriven said:

It looks like that the dual electroair system is basically two single electroair sets of hardware to fire both sets of plugs. But I can’t seem to quantify any increase at all from the single electroair installed over a Bendix 1200 magneto, I fail to see how two of them is better as well. It’s actually more complex than a dual magneto. 
It does seem to run a little leaner before misfiring, and it does run a little warmer in the summertime, but the speed, both full rich full speed, LOP cruise, and everywhere else is about the same. Weirdly, it runs warmer in LOP cruise, and when you lean it further to get it cool enough, it’s actually a little bit slower.  

Assuming mixture and power are the same, increased heat could come from timing.