Glad no damage to engine, aircraft or pilot – seat cushions are easily replaceable.  I guess it just goes to show that you never get to the point that you have eliminated all possible “gotchas!”  .  Anything different, anything new and you have a new system to deal with and all that entails.

 

Sounds like you at least got your cooling problem licked.  Good observation about the poor burning quality of the synthetic motor oil and about the O2 sensor.  I had not thought about the O2 sensor needing ambient air to make the comparison of O2 levels, but it makes sense when you think about it.

 

Ok, Tracy, stop messing around, we want to see you fly that thing someplace where the rest of us can see it {:>)

 

Ed

 

 

I was ready to flight test the new oil cooler installation this morning (or thought I was).   OAT was only 41 deg and it took a long idle time to warm up so used that time to check for oil leaks and saw no signs.  The pattern of oil and water temps looked good so I had high hopes.  Watched temps during takeoff run and continued to see good numbers. Climbed out to 500 ft and turned left to downwind and thought I smelled a slight whiff of hot oil.  Looked over my shoulder and saw that I was sky-writing with a dense smoke trail so throttled back to high idle and did a hard 360 to the right to setup for a downwind landing (almost no wind).   The only thing new was the oil cooler so I was scolding myself for installing this cheap POS and monitoring the oil pressure to see if this was going to cost me an engine overhaul.  Pressure stayed at 55 - 60 PSI all through the landing so its OK.   The oil cooking off the exhaust system did not ignite.  Wonder if the poor burning qualities of synthetic oil is another good reason to use it?

On the ground it looked like there was a couple of quarts of Mobile 1 dripping off the bottom of fuselage and left wing trailing edge.   Popped the cowl top and the entire engine compartment is drenched in oil EXCEPT for the oil cooler core itself which is dry.  The cooler turned out to be OK.  The leak was from the bottom fitting on the cooler.  It came equipped with -10 male fittings so I had installed -10 to -8 adapters to match the -8 hoses in the plane.  The tightening procedure needed on these adapters had some pitfalls.  I am always careful to use two wrenches on these fittings so as not to put torque on the cooler and damage it.  These adapters require that the adapter be put on first using the two wrench method followed by the hose fitting to the adapter.  BUT,  one wrench needs to remain on the oil cooler fitting and the other on the hose fitting.  I mistakenly put one on the adapter and one on the hose fitting.  This results in loosening the adapter to cooler mating thread as you tighten the hose fitting.  That's where the oil was coming from.

Although this was a very brief flight on a cool day, I could tell from the trend on the oil & water temps that this cooler was going to work much better than the old one even though it is about 25% smaller in volume.  Size really isn't everything.

I properly installed the adapters and hose fittings and tested for leaks (none found) but didn't have enough daylight left for another flight test.  Will try again tomorrow. 

Noticed one other oddity during this test.  As soon as the O2 sensor got covered in oil, it quit working.  These sensors actually have to 'see' the outside air at the cold end of the sensor.  They compare the O2 in the air to the O2 in the exhaust and stop working when they can't.  

Tracy