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Message
Greetings,
The Rev-4 rebuild is
nearing first flight readiness. I just put the prop back on yesterday, and
took it for a spin around the airport today. Despite some
tuning touch-up that's needed (trying to hold off for a test of the auto
tune feature), the engine is running fine.
The only problem I've had
on the last two starts was, well, the starts. Last time I ran the
engine, it took almost a full battery to get it cranked. Today, for
the first time EVER, I ran the battery down without getting the engine
started. Nothing is wrong, but I guess I need to relearn my
technique. In fairness to the Odyssey battery, the stupid under
drive pulley hasn't been letting the battery charge much in the previous
runs. I really hate having the EM-2 blinking at me anytime I get below
about 2000 rpm. I may have to reset the low limit.
I ran the engine up to 4800
rpm while attempting to hold the plane with the brakes. It sure seems
strong, and this isn't close to full throttle. I had a 6000 rpm static
before, and asked Clark to give me 500 more rpm when he did the final
finish on the prop. My static should now be 6500+ Zoom,
zoom :-)
The engine has not leaked a
drop of anything, and it stayed quite cool today. I never saw oil over 130
degrees, or water over 170 during my joyriding. The evap cores had their
ducts in place, but the oil cooler did not (since it's built into the lower
cowl). Turning the engine over by hand seems really tight. All
the tolerances when building the engine were at the very tightest limits, so
this is going to take some time to break in.
The cowl is functionally
complete, which means all the parts are stuck together, and can be bolted to the
plane and flown. I still have tons of cosmetic work. I haven't
sanded any of the overlapping joints, where I bonded the scoop, or new front
ring. There are drips and runs of epoxy everywhere. Just disgusting
:-) The oil scoop is not rounded on the front edge, which I know is
not good, but I strongly suspect that it's going to be way oversized, so
anything I do to it now will just be a waste of time. I'm actually hoping
that it's too big, because I need to do some cosmetic surgery to it.
I formed the lower cowl
shape (to clear the oil cooler), and the oil cooler duct separately, which was a
mistake. I just guessed at the shape of the scoop that would look OK with
the lower cowl. Unfortunately, it could use some work on the
cosmetics. No point messing with it until I get a clue about the necessary
scoop inlet size. The water was never a problem, but now I'm running
Evan's NPG-R, so I would expect temps to go up 20 degrees or so. On the
other hand, the cowl exit area has gone up about 50 sq inches, due to the
lowering of the rear edge of the cowl for oil cooler clearance, so I suspect
I'll make up everything I lost on the Evan's. The oil cooler is a complete
unknown. It's BIG, and should be very efficient. It's far more
vertical than the old one was, so the airflow through it is MUCH
improved. The inlet is currently 30 sq inches, and I'm optimistic
that it's going to be too much. I have some wacky plans to limit
airflow through the cowl exit when it's not needed, but I don't see that
happening until I need to (temps too low in
cruise).
So what's needed- Nothing
really. I suppose I could put it all together, tune the engine (or not),
and fly it tomorrow. That's not how it's going to happen though :-)
I plan to add the gear leg stiffeners in the next few days, and I'm still hoping
to come up with a new expansion tank for the coolant that will house my new
level sensors. Still waiting for UPS to bring my supplies, and I need to
do some testing on the sensors. The plumbing of the new tank is driving me
crazy. I just haven't come up with a perfect solution yet, though I think
I know what I'll have to do. After tomorrow, I'm illegal, but I have my
medical and BFR scheduled for Monday. Hopefully, I'll be ready to start
seriously running the engine by then, and start doing laps over the
airport. I'm off next week, but of course the Navy is flying, so my
airport is limited to a 1400 ft ceiling unless I beg Pensacola to let me climb
through Whiting's area.
In a side note, Whiting
won't be flying too many helicopters. We had a huge hail storm Saturday,
with up to 3" hail stones. One of my RV buddies is a helo instructor at
Whiting, and he was off yesterday because they didn't have anything to
fly. By his account, there are about 100 grounded helicopters, almost all
of them. He said all but a few had broken windscreens, and most had damage
to the main rotors. Check out the bike riders helmet in the Pensacola News
Journal online article!
That's way more than enough
for now.
Rusty (not long
now)
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