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from: n295vv

I think using the fuel over a heat exchanger to cool the walters turbine it a very bad idea, indeed.

Running the thus heated fuel back into the wing would raise the temperature of the wing, thus raising the temperature of the epoxy bonds in the wing.

A complete failure of bonds will take place at elevated temperatures, especially loaded bonds.  And, if you look into the literature, the plasticity point is really not very high......

Lots of problems trying to put 10 lbs of  stuff into an 8 lb bag, eh?

Think of something else to solve this problem, heated fuel is just tooooo bad to contemplate.

It also is very bad from a flash point basis.  Even the slightest of leaks can turn into an inferno..   we already had one inferno in a IV, killing two people.  We have already had oil cooler cracks--imagine what a heat exchanger with hot fuel would do if it cracked?

Which reminds me.....all of you new guys building out there--be sure that all of your oil and fuel fittings on your engine are not aluminum.  Especially near the hot turbos.
One LIV used aluminum near the turbos, and it melted them, killing the occupants with a resulting hot oil fire.

Older Lycoming engines had some aluminum fittings on the fuel lines which were breaking from vibration--they must be steel now

Fly safely.... David Jones

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