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GRT A/P roll servo water intrusion

YellowJacket RV9

Well Known Member
Patron
Hey guys -

My normally hangared 9A sat outside Friday night when some heavy rain came through. On climbout Saturday morning, I flipped on the autopilot and got some wonky error messages, mainly "roll servo hardware failure", and possible a communication failure as well. Anyways, I flipped the power to the servos off, tested the controls, and continued the flight. Saturday night the plane sat out in the rain again. When I went to take a quick look at the servo this AM on the ramp in Georgia, I found water on the top portion of the servo, and am guessing water got into either the DB9 connector, or even worse, the servo body itself.

When I am back at the hangar later this week I will remove and inspect the servo and see if I can test it on the ground, but I am wondering if this has happened to others, and if so, what have you done to better rain-proof the roll servo. I don't see any obvious leak paths, but obviously water is getting in there. Are GRT servos sealed units? If so maybe it's just water in the connector body that I can dry out at then seal up.

Thanks,

Chris
 
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