OneCharlieKilo
Well Known Member
My phase I flight testing is proceeding slowly, but the plane is flying well and I'm having fun (at about the 10 hour point).
These probably aren't unique squawks, but hopefully documenting here will help those getting ready for first flight (squawks are listed in approximate order discovered during test flight process):
1. First flight is all it took to recognize that my 18 year old David Clarks were not going to cut it in the RV cockpit. They were fine in my old Cessna 140, but after 10+ hours in other RVs with ANR headsets, the difference was VERY noticable. Begging forgiveness from my wife on the cost, I ordered a new Lightspeed Zulu headset in time for my 3rd flight and have been very happy with the results.
2. It took a number of adjustments over the first several flights to get an exhaust pipe position at cowl exit that I was happy with in terms of cowl clearance, firewall clearance, and exhaust pulse thumping on the floor under my feet (still more floor vibration than I want, and will be adding some type of damping material under my feet).
3. Noticed on second or third flight that EZ-Pilot wing leveler was not getting gps data from panel mounted Lowrance 2000C gps. This had been working during all my panel testing, so surprised me somewhat. Was simple explanation and fix though....I had updated my Lowrance 2000C with terrain awareness software just prior to first flight and the software update had reset a bunch of the settings, including turning off the NMEA output data stream. Changed the setting back and all was good.
4. On first couple flights, the #1 and #2 cylinder CHTs were running roughly 30F-40F cooler than #3 and #4. I had talked to others with similar issue and followed advice I was given to apply metalized tape to front of the #1 and #2 cylinders for an inch or two up from front baffles. This "fence" forces air up instead of directly into the front cylinder cooling fins and effectively evened CHTs accross all cylinders. The tape will last a while, but I'll eventually rivet in aluminum pieces instead of the tape (I think Van's latest baffles designs incorporate pieces like this).
5. After 3 or 4 flights, I noticed a couple spots on my front baffles behind the spinner area where the baffle seal material wasn't laying completely flat but had formed small puckered areas along the curved top cowl surface. Some strategic partial cuts of the baffle material allowed the puckered section to overlay itself and form a flat sealed area. I don't know that there was any measurable cooling improvement from this, but I wanted the flat seal there.
6. After about 4 hours flight time, I noticed when checking the oil that the dipstick tube rotated slightly when turning the dipstick cap. There wasn't any oil leak visible but clearly I couldn't leave this as it was, so off came the cowl (again....). I found the safety wire wasn't quite tight enough so removed the safety wire, retorqued the tube, and reinstalled safety wire with a little more attention to pulling it as tight as I could get it.
7. Developed very slight leaks at two fittings on the brake master cylinders (1 on pilot side, 1 on passenger side). Not significant enough to see anything on the floor, but can see brake fluid gathered at bottom of those two master cylinders and can see which fittings are wet with fluid. I'll have to remove/reinstall the fittings. Will reinstall with TiteSeal and make sure this is fixed before installing damping material in floor that I mentioned in paragraph #2.
8. At about 6 hours flight time, I had removed the cowl again for no real reason other than another engine inspection, and found that the triangle shaped exhaust slip joint fixture (Vetterman exhaust system) on the left exit pipe had rotated to the point that one of the small bolt heads was rubbing on the exhaust pipe above it. It probably rotated from all the adjusting I had been doing (by rotating pipe in slip joint) in first few flights. Rubbing had marked the other pipe but not rubbed through yet. If I hadn't pulled the cowl for that inspection, I think the bolt would have rubbed through in next few flight hours.
9. On this one, I'm not trying to start another p-mag debate, just reporting my direct flight experience. I am running a dual p-mag setup and had my right p-mag fail in flight at about 7 hours total time (7.6 Hobbs on engine, 6.6 hrs flight time when got back to airport on the good p-mag). Engine coughed/sputtered and started running rough. Was able to isolate by switching p-lead switches off similar to runup. Was a bit unsettling (lost all power when I shut the good one down and backfired on restart) and cost me a few weeks of plane down time. I tried starting on each p-mag individually once I was on the ground and quickly shut down from right side start when firing seemed to be intermittent and random - this was clearly not a smart thing to do since I was already pretty sure the problem was with the right p-mag (my tach sense is off that p-mag and tach reading also went haywire when engine went rough). I sent the p-mags back for evaluation and service and they replaced the circuit boards, loaded latest firmware, and performed the sensor magnet service bulletin (did all this to both p-mags, not just the one that failed). Good customer service, but I prefer not to need it! Still don't know what the exact failure cause was, but was told the sensor magnets on both units were securely mounted and had not shifted. I have flown almost 3 hours since putting them back on the plane, but am planning to put a Slick mag on the left side with p-mag on right and run that way until I gain a little more confidence in the p-mag.
Pedigree of my p-mags is: delivered in April 2006 and sent back for firmware upgrade in Jan 2008. I initially bought one p-mag and one e-mag. I had the e-mag unit upgraded to p-mag when sent back for firmware update in Jan 08 (this is the unit that failed, but I don't have any reason to believe the modification is the reason for the failure).
10. Following first flight after p-mag reinstallation, I pulled the cowl again for inspection and found one of the large baffles screws missing. It was the lower screw on the left side baffles just forward of where the oil cooler nutplates are installed. The washer markings were visible in the paint where the screw had been installed, but it had vibrated loose and fell out. I reinstalled a new one with washer and star lockwasher, and checked all the other baffle screws as well. This kind of surprised me and I'll keep a closer eye on these now.
11. Also at about 8 hours flight time, I found that the pilot side stick grip was loose on the stick. Hard to believe considering the beating I remember having to put on it when installing during the build process. But it has worked loose so I need to drill it and tap the stick for a small screw. It won't take much to hold it, but can't leave it twisting in place like it is now.
12. SL-30 nav/comm radio is working great on the comm side and I love the standby monitor feature, but the nav side is not receiving signals. Using one of the Archer wingtip nav antennas and have verified proper installation. I also checked the antenna in flight by disconnecting the coax behind the panel and plugging it into my handheld nav/comm radio - the wingtip antenna works fine. So it's either the radio (not likely, I don't think...), or the problem is in the tray or tray pigtail connection. Unfortunately, that area is hard to reach so I'm not looking forward to the troubleshooting or fix....
If you got through all that, thanks for reading, and I hope this helps others in their preps for first flight down the road!
These probably aren't unique squawks, but hopefully documenting here will help those getting ready for first flight (squawks are listed in approximate order discovered during test flight process):
1. First flight is all it took to recognize that my 18 year old David Clarks were not going to cut it in the RV cockpit. They were fine in my old Cessna 140, but after 10+ hours in other RVs with ANR headsets, the difference was VERY noticable. Begging forgiveness from my wife on the cost, I ordered a new Lightspeed Zulu headset in time for my 3rd flight and have been very happy with the results.
2. It took a number of adjustments over the first several flights to get an exhaust pipe position at cowl exit that I was happy with in terms of cowl clearance, firewall clearance, and exhaust pulse thumping on the floor under my feet (still more floor vibration than I want, and will be adding some type of damping material under my feet).
3. Noticed on second or third flight that EZ-Pilot wing leveler was not getting gps data from panel mounted Lowrance 2000C gps. This had been working during all my panel testing, so surprised me somewhat. Was simple explanation and fix though....I had updated my Lowrance 2000C with terrain awareness software just prior to first flight and the software update had reset a bunch of the settings, including turning off the NMEA output data stream. Changed the setting back and all was good.
4. On first couple flights, the #1 and #2 cylinder CHTs were running roughly 30F-40F cooler than #3 and #4. I had talked to others with similar issue and followed advice I was given to apply metalized tape to front of the #1 and #2 cylinders for an inch or two up from front baffles. This "fence" forces air up instead of directly into the front cylinder cooling fins and effectively evened CHTs accross all cylinders. The tape will last a while, but I'll eventually rivet in aluminum pieces instead of the tape (I think Van's latest baffles designs incorporate pieces like this).
5. After 3 or 4 flights, I noticed a couple spots on my front baffles behind the spinner area where the baffle seal material wasn't laying completely flat but had formed small puckered areas along the curved top cowl surface. Some strategic partial cuts of the baffle material allowed the puckered section to overlay itself and form a flat sealed area. I don't know that there was any measurable cooling improvement from this, but I wanted the flat seal there.
6. After about 4 hours flight time, I noticed when checking the oil that the dipstick tube rotated slightly when turning the dipstick cap. There wasn't any oil leak visible but clearly I couldn't leave this as it was, so off came the cowl (again....). I found the safety wire wasn't quite tight enough so removed the safety wire, retorqued the tube, and reinstalled safety wire with a little more attention to pulling it as tight as I could get it.
7. Developed very slight leaks at two fittings on the brake master cylinders (1 on pilot side, 1 on passenger side). Not significant enough to see anything on the floor, but can see brake fluid gathered at bottom of those two master cylinders and can see which fittings are wet with fluid. I'll have to remove/reinstall the fittings. Will reinstall with TiteSeal and make sure this is fixed before installing damping material in floor that I mentioned in paragraph #2.
8. At about 6 hours flight time, I had removed the cowl again for no real reason other than another engine inspection, and found that the triangle shaped exhaust slip joint fixture (Vetterman exhaust system) on the left exit pipe had rotated to the point that one of the small bolt heads was rubbing on the exhaust pipe above it. It probably rotated from all the adjusting I had been doing (by rotating pipe in slip joint) in first few flights. Rubbing had marked the other pipe but not rubbed through yet. If I hadn't pulled the cowl for that inspection, I think the bolt would have rubbed through in next few flight hours.
9. On this one, I'm not trying to start another p-mag debate, just reporting my direct flight experience. I am running a dual p-mag setup and had my right p-mag fail in flight at about 7 hours total time (7.6 Hobbs on engine, 6.6 hrs flight time when got back to airport on the good p-mag). Engine coughed/sputtered and started running rough. Was able to isolate by switching p-lead switches off similar to runup. Was a bit unsettling (lost all power when I shut the good one down and backfired on restart) and cost me a few weeks of plane down time. I tried starting on each p-mag individually once I was on the ground and quickly shut down from right side start when firing seemed to be intermittent and random - this was clearly not a smart thing to do since I was already pretty sure the problem was with the right p-mag (my tach sense is off that p-mag and tach reading also went haywire when engine went rough). I sent the p-mags back for evaluation and service and they replaced the circuit boards, loaded latest firmware, and performed the sensor magnet service bulletin (did all this to both p-mags, not just the one that failed). Good customer service, but I prefer not to need it! Still don't know what the exact failure cause was, but was told the sensor magnets on both units were securely mounted and had not shifted. I have flown almost 3 hours since putting them back on the plane, but am planning to put a Slick mag on the left side with p-mag on right and run that way until I gain a little more confidence in the p-mag.
Pedigree of my p-mags is: delivered in April 2006 and sent back for firmware upgrade in Jan 2008. I initially bought one p-mag and one e-mag. I had the e-mag unit upgraded to p-mag when sent back for firmware update in Jan 08 (this is the unit that failed, but I don't have any reason to believe the modification is the reason for the failure).
10. Following first flight after p-mag reinstallation, I pulled the cowl again for inspection and found one of the large baffles screws missing. It was the lower screw on the left side baffles just forward of where the oil cooler nutplates are installed. The washer markings were visible in the paint where the screw had been installed, but it had vibrated loose and fell out. I reinstalled a new one with washer and star lockwasher, and checked all the other baffle screws as well. This kind of surprised me and I'll keep a closer eye on these now.
11. Also at about 8 hours flight time, I found that the pilot side stick grip was loose on the stick. Hard to believe considering the beating I remember having to put on it when installing during the build process. But it has worked loose so I need to drill it and tap the stick for a small screw. It won't take much to hold it, but can't leave it twisting in place like it is now.
12. SL-30 nav/comm radio is working great on the comm side and I love the standby monitor feature, but the nav side is not receiving signals. Using one of the Archer wingtip nav antennas and have verified proper installation. I also checked the antenna in flight by disconnecting the coax behind the panel and plugging it into my handheld nav/comm radio - the wingtip antenna works fine. So it's either the radio (not likely, I don't think...), or the problem is in the tray or tray pigtail connection. Unfortunately, that area is hard to reach so I'm not looking forward to the troubleshooting or fix....
If you got through all that, thanks for reading, and I hope this helps others in their preps for first flight down the road!
