Preflight Checks, What do you find?

[ayavner]

When i was in the Air Force working on the 135's, the most compelling reason not to blow on the pitot was that they were heated!

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

A couple of times I found the bottom of my carby float bowl covered by tiny brown specks like sesame seeds. This is downstream of two fuel strainers and a paper filter, so it must have been some liquid precipitating out of the fuel. Was using 95 Mogas at the time. I have not seen it since obtaining my own Avgas supply.

 

 

[Mick]

A couple of years back I serviced a Jab and found about a dozen dead ants in the float bowl. Could not find any evidence of them anywhere else in the fuel system. On another Jab that had flown in from out west for a 100 hourly I found a live green frog sitting on the step in the firewall, he had obviously been there for the hour or so flight.

 

 

[Sapphire]

A couple of years back I serviced a Jab and found about a dozen dead ants in the float bowl.The ants could only have gotten in if the carby was stripped or the inlet filter pulled off;

 

they walked in and the carby was reassembled. They met their maker when the carby filled with fuel. That fuel entry past the valve is small-an ant eyeball could have blocked it up.

 

A couple of times I found the bottom of my carby float bowl covered by tiny brown specks like sesame seeds. This is downstream of two fuel strainers and a paper filter, so it must have been some liquid precipitating out of the fuel. Was using 95 Mogas at the time. I have not seen it since obtaining my own Avgas supply.Interesting, I had high octane mogas and found the same thing. By the way, paper fuel filters are no no in a/c. The paper absorbs water and if it freezes-no fuel to engine.

 

When i was in the Air Force working on the 135's, the most compelling reason not to blow on the pitot was that they were heated!If you see a pilot sneaking around with burnt lips, you'll know what he was up to in the privacy of his hanger.

[flyerme]

Of course you had to ground the plane but were there no facilities to weld it there? One gliding club I was with had continual problems with cracked muffler on a Pawnee. Many mornings they had it pulled off and someone was welding it up. Talking about welding, I am restoring a boat trailer and have to do vertical welds and welding underneath which is the worst when "lava" dribbles down on you. Is gasless mig welding easier than the stick welding I am doing?

bUY SOME STAINLESS STEEL ARC WELDING RODS. gasless mig is not the best. The stainless steel electeodes are amazing .yes even upside down.NO more cocky s$%# welding with them bad boys,they weld pretty much any metals , different metals together,and penatrate well in contamination conditions.... you can buy them seperatly from any good welding supplier.

 

 

[Sapphire]

bUY SOME STAINLESS STEEL ARC WELDING RODS. gasless mig is not the best. The stainless steel electeodes are amazing .yes even upside down.NO more cocky s$%# welding with them bad boys,they weld pretty much any metals , different metals together,and penatrate well in contamination conditions.... you can buy them seperatly from any good welding supplier.

Thanks, I'll give them a try. Don't like my s$%# welds.

 

 

[Sapphire]

Every time I open up this forum there is report of some incident/accident on the home page. Some involve pilots running out of fuel for insane reasons, another the pilot was stalled on short final and claimed a down draft forced him into the ground-wind speed about 6kts, or bouncing back into the air after a fast landing and spinning in from 100feet. We preflight the a/c but do we preflight ourselves? Having a license is supposed to say that you can at least safely take off, fly straight and level, climb, turn,decend, fly a circuit and land without getting lost. I have not gone flying because I could not pass the preflight-usually because I had a rageing cold or could not properly flight plan.

 

 

[boingk]

Well said Sapphire - I have often abandoned a flying occasion because of feeling average.

 

Once was with a procpective buyer of the craft was flying because I got a bad mag check - turned out it was fine and a full throttle run down the strip cleared it - but I'd like to be better safe than sorry.

 

Also landed Gazelles and C150's in max cosswind components without issues... if you're claiming other factors in accidents then you are c;ear;y inexperienced or simply not up to it.

 

Cheer - boingk

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Yea, I used to think I was sweet providing I did this or obeyed that, untill about 1000 hours, then I realized that ok, there are some situations I cant for see..Then at 2000 hrs I realised that I can plan fopr anything but still the odd situation will pop up that Im not prepared for..Now at 3000 hrs ish ive come to the conclusion.......sh@#t happens, and there aint nothing you can do do prepare for or predict it...Just make the best of the situation, keep your heap and you will be ok... And never ever say "id never get into that situation" because no-one ever does it on purpose.....

 

cheers

 

 

[turboplanner]

I'd generally agree with you Motz, but incase what you are saying is taken by some to mean "so there's no point taking all these precautions and doing all these checks, I'd suggest the more you think through the proposed flight and check and prepare for it the less these events are going to come up, and if they do the more prepared you will be to recover from them.

 

Things like not taking of on a strip with a forest off one end where the Russian Roulette factor of an engine failure means the same as the bullet in the chamber, or making a habit of beating up a field with a low pass where inevitably someone has built their strip under power lines and you're the one who tests them out - with conscious operating decisions relating to these operations you can eliminate them from your future permanently.

 

I found The Killing Zone by Paul Craig to be an exceptionally good book which looks at why pilots die after they get their licences and out to about 300 hours. It cured me from a number of bad habits I didn't realise made me unsafe.

 

At just $22.09 on Amazon.com, its easy to get and may extend your life.

 

 

[eightyknots]

I found The Killing Zone by Paul Craig to be an exceptionally good book which looks at why pilots die after they get their licences and out to about 300 hours. It cured me from a number of bad habits I didn't realise made me unsafe.

At just $22.09 on Amazon.com, its easy to get and may extend your life.

 

NB....

That sounds like a really interesting book Turbo. I wonder if Ian stocks this in the Clear Prop shop?

 

 

[eightyknots]

That sounds like a really interesting book Turbo. I wonder if Ian stocks this in the Clear Prop shop?

I just bought a second hand copy for $USD3.50; it should arrive sometime in December.

 

 

[naremman]

The one I laugh at is a pre flight I did on the second flight as part of my Chipmunk endorsement.

 

The first flight in the late morning had included the upper air work with stalls and about six spins, and concluded with a couple of circuits. Just before shut down there was a dead cut on one of the mags when I checked the mags!

 

As I went to investigate my Instructor indicated to leave checking it out until after lunch, as we were likely to be late for lunch at his home, and his lovely Irish born wife was not noted for her tolerance for latecomers.

 

Following lunch we returned to the airfield and I commenced a pre flight of the Chippie. On opening the side cowl I was a bit surprised to see a horse shoe magnet firmly latched onto an engine mount. Well, that explaines the dead cut on the magneto!! I just wonder how much of the previous flight it had been in the bottom end of the cowl, and was pretty lucky that it had found a good bit of metal to secure itself to.

 

A wander over to the Tiger Moth supplied us with the two screws to secure the magnet to the magneto, and we then spent a fair proportion of the afternoon testing out the structural strength of the Chippie's undercarriage, until I aquired some degree of mastery of three pointing the old girl. Not even some of my attempts at landing dislodged the magnet again!!

 

 

[Mark11]

My CFI has disconnected one spark plug, turned the fuel off and loosened the oil cap...

 

 

[Sapphire]

My CFI has disconnected one spark plug, turned the fuel off and loosened the oil cap...

 

And the plane flew perfectly

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

The Killing Zone by Paul Craig

 

It's not available in Apple's iPad library, but I downloaded a Kindle reader and the book from Amazon for about A$15.

 

Very well presented, interesting read.

 

 

[eightyknots]

The Killing Zone by Paul Craig It's not available in Apple's iPad library, but I downloaded a Kindle reader and the book from Amazon for about A$15.

Very well presented, interesting read.

I ordered mine from Amazon-dot-com selecting a good second-hand copy. 3-1/2 US dollars and freight probably amounts to about $AUD15.00 or so. Because I selected the slow freight, I probably won't see it for four weeks. So, this will become summer reading for me.