Repairing a Skyfox Gazelle

[Guest debra stewart]

I can't advise you to do one thing or another, this being such a ridiculously litigious world these days, but I can tell you that people (myself included) who used to operate planes and helicopters in the remoter parts of the country didn't always have the luxury of getting mechanical problems fixed as soon as they came about. Consequently we would often have to fly for days or weeks with oil leaks and it all came down to assessing whether the leak was going to get bad enough to lose a critical amount of oil during the next flight.The only sorts of things that would cause that to happen would be cracked crankcases or oil drain plugs with stripped threads, for examples. An oil filter with the O ring damaged could do that too.

 

Otherwise, things like tappet/rocker cover gasket leaks just had to wait until the next 100 hourly service . On some engine types you could nip up the rocker cover bolts a bit and stop the leak altogether, other types, like VW engines, have a spring clamp which can't be adjusted, so replacing the gasket is the only option, but I did have a VW beetle with rocker cover gaskets that leaked quite copiously for a year or so before I did anything about it.

 

Not to say it couldn't happen but I've never seen a rocker cover gasket leak on a car engine or a plane that became suddenly drastic, usually the leak just gets very gradually worse until you get sick of the mess and replace the gasket.

 

EDIT - to send a PM (Personal Message) just click on the name of the person you want to talk to, on one of their posts, and follow the prompts i.e. if I sent you one I would click on debra stewart and then click 'start a conversation'. The person will then get an email telling them someone has sent them a message.

Thankyou so much. I am a little bit ignorant in the ways of this forum but I will get it all eventually I'm sure. I looked everywhere for "PM" and couldn't find anything, and I'm thinking "what the bloody hell would PM be?" Never occurred to me it would be Personal message. The brain is a strange thing isn't it. I am laughing as I write this because I always get stumped by stupidly ridiculous things and yet flying come reasonably easily - wait a minute, that's not entirely true ! Ha ha. Thankyou again, all the best , Debb

 

 

[Steve L]

hi Deb, could you post some pictures of the leaks, that might help someone asses how bad it is or where its coming from.

 

Steve

 

 

[Guest debra stewart]

hi Deb, could you post some pictures of the leaks, that might help someone asses how bad it is or where its coming from.Steve

thanks Steve but I know they are coming from the Tappet covers. I've got the gasket kit, fixing it today. Very miniscule leaks but I don't like leaks of any kind. I'm kinda fanatical about maintenance.

 

It's only just happened in the last couple of weeks but I want to fix them before they get any worse. With the price of the damn oil now I don't want to lose any if I don't have to. I have someone coming to help as well, so it should be fine. I'll be doing a general check of cables and fuel filter and a host of other things so it will be really good to learn some more stuff. I'm pretty good at diagnosing just not great at the actual fixing, but I'm getting there and diagnosing is a lot of the problem sometimes. Takes a while to become a competent mechanic ( which I'm not) so I expect to perfect my knowledge over the next year or two. No course down here though so I rely soley on the generosity of others to give me an hour here or there. All works out in the end, but very slow.

 

Thanks for your help, Debb