Yup, I made engine noises for real today and am a happy man.
I thought I was prepared, but frankly it was all a bit of a blur - information overload, even with a checklist on my knee and focusing only on the EIS - didnt even turn the EFIS on, which Im glad I didnt now. Too many things flashing at me, and it takes a minute to register what you are seeing and evaluate its relative importance.
The first thing I noticed was that my oil pressure was higher than I had anticipated - initially up around 98 PSI. It did drop drop over the next few minutes down to around 90 as the engine warmed, but I thought it would be much lower. My observer pilot friend later told me that this is normal, that the cold oil will show quite high oil pressure until it warms up completely. True?
Idle RPM was too high I think - I couldnt get it below about 1230. I know I had the throttle arm set so that it hit the stop with the knob pulled all the way out, so I guess maybe I need an adjustment of some kind here.
The one time I looked at fuel pressure, it read 29 PSI. I have AFP fuel injection, but isnt this a bit high? The boost pump was turned off.
I ran the engine for about 3.5 minutes. At around 3 minutes, CHT maximum was 260. Three cylinders seemed fairly close in values, but one was only at 176. Dont know why.
EGTs were pretty consistent 1338 - 1365
The one voltage check I did showed it to be low - 12.1. I suspect that this was due to the battery not being topped off and from the initial strain of starting? Hopefully this will go up in short order when the engine is run up at higher RPM and the alternator is given a little time to do its job?
In spite of the ECI manual recommendation to not cycle the prop, I did. No response the first two pulls, but the third time was a charm. My observer later told me I cycled it way too fast. Chalk that up to lack of experience with constant speed props.
I did notice that the engine sounded like it was missing a bit early in the test, but that seemed to improve. In all the excitement, Im not sure if it went completely away or not. I did later find that one spark plug lead was not snapped completely on during the test run, but with duel plugs, im not sure if that could have been the cause.
REcommendation for others: Get two observers if possible. One to keep an eye on the engine and prop, and the other to take notes for you. There was a lot of information coming at me, and it would have been better for me to just verbally spew numbers to someone over the radio rather than write them down myself.
Well, the 3 minutes I allotted myself for the first run was over in a hearbeat. I went a little over my time allotment and didnt get to check everything I wanted to, but all in all I was happy. After pulling back in the hangar and cleaning up, I stopped in front of my plane before leaving and put a hand on a cylinder and felt the residual warmth. It felt good. Very good.
erich
I thought I was prepared, but frankly it was all a bit of a blur - information overload, even with a checklist on my knee and focusing only on the EIS - didnt even turn the EFIS on, which Im glad I didnt now. Too many things flashing at me, and it takes a minute to register what you are seeing and evaluate its relative importance.
The first thing I noticed was that my oil pressure was higher than I had anticipated - initially up around 98 PSI. It did drop drop over the next few minutes down to around 90 as the engine warmed, but I thought it would be much lower. My observer pilot friend later told me that this is normal, that the cold oil will show quite high oil pressure until it warms up completely. True?
Idle RPM was too high I think - I couldnt get it below about 1230. I know I had the throttle arm set so that it hit the stop with the knob pulled all the way out, so I guess maybe I need an adjustment of some kind here.
The one time I looked at fuel pressure, it read 29 PSI. I have AFP fuel injection, but isnt this a bit high? The boost pump was turned off.
I ran the engine for about 3.5 minutes. At around 3 minutes, CHT maximum was 260. Three cylinders seemed fairly close in values, but one was only at 176. Dont know why.
EGTs were pretty consistent 1338 - 1365
The one voltage check I did showed it to be low - 12.1. I suspect that this was due to the battery not being topped off and from the initial strain of starting? Hopefully this will go up in short order when the engine is run up at higher RPM and the alternator is given a little time to do its job?
In spite of the ECI manual recommendation to not cycle the prop, I did. No response the first two pulls, but the third time was a charm. My observer later told me I cycled it way too fast. Chalk that up to lack of experience with constant speed props.
I did notice that the engine sounded like it was missing a bit early in the test, but that seemed to improve. In all the excitement, Im not sure if it went completely away or not. I did later find that one spark plug lead was not snapped completely on during the test run, but with duel plugs, im not sure if that could have been the cause.
REcommendation for others: Get two observers if possible. One to keep an eye on the engine and prop, and the other to take notes for you. There was a lot of information coming at me, and it would have been better for me to just verbally spew numbers to someone over the radio rather than write them down myself.
Well, the 3 minutes I allotted myself for the first run was over in a hearbeat. I went a little over my time allotment and didnt get to check everything I wanted to, but all in all I was happy. After pulling back in the hangar and cleaning up, I stopped in front of my plane before leaving and put a hand on a cylinder and felt the residual warmth. It felt good. Very good.
erich
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