Craig
Well Known Member
I'm just finishing up my 40 hour test period.
I've had a couple of odd failures.
Ever since the first flight, I've had an intermittent problem with the pitch indication on the Grand Rapids EFIS. While I'm busy looking out the window, it sometimes decides to start indicating a pitch that is about 15 degrees below what the airplane is doing. Not good for IFR, of course. Carlos at Grand Rapids has been very helpful with troubleshooting. At one point, I thought I might not have been waiting long enough after power up for the alignment process. But that wasn't it. Intermittent problems are the worst. Recently Carlos had me send in the AHRS and magnetometer for testing. They couldn't duplicate the problem, but they are replacing both units with new ones. I don't know yet if that will fix the problem, but that is outstanding customer service.
My MT governor decided to quit governing the other day. All prop operations were normal the day before, but on runup the other day, the prop would not cycle. I taxied back, checked the linkage, checked for leaks, checked the prop blades, etc. Nothing obvious. I tried another runup at a higher RPM, still no cycling. I decided the most likely problem was the governor, so I sent it off for overhaul. Now, I've had the thing for three years or so. That's the way it goes with homebuilt airplanes. It's only been installed for about 6 months, and it has about 33 hours on it. MT did the overhaul, I don't think they found any problems with it. I don't have it back yet, so I don't know if anything they did will fix the problem. The warranty did not apply like it did with Grand Rapids. Of course, if the problem is fixed, I'm happy to pay.
I've had a couple of odd failures.
Ever since the first flight, I've had an intermittent problem with the pitch indication on the Grand Rapids EFIS. While I'm busy looking out the window, it sometimes decides to start indicating a pitch that is about 15 degrees below what the airplane is doing. Not good for IFR, of course. Carlos at Grand Rapids has been very helpful with troubleshooting. At one point, I thought I might not have been waiting long enough after power up for the alignment process. But that wasn't it. Intermittent problems are the worst. Recently Carlos had me send in the AHRS and magnetometer for testing. They couldn't duplicate the problem, but they are replacing both units with new ones. I don't know yet if that will fix the problem, but that is outstanding customer service.
My MT governor decided to quit governing the other day. All prop operations were normal the day before, but on runup the other day, the prop would not cycle. I taxied back, checked the linkage, checked for leaks, checked the prop blades, etc. Nothing obvious. I tried another runup at a higher RPM, still no cycling. I decided the most likely problem was the governor, so I sent it off for overhaul. Now, I've had the thing for three years or so. That's the way it goes with homebuilt airplanes. It's only been installed for about 6 months, and it has about 33 hours on it. MT did the overhaul, I don't think they found any problems with it. I don't have it back yet, so I don't know if anything they did will fix the problem. The warranty did not apply like it did with Grand Rapids. Of course, if the problem is fixed, I'm happy to pay.
