John Courte
Well Known Member
This applies more to the -7 than the 7A, but I've noticed that when on the ground, the fuel level indicators on the EFIS are more or less useless: Parked, they both read full unless I've got less than 10 gallons. In flight they're fine.
I understand fully that I should be able to keep track of my fuel by various means, such as basic arithmetic using time, flow rate, etc. But this doesn't really help on the ground before the first flight of the day. Any number of things could happen between the time you walk away from the aircraft and the next time you fly it, up to and including a bunch of teenagers siphoning out your avgas to put in their jalopy (does that sound dated or what?).
So the obvious answer would be like everyone is taught on day 1 of flight instruction in a Cherokee or Skyhawk: Check the fuel visually, by looking in the fill hole or with a dip tube.
Doing this in the RV is easy enough, with its low-wing configuration, and I can't be the first person to have this question, so does anybody have a set of photos looking inside the tank at various fuel levels with gallons-remaining numbers attached?
Maybe just some rough indications of what I should be looking for in there at 5, 10, and 15 gallons? Full is fairly obvious, but the ground attitude and dihedral throws off my guesstimates for the remaining graduations quite a bit.
Thanks!
I understand fully that I should be able to keep track of my fuel by various means, such as basic arithmetic using time, flow rate, etc. But this doesn't really help on the ground before the first flight of the day. Any number of things could happen between the time you walk away from the aircraft and the next time you fly it, up to and including a bunch of teenagers siphoning out your avgas to put in their jalopy (does that sound dated or what?).
So the obvious answer would be like everyone is taught on day 1 of flight instruction in a Cherokee or Skyhawk: Check the fuel visually, by looking in the fill hole or with a dip tube.
Doing this in the RV is easy enough, with its low-wing configuration, and I can't be the first person to have this question, so does anybody have a set of photos looking inside the tank at various fuel levels with gallons-remaining numbers attached?
Maybe just some rough indications of what I should be looking for in there at 5, 10, and 15 gallons? Full is fairly obvious, but the ground attitude and dihedral throws off my guesstimates for the remaining graduations quite a bit.
Thanks!