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IO-360 VS O360

sheldon957

sheldon957

Active Member
Looking at buying an RV7-A. It seems that 8 out 10 have a carb'ed engine.

Other than cost, what advantage if any would there be putting a carb'ed engine in instead of an injected?

Positives I know for injected:

NO CARB HEAT worries.

Better fuel savings

Better power.

I don't know if one is better than the other for hot starts.
 
I recently changed my RV-9A from a carb engine to to a FI engine, both -360s. My experience is no carb heat concerns and more equal cyl and egt Temps. Other than that, the two are a wash, except hot starts. Dan
 
If you want to do negative G acro, then the FI wins. Positive G acro and a carb is just fine.

As for the better power, I seem to recall one of the engine builders stating that with their dyno pull's, the carbs tend to do better numbers.

I wouldn't avoid an airplane because of the carb as you can always swap out the carb, if you want to.
 
Hot starting an injection engine vs carb as an issue is about the same severity level as the difference between the horizontal injection snorkel intake vs the vertical intake air box FAB.
By that I mean that the snorkel is way better in many respects (maint, cowl removal, fod) but there are thousands of people happily flying the FABs
 
How hard is it to switch over to injected? I guess you would need a new manifold, and the injectors, injector pump etc.

Also price guess?
 
sheldon957 said:
How hard is it to switch over to injected? I guess you would need a new manifold, and the injectors, injector pump etc.

Also price guess?
Click to expand...

You would need the injection servo, the spider (flow divider), the lines and the injectors. Then you would need to change the fuel system to high pressure, meaning the engine driven pump and the boost pump. Also, depending on the injection system you use, you may need a fuel return line going back to the tank. Total cost is probably about $4,000.
 
You will also need to replace most of the FWF fuel lines along with the throttle & mixture cables.
 
Carb vs FI: Hot Starting Fuel Injected Aerosport 360

There may be valid reasons to continue the FI vs carb debate, but hot starting a FI 360 shouldn't be one of them. The credibility of that statement is the fact I've been flying my Aerosport IO-360 RV-8A out of Inyokern (IYK) in the Mojave desert for 4+ years and nearly 600 hrs. with summer OAT's regularly well over 100 deg. F.

Here's what works for me - so far every time:

Throttle - Full Fwd
RPM - Full Fwd
Mixture - ICO
Boost - OFF (DO NOT PRIME)
Starter - Engage
Mixture - Move out of ICO
Throttle - Adjust after start (Pay attention or you will quickly find yourself at full power)
Boost - On if evidence of vapor lock at idle until normal fuel flow established

There may be other procedures, but the key for me on hot re-starts is not to prime - any priming at all seems to flood the engine. I use this procedure regardless of OAT for restarts. For initial start, I prime with boost pump 5-6 seconds..
 
pvalovich said:
There may be valid reasons to continue the FI vs carb debate, but hot starting a FI 360 shouldn't be one of them. The credibility of that statement is the fact I've been flying my Aerosport IO-360 RV-8A out of Inyokern (IYK) in the Mojave desert for 4+ years and nearly 600 hrs. with summer OAT's regularly well over 100 deg. F.

Here's what works for me - so far every time:

Throttle - Full Fwd
RPM - Full Fwd
Mixture - ICO
Boost - OFF (DO NOT PRIME)
Starter - Engage
Mixture - Move out of ICO
Throttle - Adjust after start (Pay attention or you will quickly find yourself at full power)
Boost - On if evidence of vapor lock at idle until normal fuel flow established

There may be other procedures, but the key for me on hot re-starts is not to prime - any priming at all seems to flood the engine. I use this procedure regardless of OAT for restarts. For initial start, I prime with boost pump 5-6 seconds..
Click to expand...

I'm going to give that a try. My experimentation has slowly trended that direction with better results as each time. Thanks
 
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