Veetail88
Well Known Member
I experienced a problem with one of my P-Mags yesterday.
Having flown for only about 20 minutes, I landed for fuel. With fueling, chatting and screwing around a bit, I jumped in to head out. Start-up went fine, but the motor seemed to be a bit odd with little misses here and there.
When I ran my ground mag check (which I almost skipped as I'd been flying just 30 minutes before and will never think about skipping again) I had no rpm drop when I grounded the left P-lead. Checking the other P-Mag, the engine lost ignition completely. Left P-Mag, dead.
Knowing that if the problem were ship's power the P-Mag would keep going I figured either the P-lead connection was bad or the P-Mag itself had gone tip up.
Taxied over to a hanger where I had a friend, I pulled the cowl off to check things out. With the motor to warm to really work on, I accepted a ride back to my hanger for tools and wiring schematic and such.
I pulled the connector and tested. P-lead, ground and ship's power were intact, so I plugged it back together fired up the motor to check it out. Everything was fine. Cowled it back up, fired it back up and everything was fine so I launched for the home turf. All systems go, no sign of any problem.
I have no clue as to the problem and have not been able to find exactly this problem anywhere in the archives here. The connector was secure and everything in good condition so I don't believe that was the problem. I didn't think to try to power everything down and restart when the condition first showed up.
Having read posts about heat problems here, I suspect that was the problem but that's based on nothing concrete. The day was I think around 76 degrees F and I don't have any overheating tendencies. Seems the heat soak might have been the problem as it was a good hour with the canopy off between the event and the restart, and things were substantially cooler.
I do have blast tubes installed by the way. I purchased the units 5 years ago but only started flying them last August. Pretty sure they were built after the teething problems were worked out. They have 55 hours on em.
I have not had a chance to try to recreate the event yet, but if things clear up today I'll try to get a flight in.
Anyone seen this issue? Any clue?
Thanks.
Having flown for only about 20 minutes, I landed for fuel. With fueling, chatting and screwing around a bit, I jumped in to head out. Start-up went fine, but the motor seemed to be a bit odd with little misses here and there.
When I ran my ground mag check (which I almost skipped as I'd been flying just 30 minutes before and will never think about skipping again) I had no rpm drop when I grounded the left P-lead. Checking the other P-Mag, the engine lost ignition completely. Left P-Mag, dead.
Knowing that if the problem were ship's power the P-Mag would keep going I figured either the P-lead connection was bad or the P-Mag itself had gone tip up.
Taxied over to a hanger where I had a friend, I pulled the cowl off to check things out. With the motor to warm to really work on, I accepted a ride back to my hanger for tools and wiring schematic and such.
I pulled the connector and tested. P-lead, ground and ship's power were intact, so I plugged it back together fired up the motor to check it out. Everything was fine. Cowled it back up, fired it back up and everything was fine so I launched for the home turf. All systems go, no sign of any problem.
I have no clue as to the problem and have not been able to find exactly this problem anywhere in the archives here. The connector was secure and everything in good condition so I don't believe that was the problem. I didn't think to try to power everything down and restart when the condition first showed up.
Having read posts about heat problems here, I suspect that was the problem but that's based on nothing concrete. The day was I think around 76 degrees F and I don't have any overheating tendencies. Seems the heat soak might have been the problem as it was a good hour with the canopy off between the event and the restart, and things were substantially cooler.
I do have blast tubes installed by the way. I purchased the units 5 years ago but only started flying them last August. Pretty sure they were built after the teething problems were worked out. They have 55 hours on em.
I have not had a chance to try to recreate the event yet, but if things clear up today I'll try to get a flight in.
Anyone seen this issue? Any clue?
Thanks.