Dave_G
Well-Known Member
I know this doesn't have much to do with off road stuff but I thought this might spark some ingenuity in some folks for future reference.
A few days ago I was flying my airplane back from Santa Maria to Rialto when I encountered a slight inflight problem. As I was level at 9500' I started to see little specks of something on the windshield that soon became streaks of oil. As most can guess, oil on the windshield of an airplane is NOT a good sign and usually generates a pucker factor that exceeds the normal scale. A quick PAN call to SoCal controllers gave me vectors to several nearby airports but the GPS said I was only 17 minutes from home so I elected to continue to Rialto based on the (flow rate ;-) and landed safely.
After landing and pushing the airplane back into the hangar I removed the cowling to try to find the source of the oil leak. I sprayed the engine down with AVGAS and rolled it outside and ran the engine up to try and see where the oil was coming from. Low and behold it was coming from the centerline case seam near the back accessory cover. Now, for those that are not familiar with a Lycoming O-360 engine it is almost just like a Volkswagen engine. Flat pancake style four cylinger air cooled motor.
On an aircraft engine like mine the case halves are sealed together with a single silk thread between the case halves. This thread had apparently broken and the only remedy was to split the case halves and reseal it. Well, that costs about $12K with an overhaul and homey wasn't about to part with that kind of money so I enlisted the help of a really good A&P mechanic who said he could fix it for a lot less.
The end result was that we connected a vacuum pump to the engine and plugged the breather line to generate a vacuum enviroment in the engine case. This caused the the leaking case split line to leak from the outside in. While it was sucking air we applied a small line of super glue ( Zap-A Gap to be exact..) to the case split line and the vacuum sucked it into the case halves sealing them. We then applied a thin film of fuel tank sealer over it for good measure.
AND IT WORKED!!
Just goes to show that a little ingenuity and experience goes a long way in solving a problem that is not as bad as you think it is.
Just thought I'd share that kind of a fix......
Dave
"I started out with nothing and still have most of it left"
A few days ago I was flying my airplane back from Santa Maria to Rialto when I encountered a slight inflight problem. As I was level at 9500' I started to see little specks of something on the windshield that soon became streaks of oil. As most can guess, oil on the windshield of an airplane is NOT a good sign and usually generates a pucker factor that exceeds the normal scale. A quick PAN call to SoCal controllers gave me vectors to several nearby airports but the GPS said I was only 17 minutes from home so I elected to continue to Rialto based on the (flow rate ;-) and landed safely.
After landing and pushing the airplane back into the hangar I removed the cowling to try to find the source of the oil leak. I sprayed the engine down with AVGAS and rolled it outside and ran the engine up to try and see where the oil was coming from. Low and behold it was coming from the centerline case seam near the back accessory cover. Now, for those that are not familiar with a Lycoming O-360 engine it is almost just like a Volkswagen engine. Flat pancake style four cylinger air cooled motor.
On an aircraft engine like mine the case halves are sealed together with a single silk thread between the case halves. This thread had apparently broken and the only remedy was to split the case halves and reseal it. Well, that costs about $12K with an overhaul and homey wasn't about to part with that kind of money so I enlisted the help of a really good A&P mechanic who said he could fix it for a lot less.
The end result was that we connected a vacuum pump to the engine and plugged the breather line to generate a vacuum enviroment in the engine case. This caused the the leaking case split line to leak from the outside in. While it was sucking air we applied a small line of super glue ( Zap-A Gap to be exact..) to the case split line and the vacuum sucked it into the case halves sealing them. We then applied a thin film of fuel tank sealer over it for good measure.
AND IT WORKED!!
Just goes to show that a little ingenuity and experience goes a long way in solving a problem that is not as bad as you think it is.
Just thought I'd share that kind of a fix......
Dave
"I started out with nothing and still have most of it left"
