This past Tuesday, March 14th, they called me to tell me that the plane was ready for the fuel level calibration and ground run. I feared the worst.
Not quite the worst was what happened. In fact, there was one piece of good news to go with the bad. The electric fuel pump that I thought needed to be replaced? That was a gauge issue, not a pump issue. It brings the pressure up to over 3PSI (minimum is 1). So I don’t need a new pump after all. Now for the bad news.
The fuel level calibrations were questionable. The “counts” registered by the engine monitor didn’t seem normal during the calibration process, but the left side seemed okay and showed full once done. The right side indication, however, was all over the place during the ground run.
And the known fuel seep had turned into something much more exciting and vigorous. Fuel started coming out around the left side inboard access panel on top of the wing almost as soon as that tank got full during the calibration. It continued after it was put back in the hangar, plus there were wet rivets under the wing farther outboard and higher, which indicates other leaks as well.
As if that wasn’t enough, the ADSB-out TailBeacon wouldn’t respond to interrogation. The wifi connection that is supposed to activate during the initial power-up wouldn’t come up at all, so they couldn’t access the unit to troubleshoot the setup/configuration/programming.
We fired it up anyway. At least get that much done. The engine didn’t blow up. But it did leak oil, which wasn’t bad enough to notice until we had shut it down and noticed oil dripping on the front strut and tire. Lovely!
The next day, they called to tell me it was done. The oil leak was a gasket on a probe, now fixed, and the TailBeacon was just slow to warm up and come online, but was working fine. The fuel levels for both sides were steady during the second ground run for which I was not in attendance. The fuel seep/leak wasn’t their problem. They didn’t touch the tanks in any way, just hooked up the wires from the existing fuel senders to the new engine monitor.
So, on 15 March, my 175-ish hour project was deemed complete and ready for its test flight. That’s over twenty weeks from when they pulled it in, and twenty-five weeks from when they promised to start on it. Assuming a single tech, 40-hour work weeks, and making no allowances for vacations or holidays, that’s 1,000+ work hours from when they were scheduled to begin. That’s efficiency one would normally only expect from .gov types.
But wait! It really wasn’t done. On Friday, March 17th, I noticed the compass card sitting on its side in a very small amount of liquid when I went to set up the instruments and GPS up to display the information as desired. They had missed the compass work. I requested it, but it was never officially added to the work order, and I wasn’t charged for it. I called them back over, and they pulled it to do the service. In the process, the mounting bracket broke. More accurately, it came apart from where it had broken before, and the repair failed. They successfully serviced the compass, located and ordered a replacement bracket.
That same day, I also noticed that both fuel gauges still showed full, despite having burned (and/or leaked) about three gallons from the left side and one gallon from the right during the aforementioned ground runs. Not good.
After I finished setting up the instruments, I cleaned the stains on the underside of the wings and fuselage from the fuel leak to see what would happen 1) over the weekend, while not moving, and 2) during the planned flight to 2GC on Monday. The left wing and the path from there to the fuselage and down the landing gear were the worst areas. Both ground runs were done from that tank, with only a brief changeover to confirm that both tanks fed normally. That had burned a few gallons, and it’d probably leaked a quart or more after it went back inside.
Knowing that I’d likely be leaving around sunrise on Monday, I stopped back by the airport on Sunday morning and wiped off the undersides of the wings again. There were plenty of fresh stains along the bottom of both wings, despite the cleanup I’d done just two days earlier, but none enthusiastic enough to make it to the landing gear.
I did the test flight to 2GC today, Monday, 20 March, to get the preventative maintenance done and to get a second opinion on the fuel leak, as planned. That wasn’t much fun. It was 27 degrees at launch. I was quite nervous, given the context of the flight and my lack of recent experience. Once airborne and clear the pattern, I called Fayetteville Approach for Flight Following. They weren’t answering. Squelch was broken for the entire flight. I thought it was the radio, and even dug the miniature screwdriver out of my flight bag and tried to adjust it in flight. I figured out on the way home that it was the intercom. That added to the annoyance factor.
I’d plotted a course via IFR waypoints that kept me just outside of Pope/Fayetteville Class C airspace until I had to descend and do the last seven miles to 2GC below 1400 to stay under the outer shelf. I made the appropriate radio calls, but flew right over the field without ever seeing it. I mean, it’s a matchstick in the middle of a field, all of thirty feet wide and thirty-five hundred feet long, so it’s easy to miss. It was just after 0800, and I knew that three training flights were scheduled to launch at any time. I circled around and finally saw it.
At launch, winds were favoring 35 but were only about six knots. I was on the correct side of the field at that point but too close in for a proper base-to-final transition, so I decided to do a bad thing and land on 17 with the slight tailwind. I messed that up, too. I didn’t go far enough out for my downwind, so even a constant base-to-final turn had me too far to the right. I did a go-around and was certain that I had an audience by this point. I got the distance closer to right and managed to put it on the ground that time, albeit more firmly than ideal and all three tires impacting at the same time rather than the mains first.
After touching down and approaching the end of the runway, I saw a Cessna 152 staring me in the face, prop spinning. He was in the extended threshold area waiting for the idiot landing the wrong way to get off the runway so he could take off. I obliged. The winds had picked up, and I’d just landed with an eleven knot tailwind. They were polite enough not to mention it while I was within earshot.
They did the oil change, installed the new plugs, and did a quick check of the aircraft. He deemed it okay to fly with his CFII once the compass bracket replacement happened and sent me on my way with the promise of an invoice to follow.
The return flight wasn’t much fun either. I checked fuel levels before I left and noted that the left tank only had a minimal amount of liquid visible, indicating about a quarter of a tank. It started the day around 5/8. Thirstier than expected, although I’d already seen that on the fuel flow. I made note to switch to the right tank for the return flight, it still being approximately 7/8.
I kept my head down until I cleared Class Charlie, then climbed to 2000 for the last thirty-five miles. I got to play chicken with another airplane early in the flight, opposite direction one thousand feet above me and slightly to my right. I saw it on ADSB, and was trying to figure out where to go while trying to get a visual on it. I was maybe a mile from the boundary of Pope’s airspace off to my left when I saw him. Confirmed off to my right and, as indicated, high enough to not be a factor.
I didn’t bother calling Fayetteville for FF, but went straight to TTA’s CTAF. Which was full. There were at least six aircraft in the pattern or transitioning. I wasn’t looking forward to merging into that mess. Then I started hitting bumps. Nothing serious, but unnerving when one’s mental capacity is already strained. Did I mention that I’d barely gotten five hours of sleep either of the previous nights?
Fortunately, all but two of the airplanes were clear TTA by the time I got close. One was about the same distance to the NW that I was to the SE and transitioning into the pattern. Since I had to cross the field to enter downwind for 03, and he was in a 172, slightly faster than me, I was pretty sure he’d be far enough in front of me to not be a factor. He called downwind as I was about half a mile from crossing over the field in preparation to turn on my downwind leg. That’s when the other guy decided to take off. I was at pattern altitude, so roughly 1,000 feet above the ground. But we have 6,500 feet of asphalt. Depending on what he was, he could be close by the time I actually cross over the runway. Not really a factor unless he’s jet-assisted, but close enough to add to the nerves.
I adjusted my heading a little, more towards a mid-field crossing instead of my intended departure end crossover point, and took my place on downwind. I finally saw the Skyhawk I’d been talking to for ten minutes as he started his base turn. Plenty of spacing. Departing traffic, having passed underneath me by this point, although staying in the pattern, couldn’t catch me if they tried. I got my approach configuration right, made base and final turns close to where I should, and with the help of the PAPI lights, made a decent final approach. I actually flared before the nose gear hit and settled somewhat respectably onto the runway with only a moderate bump and only a few hundred feet from the numbers. Probably a 4.5/10. The morning impact at 2GC was a 2, for comparison. I used up some brake pad material to ensure that I made the first turn-out and cleared the runway.
Done. Alive. No bent airplane. All glory to God.
The GPS performed flawlessly, as did both the IFR-rated KI-209 indicator and the VFR AV-30 in HSI mode. I didn’t test the precession that the AV-30s have a reputation for, leaving it in GPS-HSI mode for the duration. I’ll do that another day. The leveling is slightly off on the AI AV-30, probably one tick nose-up, but close enough that it won’t need to be adjusted. I didn’t check the VOR or glideslope radio.
The engine monitor performed well, and all engine parameters were as expected. As mentioned previously, fuel flow was above six gallons per hour at a power setting that should’ve been around sixty-five percent. I was low altitude, so I didn’t lean for maximum efficiency. I did get it below 5.75 GPH before deciding that it was good enough. TAS was just above ninety knots. I’ll work on efficiency and fine-tuning once I’m more comfortable with the entire platform. Both tanks still showed full on the monitor. The dude had to have messed up the calibration somehow because the old analog gauges were pretty much in the vicinity of accurate, and the CGR uses those original senders. One doesn’t trust fuel gauges anyway if one values one’s life.
I expected a complete mess of the underside of the wings after all the sloshing around in flight. What I found was a minimal line under both wings. This confirmed that the left wing doesn’t leak much once below half a tank, and the right wing doesn’t leak much at all. My plan stands. Keep the left below one-half as a reserve and use the right almost exclusively. For long cross-country flights where full fuel is best, I’ll fill both sides immediately prior to launch and burn the left side for the first ninety minutes.
It was clear after today’s flights that I need much more practice and level of comfort with the airplane before trying any intense advanced training. I’ll do some pattern work, then some cross-countries, and only after that will I go under the hood and resume instrument training. I already have no chance of making my intended deadline of being rated before Mother’s Day, so at this point, I just have to get it done by December so I don’t have to re-take the written. I can do that.
Grumpy 