Dieselten

David and his crew dropped in to YWOL a few weeks ago and we made them very welcome. On behalf of all the Illawarra Flyers I extend heartiest congratulations to David and his support-team on a magnificent achievement and a demonstration of the durability and tenacity of the human spirit.

The current Jabiru starting-battery is the Odyssey PC625 AGM (absorbed glass-mat) sealed lead-acid unit which can be had for something in the vicinity of $320-350. Jabiru's alternator is simple but not the best for producing current or voltage, especially at lower RPM. IMO it needs a separate automotive-style alternator-regulator operating from a belt-drive or directly via the splines at the rear of the crankshaft. For ease of starting I recommend weekly use of a good lead-acid battery trickle-charger, and fitting the Jabiru ground-power receptacle if it is not already fitted. In other words, keep the starting-battery charged at all times. At my local airfield there is a PC625 battery available with a set of leads for the Jabiru ground-power socket which usually gets pretty much any Jab started if it is a little "reluctant" first thing in the morning. Another useful little wrinkle for easy starting on cold mornings is to pour a mugful of boiling water over the carburettor. BTW, Yuasa do make a great battery, but not for the Boeing 787! Their big marine Nickel-Cadmium cells in particular were matchless for performance and ruggedness.

Garmin SL40, panel-mount, had no problems with mine in 5 years.

Goss fuel hose outlasts Mackay by about 12 months. Best option is to get aircraft-quality 1/4" fuel-hose - it will last 5 years. Automotive hoses are good for about 12-15 months at best. Try Aircraft Spruce & Specialty for aircraft-grade fuel-hose.

No, just Xenaphonobic!

Just a heads up that the well-known and popular restaurant at Wollongong airport, "The Aviator Lounge" was destroyed by fire in the early hours of Monday 20th May 2013. Cause as yet unknown, future of the building uncertain. Judging by the damage it will probably need to be demolished and a new structure built as a terminal for the Fly-In, Fly-Out crews. Not sure if there will be a restaurant in whatever replaces the current building. As someone who enjoyed many a fine meal there over the years, I send my heart-felt commiserations to the owners of the restaurant and their staff during what are extremely difficult times for them.

Carb ice.

(Without prejudice) The speed with which the non-Australian sections of the forum begin to acquire threads and posts will very soon indicate the validity of the assumptions upon which this restructure was based.

And putting the gear up wouldn't have made any difference anyway. That's seven professional airmen who aren't going home to their families any more and one tough, rugged and dependable airframe gone - forever. The airframe is just hardware, but the seven lives are irreplaceable to their family and friends. RIP.

Which model of Jabiru is this, please? If possible, some photos of the damaged area would help. On my J160C the u/c bolts are AN6 in various lengths (different from the factory spec due to uneven thickness of the fuselage layup) and I have had no difficulties removing and installing them. I used the suggested torque value for AN6 bolts into fibreglass as laid out in AC43-13B, which was about 8ft-lbs if I recall. Sounds like your bolts were somewhat over-torqued.

I'd like to see Garmin resume production of the 495/496 series GPS units which fit the panels of our sort of aircraft instead of making GPS units the size of an A4 notepad which take up way too much panel real-estate. I'd like to see Garmin drop the now thoroughly-outdated, slow and cumbersome 196 model. All it has going for it is it's cheap. I'd rather pay for a decent, capable and up-to-date 496 which is the same size and does so much more. A good way to lower the price would be to drop the land and marine navigation out of the software and use the extra bytes for more aviation stuff, such as a larger database etc. It's an aviation GPS...I already know how to find the airport by road, and if I need to know the water depth then I probably have more pressing problems with my aeroplane in the first place! I'd like to see Garmin drop the entire Aera 500 series, which are nothing but automotive units re-worked for aviation - the voice-coil speaker in them is a real trap if mounted near a panel-mounted compass. The touch-screen idea is a poor one for use in an aircraft as well. I'd like to see Garmin double the screen resolution on the 695/696 series units.When you have a display that big, make it high-res, not like some kid's been drawing on it with a crayon. Finally, I'd like to see people still carrying printed charts in case their GPS, or ipad, or whatever, dies. I've never seen the batteries in a paper chart go flat, ever!

I am put in mind of the reporting of an aircraft accident:- A small Cessna light aircraft crashed on a cemetery in Krakow, Poland. The report went something like:- "dozens of rescuers and police have descended on the scene of an aircraft crash in Poland. Thirty eight bodies have so far been recovered and it is feared up to a hundred more may be found under the wreckage." Pru Goward once said "a journalist is good for five minutes on any subject." I have heard more than one journalist say "never let the facts get in the way of a good story." And now, a couple of useful definitions to keep in mind. journalist - a failed author editor - a failed journalist

I'm interested only when a thousand aeroplanes have been flown for a thousand hours each behind these engines. Only then will we know what they're worth.

Lux flakes dissolved in warm water. Apply with soft-bristle broom, work bristles around in circular pattern, rinse off with cold clean water. Now you'll have a nice clean spot and will have to do the rest of the wing so it looks uniform!

Use a non-compounded aviation mineral oil such as Aeroshell 100 for the first 50 hours. This will ensure the rings are fully bedded-in. Run the engine at high BMEP by cruising at high power and low altitude for the first few hours, and vary the power from time to time to heat and cool the cylinders to assist bedding in. I ran my rebuilt Jabiru 2.2L engine in at 2900-3000RPM at 1500 feet amsl for the first 5 hours after the rebuild. It cruises nicely at 2900RPM now. I used the straight mineral oil for 50 hours after the rebuild to make sure. Now I run Aeroshell W100 only and change it every 25 hours, with the oil-filter changed every 50 hours. The additive pack in the 15W50 is worn out in the Jab engine in 25 hours or so because the Jab engine has very little oil in it for an aircraft engine. No matter what oil you use, change it every 25 hours because it is pretty much finished by then, especially if you use Avgas. Oil is cheap, and it is the life-blood of your engine.

We recently had a 912 fail to start and the problem was traced to a broken wire at the point on one of the the CDI packs where the cables enter the potting-compound on the pack. We were able to swap the pack with one from another engine and the problem was solved. The CDI-pack was sent to Floods and the problem was found there. Since the CDI-packs on the 912 are quite well-mounted on the top of the engine (held on via a bracket on one induction-manifold), vibration initially was ruled out as a cause. This is one of the rare instances I am aware of where a CDI-pack has failed. This particular engine had about 500 hours on it. In retrospect, the cause may well have been vibration, because this engine developed a harsh vibration at certain power-levels (below cruise-power) in the last couple of hundred hours. The gearbox was removed and overhauled and one bearing was found to be significantly worn. I have not seen so many problems on a relatively low-hour 912 before. The engine was L2-maintained, but we did find the propeller was out-of-balance, which might explain the worn bearing in the gearbox, and possibly vibration from this contributed to the CDI-pack problem. The propeller was subsequently dynamically-balanced and a fourfold reduction in the acceleration due to imbalance was achieved (from 0.28ips to 0.07ips). Engine, prop and gearbox now running very smoothly.

The J160C is certified in the Primary category, the J160D is LSA. Being primary category means the airworthiness has been certified by CASA, not the factory. So, if Jabiru went out of business and no other maker wanted to take on all the LSA Jabirus, the fleet of LSA Jabs would be grounded, but the primary category certified Jabs could keep flying. This is part of the ticking time-bomb which is LSA. When there is no manufacturer to certify the airworthiness, the fleet is effectively out of the air leaving owners with the option of re-registering VH experimental or grounding the aircraft for good. Once you go VH Experimental, there's no going back, and the aircraft cannot be put on cross-hire. LSA seemed like such a good idea at the time but wait until a few European manufacturers of LSA aircraft go under and see what happens to their fleets.

A sextant only measures altitudes (i.e. angles) of celestial bodies above the horizon. That's all it does. It doesn't know a thing about North Up or Track Up. It just measures angles. Accurately. Very accurately, actually. Marine navigation uses North Up on charts and radar displays, even when the radar is being used in anti-collision mode. For aviation most people seem to prefer Track Up. Oddly enough, the GPS receivers in my aeroplanes are set to North Up.

At airports fitted with both PAPI and PAL, turning on the PAL also turns on the PAPI. Hence it is not unusual to hear someone activating PAL in broad daylight, especially twin-turbine drivers practicing approaches and missed approaches...they use the PAPI to get their approach set up correctly. YWOL is a good example. It has an NDB, and two published RNAV approaches. Turbine-drivers from Aeropelican and other such organisations use YWOL for practicing approaches etc because it is a lot less congested than YSBK or YSSY and they cause minimal disruption to traffic in the circuit at YWOL anyway. PAL can also be activated by a rapid exchange of transmissions of several aircraft, which deceives the PAL switching-circuits into thinking the correct sequence of carrier transmisions has been received...which in a sense it has. PAL is activated by sequenced bursts of carrier-wave - it doesn't detect whether the carrier is modulated or not. Because aircraft use double-sideband amplitude modulation, carrier-wave is always present when a transmission is made.

A BRS will not make you a better pilot. A BRS will not improve your judgement of conditions. A BRS will not manufacture confidence from thin air...if you need a BRS to get enough confidence to fly, stop flying! A BRS might save you after a mid-air - provided you aren't already dead from the impact or fire. A BRS might save you in the event of structural failure...but how and why did you get into a situation where the structure failed in the first place? A BRS will deny you any further control over the aircraft's position, attitude and landing after you deploy it. You're just along for the ride. A BRS might save you if you are flying extreme manoeuvres...but why would a recreational pilot be flying in such a manner? A BRS will probably kill you if the aircraft catches fire in mid-air. A BRS might save you if you have an engine failure over inhospitable terrain...but why are you flying a recreational aircraft over such terrain in the first place? A BRS is no substitute for good judgement, proper maintenance, a thorough pre-flight inspection, a proper lookout and adequate situational awareness. A BRS is "a device of last-resort". The pilot and aircraft have been defeated by whatever caused the BRS to be activated. Ultimately each aircraft-owner must decide whether to install one or not - and accept the consequences of that decision.

I was given to understand the aircraft had ingested water into the tanks, possibly through fuel-tank-caps after overnight rain and it didn't show up in the fuel-test before the flight. At a certain angle of bank it manifested its presence in no uncertain manner. Basically the engine was trying to burn di-hydrogen monoxide instead of 2-2-4 trimethylpentane.

I think that was VH-FMI, Motz.

Sorry, Rocketing, I don't know the pilot or pax and have no contact details. The aircraft is nearly back together and has had some minor corrosion issues addressed which came to light during re-assembly. Should be back on-line in a day or two.

As I recall, when my Jabiru engine broke a through-bolt we recovered the broken section with the nut still attached. The break occurred one thread inside the nut and examination of the broken surface revealed a series of "tide-marks" indicating repeated stress-cycles causing embrittlement and progressive brittle-fracture before the final section failed through plastic deformation. The brittle fracture area was a dull grey (Martensite?) consistent with this failure-mode, the plastic-deformation section was also typical. About all we could really tell was the break occurred at a thread, presumably due to a stress-riser which had developed. Not knowing whether the threads were rolled or cut we were not able to make much more of a conclusion than that. We certainly couldn't come to any conclusion about why or how the stress-riser developed, which surely must be at the heart of the problem. That in itself was frustrating because with the broken part of the bolt we felt we might have had a chance of finding what the problem was. An enquiry was made to a metallurgist at the local steelworks as to the possibility of a probing metallurgical examination of the failed bolt inside the nut but the upshot was the sample was too small for the sort of examination they could perform. Pragmatism set in and the engine was boxed up and returned to Jabiru for a full rebuild. Navel-gazing about why a bolt broke is one thing, getting an aircraft back on cross-hire was entirely another and the commercial imperative came first. As a result the broken end of the bolt has never been metallurgically examined. All we really know is progressive brittle-fracture preceded plastic-deformation and ultimate failure. What was annoying was there were no signs of impending failure in the form of oil-leaks etc. My view is that given time Jabiru will get these engines sorted, and the combination of engine and airframe will deservedly become an aviation classic. The airframe is just about un-killable, but the engines have a tendency to be "fragile". In spite of my trials and tribulations I have stuck with my J160C because it is a factory-built, CASA-certified, aircraft (not LSA) and therefore a change or modification can be approved by a LAME, independently of Jabiru. In these days of the uncertainties of LSA, this is comforting.

The aircraft in question was VH-WFQ, a Cessna 152 based at YWOL. It made a successful forced-landing and sustained nil damage, the two occupants were uninjured. The aircraft was removed from the forced-landing site and returned to YWOL by road transport where it was re-assembled by a LAME in a hangar approved for maintenance of aircraft. These are the facts. I will refrain from speculation as to the cause of the forced-landing because this is hearsay until such time as an investigation is conducted and findings released.