Dieselten

Aircraft maintenance shop which does hydraulics should have proper aerospace fittings and be able to make a set of hoses. Bring your wallet.

4aplat,

There are a lot of ways to get information about Jabiru aircraft. There are 4 Jabirus flying from my local airport, so there are at least 4 pilots here who can assist you with technical questions about aircraft and engines. Not to far away there are another 6 Jabirus and people who build them, rebuild Jabiru engines and do all the other maintenance. Now you are on the forum, what would you like to know?

When I want information from Jabiru, I just get on the phone and call the factory. They have always been helpful. I understand this is a little less easy for you since you are in France, but at least you are on the forum, from where you can get a lot of advice from pilots who fly and maintain Jabiru aircraft.

Jabiru still sell factory-built aircraft, kit-build aircraft, engines, engine-parts, as well as airframe parts and accessories such as the Microair radio. They even repair pranged Jabirus when people try to find how big a hole in the ground can a small aeroplane can actually make.

"it's too late now"...for what? :confused:

In Europe you have some really superb ultralight aircraft, designed specifically for European regualtions and conditions. Jabirus are designed for the harsher conditions of Australia. Our regulations are slightly different too. A trip to the Jabiru website will give you an idea, and many people here are more than willing to assist you with any further enquiries regarding maintenance, handling, good and bad points etc etc etc. (I never met a pilot without an opinion!)

So, ask what questions you will. I'm sure the helpful people here will give you a great deal of good information.

BlackRod,

Engine cooling on my installation hasn't been an issue up to the 38C max ambient temperture limit in the handbook. At that temp the oil went to the bottom of the red - and stayed there. Never went any higher. After that flight we changed the oil and filter as a precaution.

Initially I changed oil and filters at 25 hours. After seeing nothing in the filters after 100 hours we went to the 50hr interval. Using Aeroshell 15W50 exclusively in this engine.

As for a 160 with a 912, I belive it's been done but the lower engine cowling shape was "ordinary". The big issue is the need for some largeish holes in the front of the lower cowling for air to flow through the heat-exchangers for oil and coolant, and this can cause differential pressure problems between cowling intakes and exit vents. Airflow inside cowlings can be somewhat complicated, as and slight oil-leak will soon show.

The J160 is a rugged, tough, no-frills aircraft that is unbeatably good value-for-money.

The 2200 Jab engine requires regular inspection and maintenance, but it properly maintained and operated correctly it is a reliable mill. You'll be putting the spanners to it a good deal more than you do on a Rotax 912, but your parts cost is way down by comparison. It is a much simpler engine to work on.

What helps greatly is to whip the heads off at 500 hours, replace (and lap) the exhaust-valves and seats, re-lap the inlet valves and seats, decoke the head, replace all the glacier bushings and the rocker-rods. Seems not enough oil gets up into the valve gear at times, hence bushes and rocker-rods wear. The latest hollow push-rods and high-flow hydraulic-lifters may improve this somewhat but we need hours on the engines to see if this is the case. If you do this then your top-end will get you to 1000 hours without dramas.

The bottom-end of the 2200 Jab is now a pretty good section, and if run regularly they run well. Not using aircraft engines is not good for them! They are designed to work and work hard. Don't baby your engine.

Airframe-wise, the only issues I have is tyre-wear on abrasive taxiways. Mine scrubs out the outside of the tread fairly quickly. I change on average four new maingear tyres every year. I swap them side-for-side on the hubs to wear both sides out. When I replace them, there is no tread left at all. At last I am using all the tread before replacement!

If was asked would I buy another J160, I'd answer "Yes", without hesitation. (Mine has done just under 500 hours in two years, on cross-hire.) It's a good little working aeroplane.

I also have a 912-powered aeroplane, so I have direct experience with both engines, and have a fondness and respect for both.

Nothing is bigger than CASA, with the possible exception of the orbit of comets originating far beyond the Kuiper Belt.

Friend of mine had 'em in his J230. After some engine issues he removed them, cleaned and tested them. None sparked in the tester. He's gone back to D9EAs.

Use at your own risk in home-built Jabs, afaik not approved for factory-built.

The Aera 500 has a speaker built-in and it will "pull" a magnetic compass anything up to 30 degrees off-course if it's mounted too near. (I know, I saw it happen) Hence the requirement for a "Compass Safe Distance" with many items of avionics. A figure of about 1.2-1.5 metres is fairly normal for such a distance with equipment containing even a small loudspeaker.

Get the 495, it is a true aviation GPS. The Aera 500 is a land-based GPS with delusions of aviation.

The lock-wires are fishing trace, with aluminium fishing-trace swages to fit. You can get both, and the correct swaging-tool, at most fishing-shops or sports stores.

Permatex 26B is a good high-temp sealant to apply to damp vibrations on the springs.

Bosch GH600, about $7 per unit, is the rotor-button. Can't help with the cap.

I have two aircraft, one powered by the Rotax 912 ULS, the other powered by a Jabiru 2.2 with hydraulic lifters but solid push-rods. I have some observations to make on these engines, for both of which I have the greatest respect. They are both good engines.

As the Jab engine had reached 500 hours and one cylinder was ever-so-slightly low on leak-down test (about 10psi), I decided to pre-emptively replace the exhaust-valves. This proved wise because one exhaust valve was on the way out and wouldn't have made it to the 1000 hour top-end overhaul, the rocker-rods were slightly worn and there was metal transfer from the rocker-bushes onto the rocker rods.

All these items were replaced, the inlet-valves were re-lapped, and the cylinder-heads were lapped to the cylinders for a good seal. The oil-cooler hoses were also replaced, as were the distributor-rotors, these being either scheduled items (oil-cooler hoses) or pre-emptive (rotors).

As the engine had run on Avgas until the last 25 hours when it ran 98-octane BP Ultimate as an experiment to see how much carbon and lead-oxide use of mogas, admittedly for a relatively short time, would remove.

The answer was "not much". My conclusion is to keep a clean engine you need to run 98-octane mogas all the time, although in my experience on this particular installation this makes the engine very susceptible to carburettor-icing, especially in the early morning at low ambient temperatures and high relative humidities - perfect conditions for carby-ice to form, especially when the engine has just started and there is no heat in the muffler to make the carby-heat effective.

The engine is less prone (but not immune) to carby-ice when running on Avgas, but engine deposits will build up due to the lead. These are easy to remove.

Result? I am now confident this particular engine will do another 500 hours with no issues (it did its first 500 hours perfectly trouble-free) and at 1000 hours the same process will occur, with a probable upgrade to high-flow hydraulic-lifters and hollow-push-rods.

Turning to my 912 engine, it has about 200 hours, has has oil changed every 25 hours for the first 100 hours, then at every 50 hours using Aeroshell SPort Plus 4 oil. It has also been trouble-free. The parts cost for a top end will greatly exceed that of the Jabiru, but it will need just the routine line maintenance until that time.

I can assure users that with the Rotax you will not be "putting the spanners to it" as frequently as you do with the Jabiru, but any engine is only as good as the way it is operated and the way it is maintained.

Keep the maintenance up to the Jabiru engine and it will run willingly and hard, but aircraft engines are consumable items. The great engine designer and thermodynamicist Sir Stanley Hooker once famously said "a four-stroke engine has one stroke to make power and the other three to wear it out!"

The two engines are very different designs and a direct comparison is difficult. I can only report on what I have experienced with the 2.2 Jabiru engine, and for those using them I would suggest a 500-hour "mini top-end" such as I outlined above as e a very wise precaution to give the best possible chance of reaching the 1000 hours for a full top-end overhaul. A few hundred dollars spent at 500 hours may save many thousands later on.

Soldering is an art, and only those who have been shown how to perform the art can do it with any reliability. Soldering isn't just surrounding two pieces of metal with a shiny glob of another metal. Soldering involves a bond at molecular level between the metal of the wire being soldered, and the solder itself.

If you will forgive the pun, here are some soldering-tips:-

1. Use a temperature-controlled soldering iron.

2. Tin the tip before use, and clean the tip regularly, preferably before making each soldered joint.

3. DO NOT use Plumber's Solder - the acid in the flux will corrode wires for quite some distance!

4. Use only resin-cored 60-40 Lead-Tin solder. Avoid Lead-free solders, they are not suitable for avionics work. Good old reliable 60-40 electronic solder is your best friend.

5. Learn what metals can - and can't - soldered. Copper, brass, tinned copper and tinned brass will all solder very nicely. Aluminium is difficult to solder, even with so-called Aluminium solders. If your wiring is aluminium, use crimped-connectors in preference to soldered ones.

6. If you haven't the skill to solder successfully, find someone who has, or at least ask for some help from someone who knows about electronic soldering. DO NOT ask a plumber about soldering...theirs is an entirely different set of operational requirements using different fluxes and tooling.

7. A frosted appearance of the solder indicates too rapid solidification and the potential for a "dry joint". A properly soldered connection has the solder looking shiny and smooth and has the appearance of properly "wetting" the metal being joined.

8. There is a practical limit to the size of wires that can be successfully soldered. Really thick wires are likely to absorb so much heat from the soldering-iron that the adjacent insulation will be damaged before a successful joint can be made. Consider a swaged connection under such circumstances, it is as strong mechanically and almost as good electrically.

9. When soldering heat-sensitive components, use a heat-sink to prevent damage.

As long as it is resonant and impedance-matched to the feedline it will work just fine. Ideally a whip antenna should be tuned for maximum RF-field (measured using a near-field RF signal-strength meter) which means it is as close to resonant as it will get, then impedance-matched by using a reactive stub to cancel out the reactive component of the measured RF impedance so the antenna now appears as a purely resistive load matching the characteristic impedance of the source and transmission-line, as required by the Maximum Power Transfer theorem.

This is what should happen in an ideal world. Unfortunately we live in the real world, so what is done is to deliberately tune the whip antenna out of resonance by trimming the length so the impedance-matching looks good on a reflectometer. (the infamous "low SWR" requirement). We deliberately sacrifice radiated field-strength for a good impedance match, basically because it is easy to cut bits off to get the SWR down, and it is a pain-in-the-posterior to get out the Smith Charts, calculate the resistive and reactive components of the impedance, then design and build a short-circuit stub to perform the impedance-matching function, after the antenna has been cut to a resonant-length. This works well for fixed-frequency transmitters operating at high power output (broadcast stations, for example) but is harder to organise for a transmitter that ranges over a range of frequencies and operates at relativly low powers (precisely what our aircraft radios do).

Convenience over-rides technical correctness, partly because with our intermittent, low-power output, it really doesn't matter all that much.

In other words, a properly tuned and matched whip antenna will work just fine with any aircraft radio, no matter who makes it. Failing that, a whip antenna for the aviation-band, correctly installed and tuned for a reasonable match to the feed-line, will do just fine. The only issue I have with whip antennas is they add parasitic drag. I prefer a blade, or an embedded dipole, especially in GRP composite machines.

Most autopilots and "glass-screens" seem to prefer NMEA 0183 as their standard NMEA input. Various sentence-lengths are available with NMEA data output frm GPS. Try to put too much in a sentence and autopilots get very stroppy. We found that out with a TruTrak autopilot and an Avmap GPS. The reason for the preference is NMEA 0183 is the data protocol for transfer of information between marine electronic navigational devices such as auto-pilots, GPS, speed-log, echo-sounder, gyrocompass etc and, by extension, aeronautical equivalent equipment.

FWIW, my Garmin 296 won't output the correct NMEA sentence for an Aspen Pilot PFD, preventing the GPS info from being overlaid on the DG section of the Aspen. I'd probably need to go to a Garmin GNS430W to get the right NMEA output. Now a Garmin GNS430W and Aspen Pilot PFD total a tad over $US15K if you buy both new. Not in a hurry on this one.

My point is don't expect a handheld GPS to offer too much in the way of NMEA output. Only so much code gets written into the ROMs for any particular price-point. You get what you pay for - if you're lucky.

Trangia set, or MSR Extreme stove, which is a multi-fuel but runs best on Shellite. This little wonder will boil a litre of water in a bit under a minute. The MSR stoves are superb for compact, efficient units, but the Trangia are fractionally quicker to set up.

I rang Jamie Cook at Jabiru and he told me they are now using J160 undercarriage legs for the 120, but it doesn't have the wet wing. He hadn't seen the ad at that stage.

Civilian? The DC-10, series 30.

An airframe so strong you'd swear it was chiselled out of solid granite.

Three of the most tractable, smooth-running and surge-proof high-bypass turbofans ever created, the mighty GE CF6s.

One of the widest flight-decks (especially compared to the 747) with an unparalleled view straight down from the Captains's shoulder, and a third crew-member on the flight-deck for those long legs when "I spy" or "20 Questions" is all that keeps aircrew awake.

Truly one of the greats of commercial aviation, and likely to see nearly 60 years of service with Fedex, haulin' freight. IMHO only the DC-3 beats it for toughness and durability - another Douglas product.

Mil stuff? The SR-71, no contest. Nothing today comes even close, yet it was designed and built in the 60s! "The Lead-Sled". The "Hammers Of Hell". "Habu". Engines that truly suck - at Mach 3, no less. An aircraft so immensely capable for its task that the satellite surveillance lobby deliberately killed it off because it was a threat to them. Gotta love that aircraft and dip your hat to the gents at the Skunk Works who built it. Kelly Johnson, you were a genius.

Before I start, these remarks apply to J160/230-size tyres.

Jabiru advise the use of "tyre-bead lubricant" for changing tyres. Because I am too lazy to go and find some at an auto accessories shop, I made mine using Lux flakes in a jam-jar with enough water to make them into a thick, pasty mash, about the consistency of soap that's been left in water just a fraction too long. Apply generously to inside of tyre-bead and inside of rim with a stiff-bristle paintbrush (a 25mm or 1-inch brush is fine) and it makes the job of getting new tyres on and off (when worn out) a lot easier! Believe me, this actually works!

BTW, Lux is mild and won't corrode the aluminium rim. Been using this trick for the last 2 years, and I have changed at least a dozen Jabiru tyres on my J160C in that time, plus a few on other Jabs locally. Taxying on highly-abrasive paved taxiways eats up tyres!

Some other tips:- slightly inflate the tube to make sure it fits well inside the tyre casing before buttoning up the rims tight. This avoids pinching part of the tube between the rims. About 2psi is all you need. Try using talcum-powder inside the tyre-casing to assist the tube to settle evenly. You can put the tube insude the tyre-casing and slightly inflate it before putting the hub-halves back in, just be sure to orient the tube so the valve-stem is on the correct side so it comes out the hole in the hub!

The disc rotors are easy to bend! If you stand on the tyre to break the bead, BE CAREFUL NOT TO BEND THEM! (If your brakes shudder, you bent your disc-rotor.) For a tyre-change, there is no need to remove them, just use deep sockets to gain access to the hub-bolts and nuts. "Tyrepliers" work reasonably well, but a motorcycle-tyre bead-breaker is a good investment if you are going to be regularly changing Jab tyres.

You can re-use the Nyloc nuts as long as the Nyloc section still retains a grip on the threads.

I use a long "Pearl-catch" to re-insert the bolts through the holes in the hubs because with the disc-rotor attached your fingers can't get deep enough to insert the bolts. A deep 7/16" socket and T-handle is perfect for tightening the hub-bolts (from the head) with the nuts on the outside of the wheel. Hold the nuts still with a 7/16" ring-spanner from the Jab kit.

Break the bead on the disc-side first! Once it is broken, remove it, leaving the tyre with just the other half of the hub attached. You can often remove the tyre from the other half with your fingers. If you need to stand on it to break the bead, at least there is no disc to bend.

If your tubes are older than 12 months, replace them too! They perish when they get old and burst at the most inconvenient times. Tubes are cheap. Keep them on hand. A lot of flat-tyres are due to tubes spontaneously perishing and letting go when the tyre-casing is perfectly intact, with no penetration by a sharp object.

When you remove a wheel, clean up around the disk-brakes and the axle. Remove and clean the axle-spacer shim (right inside the wheel, hard up against the end of the stub-axle). Grease the axle with a good high-pressure grease. Clean and re-grease the inside of the wheel-bearings too. It stops the bearings seizing onto the axle and makes getting the wheel back on a good deal easier. Use a rag and clean the accumulated dirt off the bearing-seals as well. When you are finished cleaning there should be a lot of dirt on your hands and the rag, and none on the bearing-seals, bearing inner-surfaces and axles. Don't forget to replace the spacer-shim (if fitted) in the correct orientation.

If your J160/J230 is kit-built, consider leaving the springs off the bolts between the calipers - it makes re-assembly much easier, and the brakes still work just fine. If it's factory-built, you have no choice - the springs have to go back on.

Re the brake-pads. The captive-nuts tend to fall out. I use a dab of orange high-temp silicone to hold them in place in slot in the pad-holder. This is flexible enough to allow the nut to move a little to align with the bolt when you re-assemble the brakes, and stops the nut falling out completely and getting lost. Clean the pad-holders and apply the Permatex goo, let it skin over and re-assemble the brakes. (Why Jabiru didn't use a Nutsert instead of semi-captive nuts escapes me.)

If you bend your discs, they can be flattened with a hydraulic-press, or judicious blows from a "dead-blow" hammer on a good, flat surface. If you have "wavy" discs, the tabs are the bits that bend. Look along the edge of the disc to see where the bend is. You'll see it soon enough. If your discs are badly pitted, replace them because pitted discs will chew out a new set of pads in record time. Remember, disk-brake rotors are made of the cheapest steel available on the "no expense is spared to keep the cost down" principle.

Jacking the Jabiru can be done with a wooden T-shaped prop that you slide under the wing, or for the curved undercarriage on the 160/230 series, a vehicle scissor-jack under the base of the leg works well, but just watch for interference from the body of the jack with the brake-disc.

I counter this my lifting the wingtip up on the side I am going to jack up to allow the leg to spring inwards before applying the jack. The wheel can move in quite significantly once you take to load off the undercarriage-leg. You don't want this to happen whilst the aircraft is on the jack!

If you can't get the small bolt that holds the J160/230 wheel-retainer piece on back through the hole, the wheel isn't fully on the axle. Don't force it, find out why and fix the problem. The little bolt will drop through the hole once the wheel is fully on the axle. Don't forget to put the washer and nut back on and tighten them!

The most useful thing I ever got from the Jabiru manual on tyre-changing was the bead-lubricant tip. It really does work. The rest of the stuff above comes from experience.

One last thing: when your tyre-change turns pear-shaped, remember "oaths in anguish rank with prayers".

Try spraying some electronics freezing-spray on the recalcitrant plug and see if that helps shrink it slightly in the threads and makes it easier to dislodge.

Switch it on, then switch it into marine navigation mode, let it acquire satellites, when it has a fix, switch it back into aviation mode, switch back off, then power up again. This worked for a friend at YWOL who had exactly the same problem.

Current Jabiru spark-plugs (NGK D9EA) require an 18mm deep socket, preferably thin-wall. Repco sell them. Get one with a 3/8" drive. Battery terminal hardware is metric on the Odyssey battery supplied from the factory. Haven't attacked a Bing carburettor yet, but it'd be a safe bet the thing is riddled with metric threads.

The J160C is a no-frills, tough, honest, uncompromising little aircraft that will teach you the real meaning of "stick and rudder" flying. It can be flown with minimal reference to the panel, it has decent range, a cockpit that doesn't roast you alive in summer (unlike the European offerings), efficient fresh-air vents and terrific product support with advice and spares at the end of the phone instead of in another hemisphere. Above all, compared to imported aircraft of similar capabilities, it is immensely affordable. Jabirus have been built in large numbers and significant numbers have migrated to the Northern Hemisphere as well as other southern continents. It's hard to argue with excess!

It has little sohistication, nor does it require it. As a trainer it is forgiving but requires the student to be attentive. It dislikes but tends to forgive sloppy handling, and it doesn' bite hard like the Traumahawk, for example.

For the recreational pilot who aspires to aircraft ownership, the 160C or kit-built 160 provides all the essentials with the added benefits of minimal worries about corroding airframes or huge engine-maintenance bills. Consumables (filters, spark-plugs, sump-washers etc) are mostly automotive and commonly available, although they do prefer a diet of Avgas and aircraft-grade ashless, non-dispersant oil. Other minor spares (door-seals, door-locks etc) can be sourced at Bunnings Aerospace. My only beef about the J160C is the inordinate complexity of the wing-fuselage fuel-bulkhead fittings. Eleven separate pieces of metal glued and swaged into one fitting to bring three fuel-tubes down, turn them through 90 degrees, bring them inside the cabin and turn then down trhough 90 degrees again! It will take you about six hours to replace the first one you have to change, and about two hours to replace any subsequent ones because you will now all the tricks.

No aircraft is without faults, but those who have a lot of hours in the 160 will tell you the few faults are easy to live with, and the good points really make you look forward to every flight because flying a J160 is fun!

The J160 - already well on the road to becoming a classic aircraft, and with every chance there will still be many examples flying long after their aluminium-built bretheren have gone to the boneyards.

Back to the factory is best option. Let the experts assess it. Jabs are tough little birds.

Skyfuel, and if you're flying in the Hunter Valley at all, get the special Cessnock card from them as well.

It's not just the probe, the display-instrument which the probe feeds also needs to be temperature-compensated - and only the good (i.e. expensive) ones are.

Revetation??