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Warm and coated

I went out the airport early this afternoon. My plane was back in its hangar and the battery was charged. Everything looked good so I did a partial pre-flight inspection since I wasn't planning to fly. Instead, I started it up and taxied over to the fuel pump to put some fuel in the mostly empty right tank. I put about 15 gallons in, and it filled up to the 20 gallon mark, so it looks like there was about five gallons still in the tank.

I pushed the plane clear of the pumps then started it up again. I taxied over to my usual runup area and proceeded to do a standard runup except that, when I was done, I left the throttle set at 1500 RPM. I let it run like that until the indicated oil temperature started to rise.

As I was nearing the end of the run, one of the shop technicians came over and got my attention. I shut down the engine and he said he thought he was hearing an unusual sound coming from my plane as it was running. I wasn't hearing anything unusual, and I didn't have my headset on, but I let him check around to see if anything was wrong. He was wondering if part of the cowl was loose or something similar. He checked around the cowling but didn't see any issues. He then said it was probably how the sound was reflecting off of the hangar that was to my left, and I think he was right.

After he left, I started up again, then taxied back to the hangar and put the plane away. I'm feeling better now that I've run the engine which has mixed the Camguard into the oil and coated all of the moving parts with it, especially the camshaft. I don't plan on letting the plane sit for weeks at a time, but the weather will be less cooperative in the near future so I may have to. Assuming that Camguard works as advertised, and as many fellow pilots attest to, it will at least reduce or prevent any corrosion on the camshaft from sitting an extended period of time.

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