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She's broken again, though only slightly

On New Year's Day, I took her up again for an hour. She ran great, and flew well, other than the issue where she pulls to the left described in my last post. When I checked the oil during the preflight inspection, there was slightly less than seven quarts in the engine, which is more than enough to go flying.

Yesterday, the weather was good enough to go flying so I headed out to the airport in the early afternoon. During the preflight inspection I checked the oil and... there was a bit less than seven quarts. It had used very little during the previous flight which is an excellent sign that the engine is already wearing in nicely. One thing I did notice, though was that a bit of paint was coming off the cowl where the exhaust comes through. I didn't worry about it too much at the time.

I started her up and taxied over to get fuel. When I went to connect the grounding wire to the end of the exhaust pipe, I discovered the source of that paint damage. The final section of the exhaust, the part that extends beyond the cowl, was disconnected from the rest of the pipe and was held in place by the support rod that connects it to the engine mount. I'm assuming it came loose on the last flight, and the raw exhaust hitting the cowl was what caused that damage. No flying for me with it in that condition. Because it's a Power Flow exhaust, it sticks out further than the stock exhaust, and has that separate end section.

Since the fuel pumps are right next to the shop, I went in and started talking with the office manager about the problem. Preston was in the next room and heard us talking so he came over and I described the problem to him. We went out to take a look, and he said that they'd pull the plane over the shop from there. I filled up the tanks anyway since it's better for the plane to sit with full tanks, and so that it would be ready to go for the next time. They pulled the plane around and parked it in front of the shop and will hopefully get it all fixed up in a few days.

I'm disappointed that this happened, of course, but I realize that, while this is not necessarily expected, it's something that isn't necessarily surprising. Everything under the cowl was disassembled and then reassembled and, when you do that, something may come loose after a few hours. So you check it and reconnect it, and tighten it and then it's good to go. I didn't discuss the heat damage to the cowl but I will do so next time I speak with Preston and see if they can do a quick fiberglass repair on it. In fact, it would be nice if a shroud or something like that could be installed to reduce the size of the opening in the cowl because it is probably affecting airflow through the engine compartment.

I also double-checked with Preston how long I should run it before we change the oil and he confirmed that it should be twenty to twenty-five hours. So I'll do that. If it continues as it has, oil consumption should be well stabilized by that point and we'll switch to regular oil. We'll also resume sending samples to Blackstone Labs for analysis starting with the oil change after that.

Finally, I mentioned to Preston that she pulls to the left and we agreed that they'll check it out when they do the oil change. I'm hoping it's just a matter of making a small adjustment in the cabling, such as the nosegear centering cable.

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