How NOT to rig the carb heat control (see picture). With a few breaks in less than 250hrs, it is time for a change. There is just nothing like pulling the control all the way out of the instrument panel in flight :). At the same time, I’m installing a new carb heat muff from Robbins Wings hoping for a little more heat. Also, I’m replacing the extruded carb heat door hinge with a simple piece of baffle material. I’m calling it the Zilik hinge in honor of Gary Zilik who gave me the idea along with an idea for reworking the control cable attachment.
Yeah, It is annual condition inspection time. After our Lufkin trip, we were just intending on doing an oil change while the engine was warm. We got the oil drained quickly and the engine was still hot. I asked Tanya if she was up for a quick compression test. “Sure”. We immediately broke into optimized labor tasks with barely another word. Moments later we had all four cylinders checked with numbers that I’m easily happy with. With a long day of flying, family, and the 100+ degree heat, we were done for the day. On the drive home, we decided that we might as well just get the whole condition inspection done now. The airplane doesn’t have to be flying for anything until about July 11.
So we spent the majority of Sunday diving into a full swing annual Condition Inspection. Of course Tanya knew where she was going first, into the tail cone on the “belly board”. She is a trooper isn’t she! She sees it as the better part of the deal as she doesn’t want to have too much responsibility for firewall forward just in case the fan up front ever stops.
I also decided to finally do away with the foil tape in front of the #1 cylinder and fabricated up a little aluminum ramp. With a couple of nutplates installed behind the bottom ramp, we have a part that is removable that I think will work great.
We’re pecking away at the tasks on the master checklist a little each day.
