Annual Off to a Good Start

Sounds like everything is going well! Glad the engine is tight and the fuel
tank problem was easily repaired. Did you get hit by the Superior cylinder
AD as mentioned below?

Nope, we have once again dodged the latest of the dreaded engine ADs.
With our O-540 I have felt like the guy who has been told to "Dance!"
by the bad guy in the black cowboy hat, every time I get one of those
official-looking letters. So far, they haven't hit me!

:-)

Our leak saga continues. I had purposefully let the bottoms of the
wings get dirty for the last several months, so that we would be able
to easily track any fuel leaks/seeps back to their source. Yesterday
I found evidence of a larger leak than the ones we had fixed in the
main tank, which were obviously just seeps.

As you may recall, the first evidence of our leak (other than a faint
odor in the cabin when you first opened the door) was when Mary
spotted the rubber wing-root seal hanging down, fattened and gooey
from gas exposure. My wrench and I have puzzled over this, since the
leaks we had found (and fixed) seemed to be too small to cause this
type of damage.

So, while I was under the plane cleaning out the central drain filter
(the 235 has a central "pee-drain" in the belly, like the Cherokee 6),
I carefully tracked down every stain. With the wing-root inspection
fairings removed, and a mirror, I was able to spot a tip-tank hose
fitting that showed evidence of leakage.

My A&P proceeded to dislocate both his wrists getting a couple of
wrenches on that fitting, and was rewarded with an easy 1/3 turn to
make it tight. He is of the opinion that this was our main culprit,
and that by tightening that fitting we have resolved the last of the
fuel issues. I sure hope so.

We've fixed some other nagging problems. In the cabin, on the front of
the back seat (where the calves of your legs rest) is a control that
allows us to "pee" the gas tanks out of the belly drain. This is
covered with a cheesy plastic panel, with an even cheesier metal door,
retained by an even cheesier spring. This thing is so bad that there
is an AD on the door, because EVERYONE catches it with their feet
getting in the back seat. (You can't just remove the dumb door,
either, since without it you could conceivably have a passenger catch
his pants leg on the pee-drain control lever itself, which would cause
you to dump all of your fuel overboard in flight...)

On each flight I tell my kids "Be careful of the fuel door" -- but it
still gets broken. We have repaired the damned thing (with JB Weld)
at every annual since we bought Atlas, but it's such a cheap design
that this year I asked my mechanic -- a champion homebuilder -- to
invent a better mousetrap.

So, he looked at it for about 30 seconds, went over to his metal
press, and started cutting aluminum. 20 minutes later, I had a legal,
metal-reinforced plate holding on a MUCH stronger metal door. We
then spray painted it to match the interior, and voila! Hopefully, I
won't be screwing around with that little bugger again.

(Doug Vetter, if you're reading this, IMHO this is an example of the
type of repair your A&P could have done with your battery box, and
saved you $700.)

My A&P also reinforced the tail-cone screw attachment points by
putting in a "ring" of aluminum down the line of screw backing
plates. No more metal backing plates screwed into brittle plastic!

Here's a true but all-to-common sad tale of my owner-assisted
annuals: As I was reinstalling the gas tank (by finger screwing in
the 3.2 million stainless steel screws that hold it in the wing) all
was going well -- until the VERY LAST SCREW. That one just fell in
the hole, and would NOT tighten.

This couldn't possibly ever happen on the FIRST screw, or even the
20th screw -- it HAS to be the last one. So, I had to take them all
out, jostle the tank a bit, and start over. Story of my
life... ;-) (I'm just glad I had only finger-tightened them. If I
had driven them all home, I'd have committed hari-kari on the spot...)

Today I'll put the interior back in (all was well there, just needed
some cleaning/lubing of the control pulleys, as always), and button
Atlas up. Other than the fuel leak, this has been a really easy
annual.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

I'm ready for a nap after reading that.
Don't ya just hate it when the very last screw "screws" you? BTDT many
times.
Would have putting Clecos in the tank screw holes helped you line them all
up before starting the screws?
Jim

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
... We've fixed some other nagging problems. In the cabin, on the front of
the back seat (where the calves of your legs rest) is a control that
allows us to "pee" the gas tanks out of the belly drain. This is
covered with a cheesy plastic panel, with an even cheesier metal door,
retained by an even cheesier spring. This thing is so bad that there
is an AD on the door, because EVERYONE catches it with their feet
getting in the back seat. (You can't just remove the dumb door,
either, since without it you could conceivably have a passenger catch
his pants leg on the pee-drain control lever itself, which would cause
you to dump all of your fuel overboard in flight...)
...

If there was ever an application that screamed "Duct Tape" - this had to be
it.

--
Geoff
The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.

If there was ever an application that screamed "Duct Tape" - this had to be
it.

Yeah, we've considered that, but we do need to get at that lever
regularly.

It's fixed now, hopefully "once and for all"...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
Here's a true but all-to-common sad tale of my owner-assisted
annuals: As I was reinstalling the gas tank (by finger screwing in
the 3.2 million stainless steel screws that hold it in the wing) all
was going well -- until the VERY LAST SCREW.

Uh-oh. Before you said you took out 6.3 million screws. There are 3.1
million screws floating around loose somewhere... did you look at your
A&P's biplane to see if he "borrowed" some of your screws? If not you
might have to re-do your weight and balance.

That one just fell in the hole, and would NOT tighten. This couldn't
possibly ever happen on the FIRST screw, or even the 20th screw -- it
HAS to be the last one. So, I had to take them all out, jostle the
tank a bit, and start over.

This is why you leave everything really loose - like, each screw only
engaged a couple of turns - until you've got all the screws in. You
might pick two screws on opposite sides of the thing and run them all
the way down just to keep the panel basically in place, but then you've
only got two screws to back all the way out if you can't get one started.

It may also be helpful to have a tapered drift handy to get things to
line up - use steel carefully, or brass, aluminum, plastic, or wood if
you're being really careful of the threads. Or, use a little pick or
hook to reach up in the hole and poke the nut plate or Tinnerman nut
into place.

The same thing goes for putting in bolts or putting nuts on studs when
there is more than one. Start them all, then tighten each one a little
at a time. Sometimes the manufacturer will have a recommended order
and torque. If not, doing something like tightening to finger tight or
until the nut or bolt head seats, then to maybe two-thirds of the final
torque, then to the final torque works well. This kind of thing tends
to be associated with "bigger" stuff like engines, so it might not be
the kind of thing you get to do on the plane, but it works just as well
on your car or around the house.

Matt Roberds

Disclaimer: This is based on experience with ground vehicles and in
fixed installations. I don't have an A&P; I don't even have a TG&Y.
Some of this may not be allowable owner maintenance. Your mileage
may vary.

Uh-oh. Before you said you took out 6.3 million screws. There are 3.1
million screws floating around loose somewhere... did you look at your
A&P's biplane to see if he "borrowed" some of your screws? If not you
might have to re-do your weight and balance.

Dang, you're right! Those were expensive screws, too!

;-)

This is why you leave everything really loose - like, each screw only
engaged a couple of turns - until you've got all the screws in.

That's what REALLY ****ed me off -- I did that! I thought I was so
damned smart, just finger-tightening each screw before torquing them
all down -- and that last screw STILL kicked my butt.

Ah well, it's all done, no screws stripped. Another year of flying
ahead!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
This is why you leave everything really loose - like, each screw only
engaged a couple of turns - until you've got all the screws in.

That's what REALLY ****ed me off -- I did that! I thought I was so
damned smart, just finger-tightening each screw before torquing them
all down -- and that last screw STILL kicked my butt.

Maybe the screws involved are much shorter than I'm picturing in my
head, but it seems like there ought to be lots of turns between "only a
couple of threads engaged" and "finger tight". If they're countersink
head, finger tight means the countersink on the screw is already
touching the countersink on the panel and constraining the movement of
the panel somewhat. If the screws are long enough, you should be able
to thread them in such that the clearance hole in the panel is still
floating around the shank of the screw.

I did get a little experience in this direction when I helped R&R a
cowl on a 172. The screws on that were countersink head Phillips and
about an inch long overall. I don't know if that's how long they were
supposed to be, but it was pretty easy to get things lined up when
reinstalling. I could engage the screw a couple of turns and go on
to the next one, and still have a little "wiggle room" to get things
to line up. Once I had all the screws started, the owner put the
electric screwdriver on them (carefully) to drive them all the way home.

Matt Roberds

In article .com,
"Jay Honeck" wrote:

Yesterday I found evidence of a larger leak than the ones we had
fixed in the main tank, which were obviously just seeps.

You didn't pressure test the tank when you had it out?

As you may recall, the first evidence of our leak (other than a faint
odor in the cabin when you first opened the door) was when Mary
spotted the rubber wing-root seal hanging down, fattened and gooey
from gas exposure.

Isn't "fattened and gooey" a symptom of using autofuel?

So, while I was under the plane cleaning out the central drain filter
(the 235 has a central "pee-drain" in the belly, like the Cherokee 6),
I carefully tracked down every stain. With the wing-root inspection
fairings removed, and a mirror, I was able to spot a tip-tank hose
fitting that showed evidence of leakage.
My A&P proceeded to dislocate both his wrists getting a couple of
wrenches on that fitting, and was rewarded with an easy 1/3 turn to
make it tight. He is of the opinion that this was our main culprit,
and that by tightening that fitting we have resolved the last of the
fuel issues.

The fitting tightness wasn't checked as part of the inspection process?
{Was this one of the items the owner was supposed to check? :-) }

"john smith" wrote in message
...

You didn't pressure test the tank when you had it out?

He never said he had the tank out.


Isn't "fattened and gooey" a symptom of using autofuel?

No, it is a symptom of exposing a material not intended for use with
hydrocarbons to gasoline of any formulation.



The fitting tightness wasn't checked as part of the inspection process?
{Was this one of the items the owner was supposed to check? :-) }

No, nor should it have been. Checking the torque of every fastener and
fitting is not part of the inspection process.

Jim