another year, another annual

Hi all,

Did 165 hours this year (actually over 10 months) in the 172 and brought
it into annual a couple weeks ago. Decided to overhaul the prop,
governor, alternator and rework a ton of stuff. Wound up going with
Sensenich Propeller Service in Lancaster, PA and am glad I did. The
prop came in a mere $100 over the initial quote (effectively the same).

The governor, on the other hand, did cause us a bit of pain when they
said the flyweight assembly was worn beyond spec and would cost another
$560 (yes, over the $450 initial quote) to replace with a new unit. An
overhauled assembly would have been $100 less, but we quickly
rationalized the new unit given the relatively small price differential.

The Sensenich rep who called my mechanic commented that they "hadn't
seen one of these revs [of the flyweight assembly] in a long time and it
needed to be upgraded". Oh, how _comforting_. :-)

Biggest surprise from a safety standpoint was a broken lower alternator
bracket. The unit was being held in by the two remaining bolts and the
upper bracket, but it took us completely by surprise. We had the
cowling off less than 25 hours ago and didn't see it...which isn't
really that big of a surprise given where it is (very difficult to see).
Next time you're in the cowling, you may want to give your alternator
a good tug or two.

We also decided to clean up the engine bay and strip/paint the airbox
and a couple support brackets. Should look pretty sweet when it's done.

All I can say is MAN do these airplanes get expensive at times! Of
course, we're doing lots of stuff by choice, so we have no one to blame
but ourselves :-)

I posted a ton of pics in the gallery on my site and the first two parts
of an article series I'm writing on the subject. I've learned a ton, as
usual...hope you find them equally helpful.

Safe flying!

-Doug

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Doug Vetter, CFIMEIA

http://www.dvcfi.com
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