Post-Annual Flight

John Smith wrote:


The float detached from the sender in the right main tank on the
PA32-300 I flew to Florida a year ago. The gauge was therefore inop.
The aircraft is equipped with a FS-450 fuel flow monitor. I used this in
place of the specific fuel gauge. The FS-450 is accurately calibrated to
within 0.2 gallons, much better accurate than the manufacturer's fuel
gauge.
Was I legal?


No. The FS-450 installation instructions, which are a part of the STC,
specifically say "a placard stating 'Do Not Rely on Fuel Flow Instrument
to Determine Fuel Levels in Tanks' must be mounted on the aircraft
instrument panel near the FS-450."

Of course, the float didn't fall off until right before someone
important noticed it fell off, so until it fell off you were legal ;-).
Does a tree that falls in a forest make a sound?

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:38:38 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 8:29*pm, John Smith wrote:
In article
,
The float detached from the sender in the right main tank on the
PA32-300 I flew to Florida a year ago. The gauge was therefore inop.
The aircraft is equipped with a FS-450 fuel flow monitor. I used this in
place of the specific fuel gauge. The FS-450 is accurately calibrated to
within 0.2 gallons, much better accurate than the manufacturer's fuel
gauge.

Was I legal?

Offhand, I don't see why not. FAR 91.205b9 only requires a working
fuel gauge for each tank. It doesn't prohibit an additional, non-
working gauge.

Since the FS-450 isn't TSO'd as a replacement for the facotry
installed and required fuel guage, and carries a "Do not
rely on fuel flow instruments to determine fuel levels in tanks. Refer
to original fuel flow instrumentation for primary information."
warning in the pilot's guide, I do not belive your answer is correct.

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:43:20 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 8:23*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
An equipment list is different from a MEL. *Cessna 172 S model, for
example, has an equipment list which lists installed equipment from
the factory with it's weight and whether it is Required (by type
certificate), Standard (installed by factory) or Optional (owner
request, wheel pants for example).-

Ok, fair enough. But an equipment list can't override the 91.205b9
requirement, right? Nothing in 91.205 says "unless an equipment list
says it's optional".

The stuff listed as R in 91.205 is also listed as R in the equipment
list That was my original point. It's where you go to quickly answer
questions like "can I take off my copilot door for jumpers? Can I
pull my rear seats?" The Cessna one lists the pilot seat as R, the
co-pilot seat as S. As to the original point, I do not believe he's
been legal flying with a totally inop indication, and having R in the
equipment list would have been an additional way to confirm that. I
think if you wanted to take it to the next level, if the aircraft had
to be flown somewhere for the annual I believe he technically needed a
ferry permit to relocate it to do the work.

On Feb 21, 8:49*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:38:38 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 8:29*pm, John Smith wrote:
Was I legal?

Offhand, I don't see why not. FAR 91.205b9 only requires a working
fuel gauge for each tank. It doesn't prohibit an additional, non-
working gauge.

Since the FS-450 isn't TSO'd as a replacement for the facotry
installed and required fuel guage, and carries a "Do not
rely on fuel flow instruments to determine fuel levels in tanks. Refer
to original fuel flow instrumentation for primary information."
warning in the pilot's guide, I do not belive your answer is correct.

Well, my answer was just "Offhand, I don't see why not". Now I do see
why not. Thanks.

(The part about not prohibiting an additional, nonworking gauge is
correct, I believe, provided that a working legal gauge is also
present--which, from what you say, was not the case.)

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 18:03:15 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 8:49*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:38:38 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 8:29*pm, John Smith wrote:
Was I legal?

Offhand, I don't see why not. FAR 91.205b9 only requires a working
fuel gauge for each tank. It doesn't prohibit an additional, non-
working gauge.

Since the FS-450 isn't TSO'd as a replacement for the facotry
installed and required fuel guage, and carries a "Do not
rely on fuel flow instruments to determine fuel levels in tanks. Refer
to original fuel flow instrumentation for primary information."
warning in the pilot's guide, I do not belive your answer is correct.

Well, my answer was just "Offhand, I don't see why not". Now I do see
why not. Thanks.

(The part about not prohibiting an additional, nonworking gauge is
correct, I believe, provided that a working legal gauge is also
present--which, from what you say, was not the case.)

Not neccessarily. You'd have to check the equipment list - if only 1
were required operational it would say 1, if both were required (I
don't see why in the case of redundant fuel guages in the same tank
but anyway) it would say 2. Example, the KOEL for the Piper Malibu
Mirage which has 2 alternators installed lists 1 as required
operational for IFR and 2 are required if flight into known icing is
anticipated (one will run things fine unless you need the heated
windshield, lift transducer, etc).

On Feb 21, 9:10*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
Not neccessarily. *You'd have to check the equipment list - if only 1
were required operational it would say 1, if both were required (I
don't see why in the case of redundant fuel guages in the same tank
but anyway) it would say 2. *Example, the KOEL for the Piper Malibu
Mirage which has 2 alternators installed lists 1 as required
operational for IFR and 2 are required if flight into known icing is
anticipated (one will run things fine unless you need the heated
windshield, lift transducer, etc).

Yup, no disagreement. I just meant that an inop gauge (in addition to
a legal, working one for the same tank) doesn't automatically violate
91.205b9.

On Feb 21, 8:36*pm, Ray Andraka wrote:
I didn't say that the gauge could be inoperative. *

Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest that you yourself were promulgating
the full-blown legend.

All I said was that there was nothing in the FAR that says it
must be calibrated to a certain tolerance. *

Yup, that's certainly true.

The only requirement for calibration is that it
indicate empty when there is no usable fuel left in the tank. *

But the tolerance for THAT isn't specified, either! Whether the fuel
quantity is zero or nonzero, the only requirement is for an
"indication" of that quantity. By common sense, the indication has to
be CORRECT, within some reasonable (but unspecified) tolerance.
There's nothing in the regs to suggest that the indication for an
empty tank has a more stringent accuracy requirement than the
indication for any other level has.

If the gauges are operative, indicate empty when on an empty tank, and increase
monotonically when fuel is added, I think the letter of the reg is met.

I disagree. I don't see why you substitute an implicit monotonicity
requirement for an implicit accuracy requirement. Surely it's fine to
have a gauge that is highly accurate, but has regions of negligible
nonmonotonicity; and surely it's not ok to have a gauge that's wildly
inaccurate (say, reporting 50 gallons when there are really just 5)
but monotonic without exception.

Mine bounce around so much they are useless. Only time I look at them is
when the plane is sitting in the hangar. Often times book learnin doesn't
transulate to real life.


wrote in message
...
On Feb 21, 3:51 pm, Jay Maynard
wrote:
On 2008-02-21, wrote:

But what matters isn't what you or I happened to be taught, but rather
what makes sense. Having and using working fuel gauges makes a great
deal of sense, for the reasons just given.

I won't argue with that statement. I was simply taught that aircraft fuel
gauges are chronically unreliable to the point that they should be
ignored,
and that they should never be considered "working".

I think that's half-right, and the half that's right is very
important: you should never trust fuel gauges when they say you've got
MORE fuel than you calculate. But if the gauges say you've got very
much LESS than you expect, you should be concerned. And you need to be
checking the gauges frequently, so you can notice if that occurs. (And
of course, you can only do that if the gauges are operable, as they're
required to be.)

On Feb 21, 10:36 pm, "Dave Stadt" wrote:
Mine bounce around so much they are useless.

Then your plane isn't airworthy.

Often times book learnin doesn't transulate to real life.

Perhaps not. But flying without basic required equipment often
translates to real death.

The float detached from the sender in the right main tank on the
PA32-300 I flew to Florida a year ago. The gauge was therefore inop.
The aircraft is equipped with a FS-450 fuel flow monitor. I used this in
place of the specific fuel gauge. The FS-450 is accurately calibrated to
within 0.2 gallons, much better accurate than the manufacturer's fuel
gauge.
Was I legal?

I also have the JPI FS-450 digital fuel flow gauge in our plane, which is a
hundred times more accurate than the Piper fuel tank gauges. Even with
this very powerful tool in our arsenal, we STILL rely on only the timer, and
visual verification of fuel levels.

Bottom line: If you rely on a fuel gauge (instead of physically looking in
the tank) you are taking a risk. We did not feel that flying with an
inoperative gauge that is "normally" horribly inaccurate was taking any kind
of risk whatsoever.

Mary and I would not have flown the plane if we had not considered doing so
to be utterly, 100% safe. It appears that the regulation we may have
violated (and I'm still not convinced that we did) had little connection to
practical reality.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"