Happy, happy airplane owners

[DeeG]

woooo hooo!!!!

Cessna has fresh annual, Stinsons engine will be installed on Friday........ WOW! we may actually get to go flying next weekend! We going on a three day bike ride this weekend.

Mechanic calls up Pete hte other day, asking if he had a spare Eissman mag for the Stinson. (Yup, got a few, we are parts hoarders) Seems that not only did we fly back from Phoenix on five cylinders, we only had one mag as well. Fortunately, he checked out the mag and decided he only needed that rubber doughnut thing, seems it hadn't been changed in a while and it disintegrated. Good old Franklin engine, half falling apart and it keeps on going.

 

[Carol]

woooo hooo!!!!

Cessna has fresh annual, Stinsons engine will be installed on Friday........ WOW! we may actually get to go flying next weekend! We going on a three day bike ride this weekend.

Mechanic calls up Pete hte other day, asking if he had a spare Eissman mag for the Stinson. (Yup, got a few, we are parts hoarders) Seems that not only did we fly back from Phoenix on five cylinders, we only had one mag as well. Fortunately, he checked out the mag and decided he only needed that rubber doughnut thing, seems it hadn't been changed in a while and it disintegrated. Good old Franklin engine, half falling apart and it keeps on going.

YAY, Dee!!! Have fun!

 

[Anthony]

woooo hooo!!!!

Good old Franklin engine, half falling apart and it keeps on going.

Glad to hear the planes are getting airworthy again Dee. The problem, though, is that the Franklin seems like its always falling apart. Were these things made by Ben Franklin?

 

[DeeG]

Glad to hear the planes are getting airworthy again Dee. The problem, though, is that the Franklin seems like its always falling apart. Were these things made by Ben Franklin?

it has been very frustrating at times. But the original Franklin engine (NOT the polish version) hasn't been in production in almost 50 years. Soooooo, not only are parts hard to come by, they are seldom new. It is now virtually impossible to find the OEM exhaust valves that were built by Eaton. Some folks use the one from the helo engine and grind it down a bit, or they find something else that will work (and hope that the FAA doesn't catch up with them....) And 150 HP cylinders are getting scarce as well. However, A-1 Service in OK is now putting together NEW parts. You can get new cylinders aasemblies, valves, cases, etc etc.

When you fly an OLD plane, you just have to deal with these kinds of things. Just look at what Tom is having to go through to get the Fairchild up and running. I'm sure that if he were not an IA and didn't have the talent and the tools to BUILD parts from scratch, the plane might be gathering dust in a hangar somewhere. The Franklin is a wonderful engine. Had this happened with a Lycoming or Continental, I doubt that it would have gone very far. How many 150 HP four cylinder engines can take you from AZ to WA running on only three cylinders, one mag, and with a couple of chunks of piston metal floating in the oil?