165 – A Shop Towel in the Engine! Don’t Do What I Did!

Airplane Owner Maintenance - By Dean Showalter

Hi Friends!

I have a story for you today that I wish I didn’t have. But it’s true, so we might as well learn from it. Thankfully, everything turned out well on this one.

At Moody Aviation where I went to school years ago, we had a concept called “SYE.” It stood for “Share Your Experience.”

It was a concept to encourage us to take our mistakes and make a learning opportunity from them.

Listen to today’s podcast for the story of how I accidentally left a red shop towel inside an airplane engine… I hope I never do that again! Definitely an opportunity to learn “what not to do!”

Ok… it’s time to ‘fess up I know I’m not the only one out here who’s done a dumb thing or two in airplane maintenance… so, if you’re willing to share your story, leave me a message here on the website, or shoot me an email dean{at}airplaneownermaintenance{dot}com

I’ll assume it’s ok to share the stories, without names (unless you ask me to share your name.) Thanks!

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Another item we discussed in this episode is a Cessna 172 that would not start. It turned out to be a problem with the left magneto, but in the process of troubleshooting, we discovered the spark plugs had gone far too long without being cleaned.

Take a look:

And here’s the loose distributor electrode inside the magneto:

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Other items we discussed in this episode:

• An oil leak on a Twin Cessna (you might have seen the email I sent out about this.)
• The items we used to fix that oil leak: Aviation Permatex, Continental silk thread P/N 641543 (If you only need a small amount, check with Fresno Airparts… they sell it for 20 cents per foot) and the third item used was Loctite 515. These 3 components, used properly, make an excellent seal for the oil pump cover.
• Some interesting electrical information about a Cirrus SR22 – here’s the YouTube video I mentioned with some excellent visuals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCeHxk-fJvE

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