Greetings,
Filled up with
gas, and took off to buzz the beach.
At this point, I decided that the engine was trustworthy enough to
venture out, even if it meant flying over the bay at 1400 ft. After blowing past a Cherokee
that departed ahead of me, I got to about the middle of the bay, about 10
miles away, and noticed that my volt meter was reading 11.5V. Hmmm, that should be 14.5V. I wonder how long the alternator has
been out? Immediate 180 turn, 60
degree bank, and back to the airport, passing
the Cherokee going the opposite direction this time. I turned off all the non-essential
stuff, and called a straight-in precautionary landing to 36. The voltage never went any lower, and
everything kept running just fine as I taxied back to the hanger.
Upon
inspection, I found the 100A fuse to the alternator blown. This doesn’t exactly give me a warm
fuzzy feeling, especially since I can’t see anything wrong except for the
blown fuse. Replaced the fuse,
but didn’t have a chance to test it since it was getting dark. I’ll be really surprised if the
alternator itself is bad, but I’ll find out when I run it again. Fortunately, I already have the rev-2,
smaller alternator that can be mounted now if necessary.
As a side
note, the engine didn’t run all that well in descent, so I may have done more
harm than good with my prop-off dual map calibration attempt. FWIW,
Tracy said I could scratch out
that paragraph in the instructions about calibrating this with the prop off
:-)
On another note, Tracy also said that he's hoping to
ship the first EM-2's around the end of Nov! The year was not specified
though :-)
Rusty (I need a new job- Hello GE
Medical...)
Good Catch, Rusty!
Not a good place to practice
your engine out procedures - at 1400 MSL over the gulf {:>) One
good thing, you can get further on a dying battery in a fast airplane than you
could with a slow one.
I have a big indicator light right
in front of me on my instrument panel that comes on when abnormal voltage
conditions exists (Low or High). I presume that Tracy's EM2 has
some sort of announciation alarm for such things. Now, that I only have
one battery rather than two, I find myself monitoring my voltage a bit more
often
Keeping alert for abnormal operations is
what its about - ask me.
Ed Anderson