Sender: <marv@lancaironline.net>
To:  lml@lancaironline.net
Date: Wed, 01 Jun 2011 07:42:37 -0400
Message-ID: <redirect-5000229@logan.com>
Received-SPF: none
 receiver=logan.com; client-ip=206.130.116.53; envelope-from=hwasti@lm50.com
From: Hamid Wasti <hwasti@lm50.com>
User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.24 (Windows/20100228)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Subject: Re: [LML] Re: L-IV Choice of Engine
References: <list-4999321@logan.com>
In-Reply-To: <list-4999321@logan.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Ted Noel wrote:
> Your comments below are part of what drives me nuts in this 
> conversation. A fuel line failure is NOT an engine issue. It is a 
> systems issue that applies to every aircraft that ever flew (except 
> electrics). Thus, using it as a condemnation of a one-off application 
> is not germane to the topic.
Actually, it is exactly the issue and your not recognizing it as such 
makes me worry about your grasp of the problem.

The fuel system on every aircraft that ever flew was designed, tested 
and validated over years and decades and that validation paid for in 
blood and lives. If you want to take advantage of that validation, fly 
one of those systems. Otherwise the one-of fuel system in your one-of 
implementation is as untested as the engine it is feeding. You 
trivialize it and other systems at the peril of your life.

When you buy a Lycoming engine for your airplane or a Ford engine for 
your car, someone has done all the engineering including the system 
level engineering. Even though the engine does not come with a fuel line 
or electric cables, the knowledge of how to make those connections comes 
with the engine. When you install the engine, you are implementing an 
existing and validated design. You are not designing something new.

When you do a one-of design, you have to design those systems from 
scratch. You can learn from what Lycoming or Ford did, but it is still a 
new design and subject to errors, oversights and other mistakes. The 
more things you are designing in an implementation, the higher the 
probability that errors will be present in the final system and that one 
of these errors could start a catastrophic chain reaction.

You have talked a lot about your engine. What is your operational 
history? How many hundred hours do you fly each year and how many 
hundred hours have you flown? What are your operational results for fuel 
consumption, temperatures and performance?

Regards,

Hamid