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Yes David, it was your incident I referred to. Appreciate the
clarification. I was wrong to describe it as a crash. Although, as you
acknowledge, with just slightly different circumstances it could been a crash.
In fact, I pretend it was a fatality. This gets me past the tendency to
rationalize incidents and tendency to become complacent. I've noticed our
emotional needs cause us to not take action, so I compensate by pretending
someone died.
I have unusual way of looking at such incidents. I know we all have a
tendency to focus on direct causes. Things like the cracked radiator, or perhaps
the lack of antifreeze. I look for root causes and systemic failures. The
"other" causes. If I notice those and take action on them, then I end up with
solutions that also reduce risk of other potential failures. If we use your
incident as example, it would serve no purpose for me (or others) to rush out to
the airport and look for radiator cracks. There is some value to checking
my antifreeze ratio, to make sure I too don't have a lean condition. However, I
place significance on making sure I recognize marginal cooling as a cause.
There's nothing personal in the statement. No offense intended. If you were able
to fly at full power with good temps, you never would have been motivated to use
100% water. It's that simple.
With good intentions, Ed recommended the new guy NOT take action to reduce
temps during climb. I disagree. MY INTENT is to save a life. So I encourage
him to not settle.
Ever since Paul died, and I knew he was taking risks, and I didn't say
anything....... I recognized my not saying anything is just being a
chicken. I'm an expert at preventing failures. Companies I managed
outperformed all of the competition. I have an obligation of every once in a
while to offer a suggestion. I expect some grief for having a
different viewpoint....although have to admit I'm appalled at this eagerness to
interpret suggestions in negative manner.
Date: Tue, 15 May 2007 21:27:39 -0700
Subject: [FlyRotary] Re: Marginal Cooling contributes to
Crash.
Perry, I think you are right. Al, you must be thinking about my
engine out incident. No crash, no damage. It was a gentle touch
down on a freeway. But that is beside the point.. could have been
a crash.
You also have your facts wrong about location. Like Perry
said, it was indeed California in winter.
Marginal cooling as an underlying cause is closer to the truth, but miss
leading at best.
Did I have marginal cooling? Well, I could outrun any 160h.p.
side-by-side RV that ever flew against, even on the hottest day. Could
outrun the 180 hp RV's on cool days. I could out climb and outrun any
plane that I could afford to rent, even when heat soaked on a 110 deg day with
a bubble in my cooling system.. is that marginal? Maybe, because I
wanted more....
by the way, according to your definition here is a short list of other
planes that have marginal cooling:
Every WWII fighter from every country.
Every Cessna and Piper that I have ever flown.
My marginal cooling was by no real means the cause of the incident,
but a series of not-so-smart decisions by the owner/pilot.
In order to impress my friends, I found that pure water would allow the
use of more power. I didn't put in enough antifreeze when I went to the
mountains for the weekend. The radiator froze and developed a small
crack. I switched to Evans not to compensate for lack of cooling, but to
allow me to fly home with an unpressurized cooling system (minimizing any
continued leak). However, a 7psi cap was not enough pressure, even using
Evans, and all the coolant came out past the radiator cap. Stupid Stupid
cold and tired.
So maybe if I had unlimited cooling I might not have ever had an
issue. Then again, given my quest for power ... I might then
have chosen to convert to NitroMethane and just blown
myself up... :-)
In other words, in my case, you really have to blame "must impress my
friends..." more than the cooling system itself.
On 5/15/07, Perry
Mick <pjmick@verizon.net>
wrote:
al p wick wrote:
If you guys just measure your temps as I described earlier,
then all of
the successes could be copied.
Because, heh, it's not like anybody has
ever said anything about their temps on their first flight. Everybody is SO
secretive with that information. You can't get anyone to tell you anything
about their radiator sizes, or inlet sizes, and I've never heard anyone
mention NACA ducts or external diffusion. Just a bunch of guys talking all
day with no one EVER mentioning a number.
Ernest (wishing SOMEONE
would tell me how well their cooling system is working)
My
cooling systems works so well, that the coolant temperature never budges
from thermostat temperature even on very hot days and long climbs.
I'm
trying to figure out what accident Al is talking about. I don't remember any
accident in Wyoming, and a search of the archives turned up nothing. Just
did a search for "Evans". Al must be talking about Dave Leonard - that was
in California, in winter time!
Perry
-al wick
Cozy IV powered by Turbo Subaru
3.0R with variable valve lift and cam timing.
Artificial intelligence in
cockpit, N9032U 240+ hours from Portland, Oregon
Glass panel design, Subaru
install, Prop construct, Risk assessment
info:
http://www.maddyhome.com/canardpages/pages/alwick/index.html
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