Every flight is a series of decisions. Sometimes the decisions are easy — weather’s too bad, pilot’s not feeling good, airplane’s not ready or equipped for the trip. This month’s Puzzler is a series of three flights, each with its own decision tree opportunities. Let’s warm up with data from a Cirrus SR22 with a Continental/Tornado…
If you’ve been flying LOP in cruise for a while you might forget that not so very long ago operating piston engines LOP was, shall we say – frowned upon. POHs didn’t mention it, except to say don’t do it. Some of the resistance was dismantled with the advent of multi-cylinder EGT gauges. But Insight…
What gets your attention when you’re flying? Obviously traffic, terrain and weather get your attention, but let’s narrow it down to events or trends in the engine data that would cause you to consider a precautionary landing. High CHT, no or very low CHT, ditto those for EGT and TIT for sure, especially if the data is corroborated by rough…
I saw the phrase “fueling speculation” in a political context this week and wondered how those two words became attached in our lexicon. Why didn’t “provoking” or “prompting” or “eliciting” catch on the way “fueling” did? Then I opened my first SavvyAnalysis chart of the day and found myself doing exactly that – speculating about…
The 14th century friar William of Ockham would probably cringe to know that his lofty and articulate principle “Non sunt multiplicanda entia sine necessitate” has been boiled down to “Keep it Simple.” The Latin translates to “Entities should not be multiplied without necessity”, but in the Information Age it is usually applied to shave away (using…
First some old business. In the November Puzzler I used data that depicted intermittent and unusual patterns in EGT and CHT 5. I was happy to be able to include two pictures provided by our client — one showing the rocker arm on the engine lined up off-center to the valve stem, and the other showing the…
One of the classic lines in Casablanca comes from Claude Rains playing Captain Renault: “Round up the usual suspects.” In engine monitor analysis, when we see an EGT or CHT diverge from normalcy, it’s often the result of a clogged injector, a rogue spark plug or an induction leak. It could also be bogus data from a failing probe or…
For this Halloween Puzzler I chose three charts. The first was trick-y, and finding the source of the problem was a treat. The next one is a little scary, and the last one is downright spooky. Let’s get started. First up is the Right engine of a Baron 55, a Continental IO-550-E. Here’s the whole 40 minute flight, with…
For this back-to-school Puzzler I chose two very different scenarios. Let’s apply our analytical skills and see if we can solve them. First up is a normally aspirated SR-22 with a Continental IO-550-N. This is a test profile flight, with a series of GAMI sweeps followed by a lean-of-peak mag check. Here’s the whole flight,…
While channel surfing recently I tuned into the opening scene of 12 Angry Men. It had been years since I had seen it, so I decided to give it a go. It’s not a flashy movie, it’s in black-and-white, and except for the final scene on the courthouse plaza, the movie takes place in one small…