Day 7… Fixed? Don’t know yet
Headed out to the airport to keep busy as I was waiting for the second new ignition system to be delivered. I wanted to balance the prop as there seems to be a little more vibration than I really wanted to see in the plane.
Don had a set of saw horses, some builder squares and a steel pipe. Ah, I could put the pieces together to make a prop balancer. Just call me McGuiver.
After finishing off the prop, I headed home for some lunch and found a nice surprise, the ignition system. Great! A bite to eat and back to the airport in my rental car to install the new system.
Earlier this morning Lee had to go down to Denver for some work and elected to drive his car instead of flying. I thought whats the big deal. As long as the winds are coming straight down the runway, it would be ok.. Boy was I wrong. After lunch the wind was 28 gusts to 38 and Lee was seeing winds of 49 kts in Denver.
I have been on the outskirts of many hurricanes in Charleston and the winds didn’t seem this bad. The dust was horrible. I ended up plugging the inlet of engine to prevent sand and grit from getting into it as I was working away at the plane. I thought this kind of driving sand must be what it is like in Afghanistan or Iraq. Grit in your teeth. Look how the wind sock is flight straight out!
When I finished with the bird, I had to vacuum it out to get all the dirt and grass out of it. Nothing was flying. As much as I wanted to take the bird up, it was a no go.
I ended up just starting the engine when the winds died down, all seems well and the ignition system was not overheating when I checked it. I think the problems are solved with the plane and I’ll test fly her tomorrow morning.
Now I am faced with a new issue. My buddy Ric Lee said there is a blizzard occurring in Salt Lake City and was asking if there was any snow here. I checked the weather and it may snow here tomorrow. Crap. Lee wants me to stay as long as I need to to be safe. It looks like saturday may be a good day to leave, and I can always fly south if I need to. I don’t need to be in LA until next Wednesday so all is good….