It will increasingly require hands on ownership, and at some point I think experimental classification. The payoff is a very capable aircraft
absolutely, otherwise I hadn’t bought me one, but if you have to aboard several missions, than you will loose the confidence in it. In 9 years of owning 3 different Cirrus I had no issue at a field, but with the Extra…And no one will and want to help. At my homebase there several maintenance shops, but they didn’t touch the Extra, no chance.
As an well knowned Extra owner told me this year: he drives to the airport and will not know if flying with it is possible, if yes, than it is a bonus, if not he will screw on it and this okay for him. But not for me, I want a reliable plane and to come home!
Yes, all third party components are identified by part number in the Extra manual. The vast majority are common and readily available.
I will have at least as good dispatch reliability as that of my friends with Malibu’s. This will be accomplished with preventative maintenance consistent with high performance pressurized aircraft.
The Extra 400 is not an aircraft for the average GA pilot. N registered planes have a significant advantage with respect to parts replacement and long term alternatives.
Simple aircraft have fewer systems to manage and maintain. The cost of speed and sophistication are no secret, and there is no magic carpet with these capabilities. My RV-8 requires oil changes and fuel, the 400 quite a bit more.
Cheers
Frank
I agree with Frank. Every time I get a call for advice from somebody wanting to buy an Extra 400, they get the same “checklist” of criteria.
First and foremost: you will be the maintenance manager – ok?
While I can relate to privatepilot’s frustration, I gave him this same advice.
And as to this:
“As an well knowned Extra owner told me this year: he drives to the airport and will not know if flying with it is possible, if yes, than it is a bonus, if not he will screw on it and this okay for him.”
Same problem: your maintenance manager (you) KNOWS if your plane is ok or not. So you can make reasonably dependable plans. Preventive maintenance and early detection of issues is key.
Complex aircraft such as the PA46 and the Extra 400 have more systems that can and will fail.
In the case of the Extra, add the very small production numbers, the double orphan situation and you get the picture.
I am now dismantling my engine. A part that is not specific to this engine was on the way out, but we caught it in the shop, during preventive maintenance…
A sobering finding while removing the engine was the number of potential failures we found due to deep chafing by the spaghetti of cables, ducts etc…
I will not let this happen again when re-installing.
PS – I will post photos of the cylinders and pistons soon. I think we need a thread on liquid cooled aircraft engine and Conti’s missed opportunity.
PS 2 – if you need a crankcase for an Extra 400 call me. I know where to get them new ;-)
We are making good progress with the teardown, Crankcase will be opened tomorrow.
As promised here a photo of a cylinder head. They all look similar with very little deposits.
The valves also look great and my old wise colleague has checked 2 guides so far which had like-new condition.
FWIW – these RAM cylinders and Continental pistons have 600 hours on them since were installed in 2016.
My engine was set with too much ( about 8 liters per hour, 2 GPH) max fuel flow, and must always be leaned to whatever setting needed.
I suspect that the AMM specs are too lean, and I was very lucky to have been around when they adjusted FF so I could do the engine runs myself and settle on this max FF which works very very well. Call it beginner‘s luck…
Price to pay is that I always lean when not flying and also in final due to sputter in full rich/low power.
Climb settings: 37.5 inches, 2500 RPM and FF of 125 liters per hour ( this is 88% power) and CHT of 270 F Max.
I keep this setting for 15-25 minutes depending upon cruisd FL.
Cruise settings: 29.5 inches, 2250 RPM and FF of 72 liters per hour ( around 60% setting). CHT of 230-240 F
Let’s wait for health report of all valves before concluding…
Flyingfish wrote:
Price to pay is that I always lean when not flying and also in final due to sputter in full rich/low power.
Interestingly, I heard the suggestion to lean the Continental TSIO-360 on final as well, for the exact same reason. Not exactly POH procedure, but you’re the second person I hold in high regard to suggest such operation.
Flyingfish wrote:
A sobering finding while removing the engine was the number of potential failures we found due to deep chafing by the spaghetti of cables, ducts etc…
I will not let this happen again when re-installing.
Yes! Very important. We had the same with our 210 when we acquired it and had to change quite a few routings and clampings but there are no chafings in our engine compartment since. A friend of mine lost all his engine oil due to chafing…lesson very well learnt.
You would be surprised at the amount of chafings you will find in complex light aircraft engine compartments. Unlike the modern large aircratf I am used to dealing with, traditional light aircraft do not specify exact routings and clampings for wiring and hoses…so it is often up to the installer’s wisdom, of which there is less and less around.
In the end, as you say, as owners we should be in charge and demanding (and paying for!) this level of workmanship.
tmo, thank you for the compliment, I am embarrassed !
IRAN update:
Crankcase opened and cleaned. very many bolts, cleaning was a seriously messy job…
I learnt how to remove valves at zero cost in fingers… they all look great (the valves -fingers show some persistent oil staining), but there is rough deposit at the base of the stem,
Most affected was one intake valve which even had a chunk of this deposit missing…
Exhaust valves all show very minimal staining of their surface. Boss says these parts have had very little heat stress and basically no measurable wear, no need to replace.
But I don’t like the deposits and now I know why I’ll want to learn how to clean valve stems at annuals without removing them. Advice on frequency and how to would be appreciated !
Summary so far:
Apart from the camshaft lobe and lifter and one broken cylinder, only damage we found is light scratching in the gear pump housing, which boss says is minor and can be removed locally and light scratching of oil pump gears, I am not sure whether rework as suggested or buy new.
Crankshaft, counterweights and case look perfect. Boss spoke highly of the bottom end work done in Canada 600 hours ago. Thank you Alberta Aero Engines.
Our plan is to reassemble and measure crankshaft bearing wear before making final decisions .
Boss thinks it will be ok, given general visual condition.
If this is confirmed, we’ll not even do the NDT on crank and case. We’re looking at
- new camshaft
- new hydraulic lifters
- new piston rings
- hone cylinders and resurface valve seats
- I am considering OH of starter adapter and mechanical fuel pump. Both have 600 hours and are hard to remove once reinstalled. Opinions?
Side note : I weighed pistons and pins. Much to my frustration I found that during the top overhaul done in Germany they did do the matching, despite me explicitly asking for it and them promising to do it.
Opposing piston pairs were off by up to 14 grams (to put this in perspective, this is out of 2000 grams per piston//pin).
Luckily, It did not take much thinking to get that down to 1 (one) gram plus/minus scale tolerance. I took at least 5 measurements as they would easily vary by 2~3 grams, which is after all only 0.2% and I still have to chemically clean the parts, so maybe 1-2 grams of deposits will go away…
Anyway, it does not get much better on this front (bottom end was fully balanced in Canada, so we’ll just check the counterweights.
Expecting that the engine will be as smooth as it can possibly be after this project is a nice prospect… so happy camper here…
I am looking at a complete redesign of the layout of bowden cables and various ducts and tubes. Plan is tidy up alignments and attach as much as possible to the firewall, which may imply re-ordering some hydraulic or fuel lines. Any “tricks of the trade” advice?
Are there any FAA approved hydraulic line manufacturers this side of the Atlantic?
What would you do to protect SCEET from mechanical aggression?
how to clean valve stems at annuals without removing them
Not sure you can… there is a technique which involves removing the springs, putting grinding paste on the visible part of the valve stem, and rotating the valve up while moving it up and down. Then you have to “somehow” remove all traces of the grinding paste 
There is an emergency version of this called the “old rope trick” (do a search here). When I got a sticky valve in Oct 2019 my A&P decided it was much better to remove the whole cylinder and get it repaired properly, and he was right; TB20, #2, very accessible and it took no time at all. But it must be done right, with the right torques etc.
What would you do to protect SCEET from mechanical aggression?
They need to be secured so they don’t throw themselves around. Just use large (wide) cable ties in the right places. And make sure that anything (not just pipework) running between the engine and the airframe, i.e. all the connections which need to take up engine vibration displacement, are properly secured while having enough distance to move as the engine moves. I’ve seen some horrible things in this area, one of which was a copper fuel line, on a homebuilt (I told the owner it will crack and will spill fuel onto the exhaust during flight but he wasn’t too interested).
Opposing piston pairs were off by up to 14 grams
I’ve been told that when you buy a set nowadays they come matched to within 1g. My engine was rebuilt twice, by Barrett Precision in Oklahoma, and dynamically balanced each time.
Thank you Peter!
Flyingfish wrote:
Are there any FAA approved hydraulic line manufacturers this side of the Atlantic?
Wouldn’t you be able to claim “owner produced parts” in a pinch?
Saywell seem to be a good place to talk to this side of the Atlantic. Otherwise Guy Gibney (GeeBee) from Beechtalk will likely be able to make anything and everything, but you’ll end up with an OPP part (probably better than original). You can talk to him about SCEET and the like as well.
You can also see if your shop won’t be able to make the hoses, or doesn’t know a local one that specializes in some other industry but does a good job and has the necessary tools in sizes appropriate for your task.
There is one more hose place in Germany, but they never responded to my query about brake lines for my plane, so I’m going with Saywell when it’s time for the annual.
