I want my $50 back!

[Dubya]

Excellent.

mar...without a doubt...one of the best reads i've had on this board yet. I hope your mood has improved! What a treat to be able to fly history every week. Cherish it.
Thanks for sharing.

W

 

[Timebuilder]

Mar-

When I worked in a garage, I spent most of my time under the hood, looking at a Sun machine, doing diagnosis.

Can you breifly describe how you are able to get a voltage trace from each of 144 spark plugs? What kind of wiring and switching arrangement is used to accomplish this?

Oh, one more thing:

I'm sure that 100LL was not the original fuel for the DC-6. Were there any mods to accomodate today's available fuel?

 

[TurboS7]

I think you just got your $50.00 worth. BTW the information on the religous threads is very impressive. You would pay about $8000.00 for all that infomation via Bible School. I just think that having someone on this board that is willing to put that most effort into stating their views happens to be great. I very much enjoy also reading about the ol' DC-6==I miss it and I miss Alaska.

 

[Freddie Spencer]

Mar,

Now I can see the reason why you fly for a living, and Timebuilder don't. Awesome post, keep it up!!!

 

[Timebuilder]

Yo, Fred!

At the risk of sounding "arrogant", the reason he is flying for a living and I'm not is that I was laid off from my job, and he still has a job.

But I imagine you would never miss an opportunity to act like an...

 

[Duke Elegant]

Hey mar my son,

Good story mate!

GEEZ! I had to dig up my thread from Page 3.

 

[Cat Driver]

Hey Duke, good you joined us.

This group needs some pilots here.

That Mar Dude did a fine job on the 6 Huh?

Cat.

 

[Duke Elegant]

Yeah I too am tiring of the God Botherers.

I flew the Murphy Moose yesterday.. I thought it was a great little bush plane.

 

[Cat Driver]

Yeh, I flew a couple of Murphy Rebels and was impressed.

A friend is just finishing a Moose with the Russian Radial in it..that should be a real erection builder.

I got to work with a lot of Russians in Africa and did some stick time in the MI 8 helicopter........ jeeses those Russians build brutal machines they are fu..in bullet proof.

Cat

 

[mar]

Russian sleds

Cat Driver: Those Russian sleds need to be bullet proof when they de-ice with vodka. Oh wait a minute, that was Alaska Airlines.

Anyway, there's probably not much de-icing going on in Africa...

NWT in Yellowknife, eh? I see the Air North guys in Fairbanks quite a bit. I think they come from Whitehorse--a fine town, I must say.

The only other YT community I've visited is Old Crow. We delivered a load of heating oil.

Thanks for everyone's comments. I enjoy expanding the discussion beyond Scope, PFT, Bankruptcies....and, you know, everything else.

I love to fly. I just live for it. And the only reason I'm still working when others are not is out of pure luck. And timing. And networking.

I've been fired and layed off more times than I'd like to think about.

TB--I have absolutely no idea how that engine analyzer works. I bet somebody like Avbug or Asquared can explain it.

All I know is what I was trained to do: Look for bad plugs and synch the props (it'll do that too).

Ever tried to synch four worn out props? Maddening...

About the fuel...I'm not aware of any changes to the engine to accomodate the lower octane.

 

[Big Duke Six]

Now we're talkin'

I'm a little late here, but thanks Mar! I very much appreciate the time you took to put me on board with you for awhile. Nice.

I had no idea you could monitor those engines that way! That does sound pretty advanced for its day. But d@mn, the part about the oil floors me. For being built for long-haul work, and at the usage rates you quoted, it sounds like 30 gallons per is not nearly enough. Can you add more to the engines inflight via a pump from a barrel or something? How do you manage and plan for that? Oh, wait, maybe you meant total burns, not per engine.

Glad to see we're pointed in the right direction again. Hey, you ever spend any time at the Bush Company or Chilcoot Charlie's? That's nearly 20 years ago for me, but I was wondering if they're still around. AF you know, spent a few weeks at Elmendorf once or twice.

 

[Wang Chung]

That "day in the life" reminded me of when I flew unscheduled freight in piston Convairs....everything minus the FE!! It's a high workload cockpit at times! One of the most interesting parts for the non-flying pilot was to scan 20+ steam guages and also make callouts during the first part of the takeoff roll.

Mar - do you guys use high blower? Most heavy radial birds today have high blower disabled, I think. I guess I was lucky enough to use high blower for a few flights on one particular Convair that still had it.

Wang

 

[Timebuilder]

Yeah I too am tiring of the God Botherers.

I flew the Murphy Moose yesterday.. I thought it was a great little bush plane.

Well, Duke, the reason you are happy with this thread is that so far, no one has given me any reason to mention anything outside of flying.

Everyone knows how to click or "not" click, right?

Suuuuure.......

 

[Cat Driver]

On the fuel question.

In the fifties and sixties we used 115/145 and up until the eighties 100/130 however big radial engines are low compression engines and run quite well on 100LL.

For oil we use 120 weight in summer and 100 weight in winter ( and oil dilution on shut down in below freezing temps. ).

One thing big radials will not tolerate is turbine engine pilots due to the care needed in throttle and prop pitch control. A throttle monkey can ruin a set of engines in no time at all.

Nothing beats watching and hearing a big radial clink, clack spit and bang into life trailing smoke out of the exhaust pipes on start up.

The clacking noises are the counter weights being thrown into position as the RPM increases above idle...

Cat Driver:

 

[mar]

Deactivated equipment

All right. Now I'm learning stuff about my own airplane.

I don't know where I picked up that 100LL wasn't as good for the engines. You know, there is so much folklore out there. But it make sense that a low compression engine would run fine on that.

Wang Chung--I can't imagine operating a DC6 without an FE but our GOM says one is required for every *revenue* flight. In other words we're permitted to ferry it without one.

And yeah, the high blowers are declutched.

So is the oil dilution...

...and the aux oil pump. Which answers Big Duke's question about running out of oil when you're crossing an ocean. There is a reserve oil tank with a pump. The FE can select any engine and direct oil via a switch in the cockpit. I think they would make a 50/50 mix of fuel and oil to keep it from congealing in flight--easier to pump. But I'm not sure as I said because we never use it.

And yes those oil burns I noted are *total*. One gallon per engine per hour = four gals per hour. But in reality some are less and some are more. One engine may go all day and never use any and then one of the others may be a real 'burner.'

Cat Driver, true statement about turbine pilots.

One of our pilots has a sticker on his locker: "Jets are for kids!"

It was a big transition for me coming from Metroliners where I would use a 3:1 descent plan and pretty much flight idle (above NTS) and then go to the Six where I use 6:1 and try to plan my descent so that I don't have to add power until I bring the RPMs up at the FAF. It's a game of management and patience for sure.

But it's like we always say, let's baby those engines now so that when we need them they'll be there for us. Oh baby, let me tell you, those Pratts'll put out more than 60" MP if you need it.

I pet them and talk real nice all day to them.

 

[Birdstrike]

Grind Me A Pound

"...Electrical: One GEN can handle the entire load. Three inverters. Engine instruments get power from two. The third is for emergencies when on BATT power..."

-----------------------------------------------------

Mar, are you referring to only one generator on-line being able to handle the entire load? Out of how many? Can they be reset in flight? Are they off the main elec bus or do they have their own? Fascinating story, thanks.

Ref your opening remarks, though, just get over it, it ain't gonna happen. Beechin about it actually seems to make it worse.

You probably ought to write a book about flying in Alaska.

 

[A Squared]

The ignition analyzer:

The Engines on the DC-6 have a low tension ignition system. the magnetos produce a *low* voltage imples (400 v or thereabouts) which is boosted at the cylinder head by a secondary coil. The ignition analyzer is an oscilliscope where the horizontal trace is driven by a timing generator on the accessory section of the engine. One sweep=2 revolutions of the encine The trace comes from the voltage in the primary ignition circuit. A rotary switch allows you to select one of 8 distributor circuits to display (2 distributors/ engine X 4 engines) In the most commonly used mode, the sweep is amplified horizontaly so that the pulse of a single spark plus is displayed, rather than all 18 pulses on hte same screen. A second rotary switch varies the timing of the sweep so that each spark plug can be selected. The synch mode displays the ignition pulses from one engine with the sweep timed to another engine, apparent motion of the ignition pulses indicated an rpm difference between the selected engines.

The engines are unmodified for running on 100LL. When the 108/135 and 115/145 fuel was available, CB-17 power settings were used, this allowed up to 62" MAP with water/meth injection. WIth 100LL fuel the CB-16 power settings are used. The CB-16 power settings were originally established for 100/130 fuel which is no longer available. There is no physical difference between a CB-16 engine and a CB-17 engine.

Oil: there is 26 gallon Aux oil tank which is used to replenish the engine oil tanks in flight via an electric pump.

High Blower ... At my company (not the same company as mar) the high blowers are not used, we use low blower exclusively.

 

[mar]

I told ya Asquared would know.

AA has a much better head for the finer aspects of flying.

I just like to watch the scenary go by.

Birdstrike--I'm over it believe me but I must admit I cannot let certain comments pass unanswered. It's the whole silence equals consent thing.

If everyone would just remember why we come to this website in the first place it would be much more productive than sifting through reams of rhetoric.

I'm also just as guilty as the next person.

One GEN out of four can handle the entire load. Typical load during flight might be 200amps. One GEN can handle 300.

Peace.

 

[Timebuilder]

The Engines on the DC-6 have a low tension ignition system. the magnetos produce a *low* voltage imples (400 v or thereabouts) which is boosted at the cylinder head by a secondary coil.

So the FE is monitoring the traces produced by the primary circuits to determine engine efficiency and synching. Interesting.

Since the high blower setting is disabled, what is the typical maximum boost used today?

 

[A Squared]

So the FE is monitoring the traces produced by the primary circuits to determine engine efficiency and synching. Interesting.

yep, you got it. the wave forms can give an incredible amount of information about what is going on with the engine. In addition to showing faults in the ignition system (shorts, open circuits, Breaker point malfunction, spark plug fouling, etc) you can also detect non ignition problems. For example, a cylinder with low compression; because the dielectric value between the plug electrodes is lower when the compression is low, it affects the waveform all the way back upstream in the primary curcuit. Ignition analyzer interpretation is one of those black arts, soon to be a lost art.

Originally posted by Timebuilder Since the high blower setting is disabled, what is the typical maximum boost used today? [/B]

59.5" MAP, the max CB-16 power setting. That is obtainable up to about 3000 ft. The high blower was never intended to achieve a higher max MAP, but rather to enable cruise or climb manifold bressure at high altitudes. It's the high altitude performance which is lost with the high blower setting rather than max boost. In fact, because of compressive heating of the intake air, the max MAP in high blow was *less* than the max MAP in low blow.