What To Do When The Starter Dies...

[Crism]

After getting my PPL about 2 weeks ago, I decided to go on another flight with a friend today. Weather's CLEAR skies all over New England. About 2 hrs before the flight, I get the call. The plane's starter died this morning and they don't have another plane to put me in. I got mad of course. So now I'm contemplating what to do today:

A. Go another local airport and take pictures and beg for rides
B. Go to work
C. Sit at home

If I beg for rides, what's a polite way to do it without sounding pushy or rude?

 

[NJA bound]

Hand prop it, works well with lycoming 4 bangers, done it hundreds of times with Cubs that didn't have an electrical system, had to handprop them. Turn the prop over a couple times than push the mixture in and turn the mags on and she should start right up.

 

[91100 100 set]

Sounds like a fast way to end up with a broken arm, or worse.

 

[avbug]

Pilots have been safely handpropping airplanes for many decades. Proper training and initial supervision is important, however. I've never seen anyone break their arm properly handpropping.

Certainly don't attempt it based on instruction received over the internet, however. The throttle must be set properly, and the aircraft should be chocked and tied down...at leat the tail should be tied down.

As a student, however, you really don't need to go fly when you have a system down, such as a generator failure. Or dead starter. Or dead battery. If you have a nearly dead battery, for example, you could handstart it, but depending on what type of battery you have, the high recharge that may take place when a generator kicks online could cause a fire, or worse. I've seen the terminals melted off lead acid batteries from this (and the battery cases warped), and thermal runaways in nicad batteries that melted into or through the aircraft structure.

A dead starter may or may not be a bad starter. You could have a bad relay, stuck bendix, or other problems. If the bendix drive is stuck and engaged, you might be able to handprop the engine and get it running, but with excess drag, and a chance of burning up the starter, literally. Or suffering other mechanical damage. The generator or alternator might not be outputting, or you might have another problem. I have seen belts break, brushes break, failed commutators, wiring failures, even mounting bolts break where the generator was hanging by it's shaft. In some cases, a generator failure can lead to an uncontrollable engine fire, especially a generator bearing failure (or constant speed drive failure in high performance generator systems) in a magnesium framed generator. The point is, what seems like a trivial thing may not be...don't assume it is, and knowing you have a mechanical problem, don't go flying with it. Get it fixed.

As for begging for rides...as a kid I was the proverbial airport kid. I sat on the fence, begged rides. I used to follow people to their airplane, literally, asking if they had an empty seat. I was fourteen or fifteen, and enough of a pest that the local flight school/FBO owner pulled me aside and told me I was hurting business by harassing customers. I was told to stop, and that if I would stop, I could have a job washing and waxing airplanes to pay for some flight time of my own.

Join Civil Air Patrol, go flying that way. Find owners and split some cost with them. Wait until your airplane is fixed and keep on training...flying too many different types of airplanes before you have the basics mastered may serve to confuse you. Get a computer flight simulator and have at that...simulators are useful when you apply actual experience to the simulator, rather than the other way around. When I was a kid, my instructor told me the best practice I could get was to sit in the airplane on the ramp with my eyes closed and practice flying in my mind, while touching the actual aircraft controls. If I couldn't sit in the airplane, then sit in a rocking chair with a tennis ball and a broom stick to simulate controls...but close your eyes and imagine a flight lesson, and rehearse it mentally. It does make a difference. (It's been more than a few years, but I can still remember the lessons and see what I saw then by closing my eyes and taking that flight all over again).

Fly where ever you can. Don't make yourself a pest. Experience everything you can. Your airplane will be up and running soon enough.

 

[steve937]

Nice Reply AvBug!, I don't know howmany times I see pilots assuming what the problem is with out comfirming it.
If available A MEL is a good Go-No-Go tool to make issues black and white, and spells out what must be checked before flight.
It seems alot of small 91 operators don't take the time to learn this system that should.
Is MELs typical taught at a Flightsafety or Simuflight course?

 

[avbug]

MEL's are not normally used at FSI or Simuflite. Only if applicable as part of a specific company training program. FSI's syllabus and training program is conducted in accordance with a specific company needs and operations manual. However, the training isn't really about squeezing through loopholes in order to fly with minimum equipment, it's about handling emergencies and following proceedures.

While the MEL may make you legal, it doesn't necessarily make you safe. Generally the MEL provides that if part of a system is inoperative the entire system is inoperative. It may provide some guidance as to how to deactivate or make fully inopeative a system in M&O proceedures, or it may merely state an item is not required.

Even though an employer, FBO, owner, operator, or other may alter the airplane legally (eg, MEL, or 91.213), ensuring that it's safe is the responsibility of the PIC. Something is not necessarily safe merely because it is legal, any more than something is legal merely because it is safe. Professionalism, which is not restricted to only the paid professional pilot, demands in our industry that we see that each flight is conducted both legally and safely, else the flight must not go.

MEL's are aircraft-specific. That is, each aircraft which opeaterates under a MEL must have one custom tailored for the specific airplane, and approved by the FAA for that specific airplane. The MEL becomes part of the aircraft documents, must be carried aboard, and is regulatory in nature. It constitutes a supplemental type certificate, ammending the aircraft type certificate to allow operation in a condition other than it's original or previously ammended type certificated status. MEL approval is generally not sought, nor used, in light airplanes.

 

[Guitar rocker]

Hand prop it, works well with lycoming 4 bangers, done it hundreds of times with Cubs that didn't have an electrical system, had to handprop them. Turn the prop over a couple times than push the mixture in and turn the mags on and she should start right up.

Now THAT is a text book avatar. Didnt one of these chicks hand prop a plane too?

 

[aucfi]

To hand prop safely, see my avatar. Removal of any loose clothing is required.

 

[erj-145mech]

With the starter inperative, and no MEL for the aircraft, the aircraft is unairworthy, and the insurance policy is not worth the paper that its printed on at that point. The airworthiness certificate is also voided out if the aircraft is not maintained in an airworthy condition. Read the small print in the big block in the center of the certificate.

 

[Waldom]

Ausfi, I'm fond of both of the subjects in your avatar, but the photo is printed backwards.