Date:         Fri, 26 Feb 1999 23:01:01 EST
Reply-To:     KENWILFY@AOL.COM
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         KENWILFY@AOL.COM
Subject:      Friday (aircraft content!)
Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII

Since Friday is the only day I get to share off-topic stuff I thought I would
take this time to share something cool that happened to me this weekend.  I
drove to school in my '91 Carat Vanagon (mandatory Vanagon content).  We have
been working on a Beechcraft A90 KingAir for about a month now at school.
This is a plane that the school got a couple of years ago (drug siezure) and
it sat at the local airport for over two years shut up tight.  Upon opening
the AC we found it to be full of corrosion due to all the condensation of two
years.  It was so bad that the rudder pedals were eaten almost all the way
through.
Anyway, we have been working on this AC everyday for the past month.  Cleaning
it up, troubleshooting systems, with the final goal of starting her up and
hearing those two PT6 turbine engines whir to life (these are turboshaft
motors as the AC is a turboprop).  Well on wednesday all our hard work finally
paid off.  It felt great to sit there in the cockpit, to here the starter wind
up the motor to 20 % and then the elation when the flame lit and the engine
began to self accelerate up to 65%.  We finally pushed her up to 90% and the
whole plane began to pull against the securing chains (these engines have over
500 shaft horsepower each)!
I really wanted to share this with the List for two reasons.  First I know
there are a bunch of old aircraft folks on this list who would really be
interested.
Second, I wanted to let you know that the troubleshooting methods and work
methods that I used to help get this seemingly very complex aircraft, up and
running were the ones I developed while working on VWs (Vanagons mostly).
You see all of the massive twists of wiring in this aircraft and the wiring in
your van is the same.  It all works on the same principals.  Source, Path, and
Load.  If you learn these three things needed to have an electrical circuit
you can get your van back on the road or work on the spaceshuttle.  Fuel,
Intake, Compression, Ignition, and Exhaust.  If you learn that these are
needed to keep your van engine running then you could also use this knowledge
to help you troubleshoot a turbine engine.
So my advice to this list (and what I try to help folks get in there minds
here) is to learn your systems.  It makes that thing in the back on your van
less scary and allows you to have more confidence that if something happens
and the van won't start, you can troubleshoot the problem and get it back on
the road as quickly (and cheaply) as possible.
Ken Wilford
Van-Again
John 3:16