Merry Christmas 2013! HOBBS 2434.0 hrs

http://www.holidaycardcenter.org/aopa/product/2609/68

As you can see, I am getting caught up on quite a few overdue blog posts before we roll over into 2014. I can't believe it is already Christmas eve...seems like it was just Thanksgiving last week!

 

I hope Santa brings you all exactly what you want tomorrow morning (or tonight). As for me, to borrow a quote from a recent VAF post..."Move on Santa, I got all I need"...I couldn't have said it better. KPR!

 

A gratuitous shot of my Garmin GDU375 talking to my GDL-39 ADS-B receiver. This is cool stuff, when I am in the air, this screen will fill with airborne targets to give me better situational awareness about traffic around me.

Wing Root Farings HOBBS 2434.0 hrs

 

I continue to get prepped for my wing mounting, I tackled installing the wing root fairings. No reason not to from what I can tell. As with almost everything these days though, what I thought would take a couple hours took much longer...about 5 total. The first wing took me almost three hours to do...the second about two. Ugh. This first pic shows the many nutplates that need to be installed. I will say I wasn't completely happy how these lay down when screwed...they tend to pillow up a little bit. I suspect this is a common problem inherent in the design.

 

Here is the fairing screwed into place...this is the bottom side as you can tell. The faring will screw to the wing and butt up against the fuse with the black rubber edge seal you see on finished RV's. I expect I may have to trim these during final fitting with the fuse.

 

This shot shows the top of the wing. So, the fairing covers the top of the wing in its entirety, wraps around the leading edge and about halfway across the bottom half...that's where the fuse will mate to the wing. When I mount my wings, I will need to match drill these last holes on the bottom (not shown)...remove the wing and then install the nutplates before remounting the wing permanently. Hard to describe in words but you'll see when I get to that point.

Low Oil Pressure HOBBS 2434.0 hrs

 

You'll notice that if you have a modern EFIS installed in your airplane, you will be amazed at how much information it provides at your fingertips. Its easy to get in the mode of, forget everything else, I have my EFIS. But what if the EFIS craps out? Sure, there is a backup battery...but computers do take a dump from time to time.

 

I don't plan to have every scenario covered, but one that is easy to do is an independent, simple pressure switch hooked up to a panel mounted LED to let me know if I have lost oil pressure. That is a $30,000 engine that I would like to protect. Yes, in an emergency situation I realize protecting the engine and the airplane are not the priority. But what if you are 200 miles from home, the EFIS goes tits up and you need to ferry the plane back under VFR conditions to your home base? An oil pressure light would be a nice security blanket. I got this idea from Paul Dye on VAF...and liked it. It also gives me redundancy for the EFIS.

 

Looking at my manifold, I realized I had a problem. The firewall penetration was not placed very well by me (don't do that). It was right where I wanted to mount my pressure switch. After some debate (i.e., head scratching), I decided to swap the Dynon fuel pressure sensor with the oil pressure sensor. The hose routing wasn't ideal, but it worked.

 

Here it is installed...I need to hook my MAP hoses back up, but this should work out ok. I did a test of the system and the LED did illuminate (which its supposed to do under 4 psi). When I do the first engine start, I'll see if it goes out when it gets over 4 psi. Of course, this is just a backup, the EFIS will give me real time information on this. Until now, another task complete....next!

General Purpose Thermocouples HOBBS 2434.0 hrs

I've been playing around with my EMS (Engine Monitoring Module) unit, getting all of my sensor inputs finalized for the SV. It does much more than just engine monitoring however, all sensors go through this unit. One goal I had was to add general purpose thermocouple's for the engine compartment and also for the cabin temp. I was a little confused how to go about doing this and posted my question on the Dynon forum with no response. I think I now have it figured out sans any extra help so I thought I would share it with my readers to save you some time.

 

For the engine compartment, a thermocouple is definitely the way you want to go because of the temp range. You will notice that Dynon uses J-type and K-type thermocouples for CHT and EGT respectively. The main difference you need to know between the two is that they are capable of different temperature ranges. The K-type has a higher temp range, is inexpensive and is generally thought of as a general purpose TC.

 

The reason for this TC in my setup is to detect an engine fire and provide warning to the cockpit. I plan to mount the sensor near the lower exhaust exit area as that seems to be the logical place for fire exiting the cowl in flight. Early fire detection is paramount to turn off the fuel source and get down safely, many pilots do not realize they are on fire until late in the game. 

 

So, now I know I need a TC for the engine compartment...I could order one from Dynon, but I went hunting on Ebay for something cheaper. I found K-type TC's for $3.50 each with free shipping from China...can't hardly beat that! Even if they turn out to be junk I am only out $10 (I ordered three...one for a spare).   

 

I received them (shown above) and proceeded to hook them up to the designated pins 27/28 and 36/37 on the EMS 37 pin connector. For K-type sensors, the yellow is positive (polarity is important). My sensors, however, had wires that were white w/ red stripe and white w/ black stripe. Turns out the red is positive. I then setup the sensors in the SV EMS setup screen...added widgets to the screen and fired everything up. Bam! Low and behold, I now have cabin temp and engine compartment temp. They seem to be working just fine.

 

Here is a screenshot showing my two TC's in action. The Cabin temp (74 deg) was high because I was putting the TC in the palm of my hand trying to test it. The 62 deg temp didn't quite match up with my CHT and EGT TC's that showed 64 degs, but I can live with that for $3.50. Also notice all of the indicator "widgets" you can add to your SV (multiple arrows)...it kind of makes an annunciator system not needed. I reduced my panel LED indicators because of this.

 

 

 

From what I can tell from SV installation manual (see above), you can also do cabin temp with one of their OAT temp sensors. It appears these are not actually TC's, but just a thermometer. This would work fine also, but beware Dynon wants $37 for an OAT probe. For me, the TC will suffice I believe...cabin temp is a nice to have, not a must have...time will tell if I have problems with it.

GD-40 Install HOBBS 2416.0 hrs

http://www.fdatasystems.com/Products/GD-40/GD-40.html

I installed my Flight Data Systems GD-40 carbon monoxide sensor a while back, but when I powered it up, it wasn't talking to the SkyView (SV) system which caused some head scratching. I kind of put this on the back burner as I worked on other, more important wiring issues. I have now finally circled back around and started messing with this again.

 

When I bought it, it was advertised as something that would indicate CO level in parts per million (PPM) on the SV (like the above picture with AFS). Well, fast forward about a year to now and it appears this is actually not the case now that I am wiring it. After doing some research on the Dynon forums, the SV does not have serial interface support for the GD-40 so it will not pass any 'intelligent data' to the SV. Not sure why? But its a moot point right now as to why.

 

Without serial interface support, you can't get PPM data from the unit. What you can do instead is, wire the device to a general contact, then add a "widget" to the SV to show a CO indication on the screen. This type of setup is somewhat of a "dumb" indicator...it just shows a CO alert, green for good, red for danger. The GD-40 also comes with its own panel mounted LED and push button. The push button, from what I can tell, is needed for doing a self test. The LED will show, green/red for different PPM thresholds. I wanted the push button and like the LED so I installed this in the panel. The issue is, do I keep the redundant "widget" on the SV or just use the panel LED?

 

Here is a pic showing my CO "widget" on the SV (see arrow) and also the LED and button that I installed in the panel. Definitely redundant...I may just remove the widget from the SV later to free up space.

 

Lastly, I also wired the GD-40 into an unswitched output on the audio panel for audio alerts. When you power up the unit, a sexy woman's voice will announce a "Carbon monoxide good"...and when doing the self test,  you will hear "danger, carbon monoxide detected" or something to that affect through your headset. So, even absent not noticing the flashing red LED light, you will get an audio warning as well. Definitely probably overkill for CO sensing...but pretty darn cool and it gives me peace of mind.

View from the Cockpit of a Pitts HOBBS 2416.0 hrs

Eric Sandifer shot this great cockpit video of him doing some aerobatics in his Pitts. Watching this will give you an idea what its like from a pilots point of view, how quickly things move and how disorienting it is to new aerobatic pilots. I remember my first couple flights in the Pitts and being downright startled at how nimble the airplane was. Its hard to describe if you haven't experienced it firsthand. 

 

Project related...I've got several irons in the fire right now. I finally got my CO detector working properly, did some layout work and ordered my final three push/pull controls (oil shutter, ram air and cabin heat) from McFarlane and lastly decided to add an accumulator to my "semi-inverted" oil system. I will comment on all of these topics in greater detail next week. Until then, as I always say, "its not going to build itself!" Have a good weekend...you know where I'll be.

Get-Home-itis HOBBS 2394.0 hrs

 

Last week I sent out an email to about a dozen of my building/flying RV friends asking for their assistance with mounting my wings permanently. I finally felt like I was ready to tackle this task and was quite excited about the prospect of it. I mean, after hanging the engine and doing my canopy, this had to rank right up there with a pretty big milestone on the project. I received a great response--I've got great friends, as almost all of them were eager to lend a hand and help out.

 

I knew when I set the ball in motion with the email invite, I was going to be scrambling to get ready for this. This was by design, I wanted to add this aggressive deadline to help motivate and push me to get a lot done this week. Alas, here we are...almost halfway through the week, and I have accomplished quite a bit so far. But...try as I might, I am just not there yet and probably wont be by Saturday morning. There are still crucial things I wanted to get done.

 

So far, this seems like a pretty standard story that most builders have probably gone through...right? Well, I tend to always be looking for lessons in life...nuggets of wisdom that I can extract from situations that come up. A good pilot is always learning. This, on the surface, may not look like one but don't give up on it so fast. Dig a little deeper and there are countless lessons to be learned. The beauty of this, is they directly relate to how I fly and the decisions I make.

 

I am, by nature, strong willed and sometimes referred to as "bull headed" by those who know and love me. When I set my mind on something I have a tendency to put my blinders on, acquire radar lock on the target and get tunnel vision. This allows me to ignore the chatter of everyone around me saying it can't, or shouldn't, be done. Now, before you make any snap judgments, this isn't always a negative trait to have, in fact it has been the backbone of many of my life's greatest accomplishments. I don't intend to eliminate this trait, because I am rather fond of it, but I also know it needs to be kept in check.

 

I have learned, through self awareness and life experience to not only be aware of this trait, but also know when it is about to get me into trouble. I make a conscious effort these days to step back and separate myself from the emotion of a decision and make an objective choice on how to proceed.

 

That's what I did today when I called off the wing mounting, postponing it until later. Two people (Sean and Jim) whom I both respect questioned me this week, "are you sure you are ready to mount the wings?". I already had my nagging doubts, but felt pressure to stay the course. My friends had already made plans to come help me, surely I couldn't let them down?

 

When the first person asked, I brushed it aside and said, "sure, I will be ready"...but I knew in the back of my mind I was lying to myself. Remember, I was still locked on target...my tunnel vision was fully intact thank you very much, this was just chatter. When the second person asked, that's when it struck me. Not immediately, mind you. Initially, I was ready to also brush aside this questioning just like the first...and then it finally dawned on me, they are both right, snap out of it! Like a pit bull, I had to unclench my jaw and relax to get the blood flowing to the brain again.

 

My hangar mate, Bill, put it very eloquently in his email response to me when I called it off, "As men, we are all condemned to a bit of tunnel vision and only the wise amongst us can take a step back and reevaluate a plan we have already set in motion." That sums it up perfectly, although not sure I am all that wise...I'm wondering if he pilfered this quote from someone famous?? Just kidding Bill! ;)

 

How does this relate to decision making with our flying you ask? Can you see any parallels in my story to get-home-itis? If you've gone through pilot training, you should be familiar with this term. To refresh your memory, it is a psychological phenomenon described like this;

 

"Press-on-itis (or get-home-itis) is really the result of a decision-making error that involves continuing toward the destination (objective) despite a lack of readiness of the airplane or crew and the availability of reasonable lower-risk alternatives. Press-on-itis often occurs when there is an unsuitable environment such as bad weather at the destination. The pilot may continue on despite warnings from ATC or other crew members." [1]

 

Based on this definition, lets look at the scorecard:  I had my mind locked on achieving the objective, there were reasonable lower-risk alternatives available, add in some internal and external pressure, lack of readiness and ignoring warnings from 'crew members' for good measure. Its a classic example of how our thinking can become clouded and dangerous. Beware of this when you make decisions with your aircraft or in life, its all too easy to get into this mindset and not even realize it, ignoring the 'chatter' telling you to turn around.

 

Of course, my particular decision wasn't life threatening, launching into adverse weather in your aircraft is. Thankfully I was aware of my thought pattern and terminated my course of action after listening to my 'crew' (CRM)...I broke the string of bad decisions. This is good practice for when decisions will take on added importance. Decision making, like any skill, can and should be practiced to become good at it.

PS Engineering PAR100EX Tips HOBBS 2371.5 hrs

http://www.ps-engineering.com/PAR100EX.shtml

I am on fire this week knocking down barriers that have been plaguing me for weeks! Before Thanksgiving, I mentioned three big wiring headaches that I needed to resolve. The PMag's, A/P servos and the PAR100EX (read my Thanksgiving day post for details). As you know, the PMag and A/P servo were addressed earlier this week. Now, I can cross off the PAR100EX problem as well.

 

Remember, I had thought I had fried it and was going to send it in for evaluation...it just wouldn't power up no matter what I tried. Well, in the interest of full disclosure...I am throwing myself at your mercy, be easy on me while drinking your beer and participating in some good ol' hangar talk. Try to bite your tongue when you start to say, "That Ron sure is an idiot!" 

 

The problem with my PAR100EX was....wait for it...the POWER button!! Yes, the gosh darn power button...you heard me correctly. I had inadvertently turned it off while installing it in the tray and didn't even realize it. Who knew to check the power button??

 

In my defense, and I know its shaky at best, most avionics don't even have power buttons (COM's are an exception however). Second, the one on the PAR100EX is a push button, so there is no indication like a dial indicator (on the SL40) to indicate it is powered on or off. So...don't let this happen to you...always check the power button if it has one.

 

Fired up the unit, working great...but now I remembered that before I had put my wiring on hold a few months ago, I was having an issue with my PTT not working properly. The PTT worked on COM1 from the pilot side, but not COM2. It was reversed on the co-pilot side...COM2 PTT worked, but not COM1.

 

Now, try and wrap your head around that troubleshooting task...it was definitely making my head hurt. Of course, that problem hadn't magically gone away since I last jacked with this. After checking all my wiring again and finding it was all correct, I retreated to the manual for some more reading (see, I'm learning, RTFM). Nothing...no nuggets of wisdom this time.

 

Then, it happened again, I had a lightbulb moment...these are becoming quite common with me lately, it must be the flying gods wanting me to fly...fate or something. I had remembered reading a VAF post quite awhile ago about someone having this same problem. Its so hard to remember all of the stuff you read over the course of a build, but somehow this one stuck in my mind. 

 

The solution, in this gentleman's case, turned out to be that the PAR100EX doesn't like it when you have both your pilot and co-pilot PTT wired together. I figured...it was worth a try. I quickly separated the wiring and tested it...BAM! Worked like a charm. I think I danced a jig around the airplane to celebrate!

I then wired my additional panel mounted PTT (one on the co-pilot stick and one on the panel) to the co-pilot side, its ok to do that...just keep the pilot side isolated. Problem solved. I can now count the COM/Intercomm system done! That was quite a challenge for me...but again, I could teach a class on this topic at this point from all that I have learned through my challenges.

 

These three hurdles were my last big (known) challenges. I should wrap up the remaining wiring in short order and mount the wings in about a week and a half. From there it should be no time before I am doing a first engine start. What a relief! Wiring was almost the death of me!

100,000 Pageviews!! HOBBS 2371.5 hrs

 

Just a quick acknowledgment of the fact that the blogsite has now exceeded 100,000 pageviews in its 4 1/2 yr existence! I have to admit, 100k, that's kind of a cool number to see. I have said it before and I'll say it again, not in my wildest dreams did I ever think this site would turn into what it has when I started it. Thanks for taking the time to visit, its truly humbling to think you all hopefully find some value in it. Here's hoping its making your build go easier...I am a mistake-making machine after all...you're welcome, just trying to help! ;)

A/P Servo Wiring

Again, you may have read in a previous post that I was having trouble with my auto pilot (A/P) install. The VP-X was telling me the servo's were powered up and drawing 0.1 amps, which is exactly what I would expect. The SkyView (SV) however, was not seeing them in the network. Doing a "configure" command yielded nothing as far as servo's. I had called service support at Dynon and told him my dilemma, he asked a few questions and then concluded that I should send them in for evaluation. He gave me two RMA numbers, one for each servo.

 

Now, knowing that I would be stuck with the shipping bill and not to mention the time to remove them and shipping time back and forth, I didn't want to give up without a fight. So, I started doing continuity testing on all of the network cables (even the ones I bought from Dynon). I had pretty much gone through all of them and they looked good and was ready to give up and just package them for shipping when I had a breakthrough moment. You gotta love those!

 

Working off the system planning diagram that Dynon provides in their installation manual. I had bought the two splitters and a 3' network cable from Dynon. What I didn't buy from them was the SV-NET-CHG cable. It is a simple gender change cable. Its a "female-to-female" cable. Shoot I thought, that's easy to make instead of buying one. I wired it up, nothing to it. Or at least that's what I thought.

 

As I was doing the continuity testing on the splitter from Dynon, I noticed that when I checked the "female-to-female" ends on that cable, the pin1 wasn't in the same location as the pin1 on the corresponding connector. That's when the lightbulb went off.

 

I had wired my gender change cable visually because it seemed so simple, I didn't actually look at the pin numbers...and it intuitively looks like the pin1 should match up with the same geographic location on the other connector. Nope, its mirrored. It actually switches over...I was unknowingly wiring pin1 to pin5! D'oh! 

 

Just check each connector if you do this yourself...follow the markings on the connector and you'll be fine. Just a simple thing that can trip you up if you aren't paying attention and have never done this before.

 

Needless to say, the network now "found" the servos and consequently updated their software. This was a HUGE relief...it saved me the time and money to send them back to Dynon, only to have them inform me they were good. Dodged a bullet there.

 

So, over the holiday weekend, if you are keeping score, I had two big breakthroughs on my wiring challenges. The PMags and now this. I am now working on my backup circuitry, in case the VP-X takes a dump...more on this in the next post.

PMag Gotcha HOBBS 2371.5 hrs

In my last post, I mentioned that I couldn't get my PMag's to power on. I checked all of my wires and everything looked good (there is not much to this) so I was stumped. During our last airport lunch at BJC before thanksgiving, I mentioned my dilema to a fellow builder/flyer and he was surprised. He said that he installed his PMag's and it was very straightforward. He said he would stop by and help me troubleshoot it later that day. I welcomed the offer, so we set it up.

 

Before he arrived I wanted to make sure I hadn't missed something simple. I went back to the PMag website and scanned through the Trouble Shooting Guide and found the section about what the LED's are telling you. My problem was, as I energized the PMag, the LED wasn't illuminating like it was supposed to.

Then I found this nugget of information, I had, indeed, missed something very simple...

To get the unit into "setup" mode, it must be "off" (grounded) during initial power up. I had wired my switch backwards and it was actually "on" (not grounded) when I thought it was off. If you don't get the PMag's into "setup" mode during initial power up, the LED will only blink briefly and then go out...easy to miss. In setup mode, the LED will remain on. Once I reconfigured my switch (just changed up the connection points), and had the PMag's grounded, it worked exactly as advertised. As they say RTFM (Read The F-ing Manual!), as this information was in the manual as well.

 

I then proceeded to time them (blowing into the MAP tube while at top center [TC]), route and finalize the MAP tubing and then do a "pull-thru test" on all 8 plugs to ensure everything was not only firing, but firing when it was supposed to.

 

Len called and asked when to stop by and I informed him I had it figured out...call off the hounds! All is good to go now. This was a nice hurdle to get past and gave me a sigh of relief. I now have SPARK!

 

By the way, this is my wiring strategy on the PMag's. I will test PMag internal power during runup by switching off the ship's power to the PMag via the VP-X control panel. If you don't have the VP-X, you should probably do a 3-position switch (Off, On w/ Ship's power, On w/o Ship's power).