service bulitin

[Brett]

Amazon wont ship that oil to Australia..... if they did the shipping would be sky high anyway.... but cheers anyway.

[sonex892.]

Hi Brett.
Here is a box of Brad Penn 20W 50 on ebay located in Wollongong with free shipping. The bottle says high levels of Zinc and Phoshorous.
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Brad-Penn-SA ... 8#shpCntId

[Brett]

Well I just bought some of that eBay oil. I do hope Sonex don't go and change their minds now about it.

[intoaircooled]

Even if they (Sonex) do change brands. i'm sticking with Brad Penn, it's the best oil for this type engine.

[intoaircooled]

I also have an explanation as to why my engine is junk.

Bill,

Can you expand on that statement. I'm not seeing how the turbo would make your engine junk.

I find the AeroVee Turbo to develop and maintain power very good. The performance is outstanding, very smooth at a great price point.

[caymancraig]

I'm sure there's goning to be some follow-up direction from Sonex this week, but I wonder how much tear down and inspections are going to need to be done on the existing turbo engines. I would expect that every turbocharger will have to be inspected but I wonder about the bearings in the rest of the engine and the oil lines. Wouldn't the coking of the oil in the turbocharger get into the rest of the engine also? I think I would worry about flying my aerovee with just a fresh oil change.

[wlarson861]

Carl
My engine is "junk" because it hasn't run right since about 3 months after I added the turbo. This year while investigating the cause of my lower power I discovered 2 cylinders were 40/80. They had been 73/80 before the conversion. bought new heads which leaked on arrival, wouldn't hold solvent for 5 min. also spun a spark plug with less than 10 ft pounds torque on a brand new head. sent them back to Sonex who took care of the problem at no cost to me (they even covered return shipping). I followed all procedures during the conversion including the recommended oil. Within a few months of flying the conversion I started getting 35 in. max map intermittently. I asked the crew at Airventure about what I was seeing but they had no idea as to what the problem could be. The last time the airplane was flown was in May except for a failed test flight in july. The engine is junk because it doesn't work. Until the bulletin came out from the factory I had no idea what to try next to make it perform as advertised. I'm disappointed that I paid a premium for the kit because of all the r&d done by the factory to find out that the builders and I are the r&d. I fully expect that Sonex will do right by the builders but am frustrated in that by the time I get the engine repaired the flying season will be over. Ive missed flying the plane to all the nearby flyins, Airventure and now looks as if I will miss Crossville as well.

[daleandee]

*

[intoaircooled]

Bill,

First I'm going to start off by saying I'm sorry for your troubles, it sounds very frustrating, for sure.

Just a couple of thoughts on my part. I don't see how your turbo would take out two of your cylinders unless there was an extended over boost issue or overheating problem, but most likely if that was the case it would more then likely cause damage in the heads. And I'm sure that wouldn't be the case, simply because you would be keeping a close eye on that. And you indicated that your not making boost pressure anyway. So I don't see how the turbo would cause you to loose compression on those two cylinders. It would have to be something else that caused the cylinders to fail.

Have you removed the exhaust pipe to expose the hot side of the turbo to see if it's freely spinning? You would have to be careful with the gasket (most likely it will get damaged and have to be replaced). How many hours do you have on the turbo? Do you have a cool down at idle procedure you followed.

When I installed my kit I clocked it at the time of the install, just because it didn't seem right to have the line on the side. Top feed and bottom drain just made more since to me just so oil couldn't collect at the bearing at shut down. I also had a spin on oil filter that was already in use. I tied it into the system to filter the oil from the turbo but mostly to add more volume and to help in cooling the oil before it was returned to the oil sump. I didn't do the valve cover return from the turbo just because the spin on filter was already in place and my oil/air separator was already using that valve cover. This works very well and I have just over 40 hours on it now. The only issues I have had was my # 2 cylinder exhaust flang bolts coming loose and my turbo dropping offline during a flight. It was unnerving but once I realized it was just a normal non turbo engine performance, I flew it home and figured out what was wrong and haven't had an issue since. I also had some oil coming out the prop hub. That we fixed by up sizing the breather to a 5/8" ID line and the rings breaking in, still see a very small amount of oil but that is expected as it just a slinger and not a "seal".

The sump filter would catch anything and filter it before it would be pumped back into the engine. It's very unlikely that any coking oil contaminates from the turbo (if any) would make it into the engine as it's filtered before hand.

If you can check the free spin of the hot side of you turbo and it's good, I would be looking at the waste gate valve. It may be out of calibration and opening way to soon and not allowing you to make pressure. The turbo system is very simplistic in it's design and shouldn't be very hard to troubleshoot a problem with.

[wlarson861]

Carl
I have done every one of your suggestions when I began my investigation of this issue. In May I cleaned all the crud off the waste gate and at that time the turbine spun freely, however it must not have been as free as I thought. Today I removed the turbo from the plane and found the turbine completely seized. Now waiting to hear from Sonex as to the repair. As far as the leaking valves I have no idea if there is a causal relationship to the turbo or not. I did have the same clocking issue as listed in the service bulletin so that will be corrected on re-installation. Hopefully that and the correct oil will fix the problem and not have any further problem. When the turbo works it turns the plane into a true performer which is why I don't want to remove the turbo and go back to the normally aspirated configuration.
Blue skies....eventually.