How Long

Danos

Danos

Line Up and Wait
Joined
Mar 14, 2007
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i And I Survive
How long would you let a plane sit without being run before you would be concerned about the engine? Rental. Not your own.
 
Concerned in what sense? Safe to fly? Detrimental to longevity?

That said, Lycoming's recommendation is to "pickle" the engine if it is to be left inoperative for over 30 days.
 
This last month, I've encountered two pilots who left their planes to sit for nearly three months, not run at all. I repeated the suggest to run it once a week at least a half dozen times. The fuel and time cost nothing compared to the harm caused.
 
Danos said:
Safe to fly. Pickle?:dunno:
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Treat the engine for corrosion protection. Involves special oil, desiccant "spark" plugs etc. There's another option called "flying storage" which is just special oil that can be used in flight although it's apparently not all that good a lubricant.
 
The Hanggar mate next door bought a 1960 210A ten years ago, that sat 7 years in Philly. unattended. he went back there paid the widow, dumped the fuel, dumped the oil, put in fresh fuel and oil, ran it 2 hours on the ground, and changed the oil and filter and flew it home to OaK Harbor in 3 legs and has flown it regularly for 10 years with no problems.

There are no hard and fast rules. there are way too many varibles to consider.
 
KennyFlys said:
This last month, I've encountered two pilots who left their planes to sit for nearly three months, not run at all. I repeated the suggest to run it once a week at least a half dozen times. The fuel and time cost nothing compared to the harm caused.
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Running it once a week can do more harm than good.
 
lancefisher said:
Treat the engine for corrosion protection. Involves special oil, desiccant "spark" plugs etc. There's another option called "flying storage" which is just special oil that can be used in flight although it's apparently not all that good a lubricant.
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This is Shell's version

http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/eppages/EGAoilAdditive.php

This is Poly Fiber version.

Both say "not for flight" on the can.

I use a mix of paralcatone (sp) and engine oil in a 1-3 mix., and yes I have flown with it, with no problems.
 
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KennyFlys said:
It has to be better than three months with no oil circulation. What's the solution?
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I'd say run it once a week as in a full runup if not a pattern flight. I can't picture why it would be bad to run it once a week if you're doing runups....

Afterall, there are many planes that fly once a week, right?
 
Critters concern me more in the short term. Things like a mud dauber nest in the carb heat muff migrating to the filtered air induction side of the flapper valve on run-up and then to the carb venturi throat when going to take off power (after my plane sat for 3 months while on an overseas assignment).
 
SkyHog said:
I'd say run it once a week as in a full runup if not a pattern flight. I can't picture why it would be bad to run it once a week if you're doing runups....

Afterall, there are many planes that fly once a week, right?
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IIRC, running it (not in the pattern or full run up) for about an hour may just get the water (from condensation) to separate from the oil. Then the cylinders are exposed to the separated water and they can rust.
I am not the expert, this is what I read a few years back.
The upshot of this is, take that lonely bird for a ride!
ApacheBob
 
KennyFlys said:
This last month, I've encountered two pilots who left their planes to sit for nearly three months, not run at all. I repeated the suggest to run it once a week at least a half dozen times. The fuel and time cost nothing compared to the harm caused.
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I was told that this was not a wise thing to do. You get the engine hot, but it is not run long enough to get rid of any water that has accumulated in the crank case and may cause addition water build up from condensation. It is best to just pull the prop through several time to pump oil back through the engine.
 
Fly it once a week - the time on the engine is the same, and you might as well enjoy the flying time too. You absolutely need to get the engine oil hot enough (I think it's 180 at the temp sensor) to boil off moisture. I don't know if there's any published data (though there should be) on how long in terms of time at cruise power it takes to reach that temperature.
 
NC19143 said:
Running it once a week can do more harm than good.
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Depends on how you run it. If you do like Lycoming says and run it long enough to get the oil to 165F and keep it there for 30 minutes (gotta do that in flight -- on the ground, the CHT's will redline), you'll be doing what you need to keep it healthy.
 
Ron Levy said:
Depends on how you run it. If you do like Lycoming says and run it long enough to get the oil to 165F and keep it there for 30 minutes (gotta do that in flight -- on the ground, the CHT's will redline), you'll be doing what you need to keep it healthy.
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Of the two guys I dealt with, one has a PPL and could do the flight. The other is a student and not solo'd.

If the certificated pilot won't care of his plane, I'm not sure the student will. He left it sitting and won't replace the fuel shut-off valve lever, the reason I won't fly with him.
 
Ron Levy said:
Depends on how you run it. If you do like Lycoming says and run it long enough to get the oil to 165F and keep it there for 30 minutes (gotta do that in flight -- on the ground, the CHT's will redline), you'll be doing what you need to keep it healthy.
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If you don't run it long enough to get the water out the breather, all you do is place the water on the upper portion of the engine where the cam is.

If you run it too long you will cook the rear cylinders.

Ever notice that it is most often the rear cylinders in the 0-235/0-320/0-360 that fail first?

So unless you have some clairvoyant method of telling when the water is gone, you run a pretty good chance to harm the engine in one of two ways.
 
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