Well after a long hiatus, I got back to work on the plane. After completing the install of all the oil lines, coolant lines, and adding some fuel. I was happy that there was only one small fuel leak on the firewall at one of the Red Cube fuel flow fittings. Got that fixed and went on to try starting the engine.
However, my exuberance was short lived. When I went to start the engine, it wouldn't start. I had fuel flow, spark, the starter turned the engine fine. Just wouldn't start.
It just so happened that I had Chris McAllister (the guy helping wire the plane) coming for a visit to help straighten out some other electrical gremlins. So, when he arrived we took a look at it. Turns out the ECU mapping was incorrect. We had to reprogram the ECU which took an entire day of trial and error to get the engine to run. But, we did it. Here is a short video of it running for the first time.
The next day I installed the prop and ran it again.
All in all, we put 2 hours on the engine over two days.
In between starting and running the engine we tackled several other problems. A Garmin auto pilot servo went bad and was reporting errors. Since Chris was coming, I wanted to rule out a wiring problem so I ordered another servo before he arrived. I was able to determine that it was the sevro that was bad.
Unfortunately, it was in the wing and was very difficult to remove and replace. Originally, I thought for sure I would have to cut the fabric on the wing to get it out. After several hours of reaching through the 6 inch access holes I had installed in the wing, we were able to uninstall the bad servo and install a new one. We checked the function of the new servo and verified function before installing it. After installation, the auto pilot was checked for correct operation.
Other problems that needed sorting out were programming issues with the G3X and the GNS 375 navigator. The G3X issues required the engine running to verify the sensors were working. EGT's, Oil Temp, Oil Pressure, Coolant Temp, Gearbox Temp. Fuel Pressure, Fuel Flow, and verifying that the alternator was charging. All the temps were good at least at the RPM's that we were running at.
The 375 problems were that it dumped all its settings. No idea why, could have happened when updating it? Don't know. Anyway, we got it reprogrammed and also tested the ADSB for correct function. Worked perfectly.
We also spun the airplane to calibrate the Magnetometer. To do this, we rolled the airplane out of the hangar and away from the metal building. Then started the calibration process on the G3X which requires you to rotate the airplane in ~30 degree increments while the magnetometer calibrates, Once you make the 360 rotation the G3X lets you know if it was successful or not. First time we did it, it failed, so we did it again with success.
In the morning before going to the hangar I registered the ELT with the Search and Rescue folks at the NOAA. I installed the required batteries into the ELT and we checked it for correct operation. It passed operation.
Last but not least, we verified headset operation by plugging into both sets of jacks. Everything worked perfectly. We ran through all the functions of the Audio Panel including Sirrus/XM music.
Oh, I was able to verify the Muffler system worked as designed and sounded great. It was much quieter than I expected. I know it will scream at full throttle, ~9500 RPM, but at idle up to 4000 RPM it was fine.
All in all, we accomplished a lot in two days. The ECU programming is very complex and we just got it running but I'll have to get Thomas at Edge Performance to log into it and set it up proper before flying.
