Engine Trouble
These are the overhauled cylinders re-installed with new intake hoses and intake/exhaust gaskets.
Discovering the problem
The day the pilots were flying out, we encountered a problem. Jeff had just returned a group of staff from Kokrine to Nenana, and a few women on the work crew had been loaded onto the plane. (Right after the last camp, a work crew comes in to clean up our mess, fix stuff, and improve Camp.)
Around fifteen minutes into their flight to Camp, Jeff noticed a change in the sound of the engine. Jeff has flown hundreds of hours with this engine, and at the top of the climb he heard the engine begin to "grumble". He tried adjusting the fuel flow supplied to the engine, but the increased fuel flow made the engine complain more.
When a pilot encounters a situation like this, the safest thing to do is to land at the closest airport. Nenana and Manley Hot Springs were the two nearest airports. Since he was the same distance from each location, and in Nenana it's way easier to fix things, he turned the plane around and headed back to Nenana.
When they got close to the runway, one of the ladies asked Jeff, "Are we landing at the same place we came from?" They hadn't noticed anything was wrong. And they didn't realize they had turned around!
Fixing the problem
Once he was on the ground, Jeff tried to figure out what the problem was with Adam White, who also flies for camp. What they realized was that an unusual amount of oil had burned. After checking the spark plugs, they saw that two of them had been fouled by oil. This was a sign that the valve seal that keeps the oil and fuel separate was leaking.
Jeff and Adam cleaned the spark plugs, however, when Jeff test flew the plane, the plugs quickly became fouled again. The valve seal in two of the cylinders needed to be replaced. That couldn't happen in Nenana.
Because the Blue Cherokee was out of commission, Billy ended up finishing the staff flights with Adam. And Jeff flew the Cherokee back to Big Lake.
The cylinders are fixed now, but aircraft parts cost a pretty penny. Due to this unexpected maintenance expense, please consider donating to Soaring for Christ to cover the extra costs.
Oil leaking past the ring inside of the cylinder. Adam had a borescope so they will able to look inside the engine to see what was going on.
One of the oil fouled spark plugs.
