[ The Frye RV-7 Project ] Friday, March 29, 2024  
 

 

Engine Installation


 
This section will detail all of my trials and tribulations (and successes!) of building and installing my engine. The current plans are to build a Superior Airparts engine at the Superior build facility. The process has begun (i.e. money is flowing out) and you can follow the activity below.


Sub-section(s) :  Fuel Injection    Superior Engine Build  

Ordered (Put a Deposit On) An Engine
I finally identified the correct Airflow Performance choice on the Superior web site, and placed the order for my engine today. The Superior folks gave me a call, confirmed that I was serious, and e-mailed me the order form. I have filled it out, and only have to write a deposit check ($1000, which is refundable if I bail out) and send it to them to lock in my order. This will also lock in my build class date ... as I am intending to build it myself.

What I have ordered is an XP-IO-360-B1DC2. This is a Superior XP-360 with the roller lifters, Airflow Performance fuel injection, a hollow crank for a constant speed prop, and vertical induction. With the roller lifter option comes a 3-year warranty and a really huge price tag.

I've not been able to talk myself into doing anything but a new engine (probably silly, but there you have it) and the family seems to support that decision. I'll be writing my check and getting the order into the mail tomorrow. The biggest expense of the whole project starts today!

(Yes, I'm paranoid about identity theft and making too much personal information available thus the redactions on the picture of the check!)

Airflow Performance FI-101 Class
Take a look at my Fuel Injection Page for more information on the class.

Fuel Injection System P.O. Recieved
I got word from Don at API today that the purchase order for *my* fuel injection system (go read my FI section if you don't know what I mean by "*my* fuel injection system") arrived from Superior. Things are on track for me to go do my engine build ... with *my* fuel injection system. :)

Engine Build School
I headed down to Dallas to build my engine, and had a great experience at Superior. Evan Yearsley is a fantastic instructor, and kept the class fun even when we were having to hussle to get work completed. See my XP-360 Build School section of my logbook for details and more pictures. This was a once in a lifetime experience, and if you are engine-ignorant like I was and are even remotely curious about wanting to learn more about how your engine goes together .. do it. Just pay the extra money and go do it!

Engine Shipping!
I just got a call from Dena at Superior, and my engine finished its run-in with flying colors today! It'll ship out tomorrow, and should be here by Monday mid-day. Wow. This is MUCH faster than I expected. Maybe it was a good thing I went ahead and got my engine lift last week after all!

Engine At Freight Dock
Today I confirmed that my engine is at the Yellow freight dock. They are a 24-hour facility, so we can go tomorrow after work and pick it up. I have had a number of folks volunteer (they did, really, I think) to lend a hand moving it home.

Engine Comes Home!
Except for one small issue, bringing the engine home was a trivial exercise. Thanks for the loan of a tilt-up trailer from a co-worker the loading and unloading of the engine was simple. The Yellow Freight folks loaded, and we unloaded. Unloading was as simple as backing the trailer into the garage, taking off the cargo straps, tipping the trailer up, and sliding the box off onto the floor. Trivial.

As we got it uncovered all agreed that it was beautiful. This also means that my fuel injection systen has taken another trip across the country and is now .. finally .. home as well. They removed it from the sump for shipping so I was able to pull it out and admire it. What a fantastic piece of work Airflow produces (and I'm only slightly biased because I got to build it myself. We took the plastic off to give it a good look-see .. and as I continued to explore the engine I noticed the ONE small problem I mentioned above.

It looks like the right side of the engine (facing forward from the back) took a hit in shipping. The only damage was a scuff to the side of the box (not clearly visible in the streetlight-lit parking lot of the Yellow freight depot, but visible in the dark first picture above of the box on the trailer at the house) and rather dented valve covers.

We then quickly realized that another bit of damage evidence was a broken strap inside the box that was supposed to secure the engine. See the last picture to take a look. Clearly somewhere during shipment the engine got a bit loose, and hit something. Or something hit it which broke the strap. One or the other.

I'll want to take the two valve covers off (after checking with Superior) to make sure they didn't hit the rocker arms ... but I can already see they are not likely to be dented enough to have done that.

If it were anything else, I'd be upset. As it is I am 100% certain that a pair of replacement covers and 10 minutes with a screwdriver will rectify the issue. I'd be truly shocked if Superior didn't just send me a replacement pair .... but I'll update this with the details after I talk to them tomorrow.

I am _very_ excited. The engine is ... beautiful. What a milestone!

Update : I talked to Dena at Superior first thing this morning and within moments she was making plans to send me replacement valve covers. No questions. No need to look at pictures. Zero hassle. No discussion of how it was really a problem for the freight company to deal with. That is what I call support! Thanks Dena!

Building Engine Stand
I started work on the engine stand today. Yesterday was a dead loss (other than collecting some materials for the engine stand) due to wanting to do a lot of family stuff. Even today work is broken up by going to a birthday lunch for my son's girlfriend. :) Still, work going good, and I'm pleased so far.

After lunch I dove back into the work on the stand, and got the basic frame finished and put together. I got stopped on adding my wheels because the bolts I got were 1/2" too short! Not only that, I got to Ace Hardware just 5 minutes too late to swap them for the longer bolts. Dang it! I'll wrap that up tomorrow night, I guess.
Time : 3.5 hours

Attached Wheels
I know it doesn't sound like much ... but I wanted to get my wheels onto my engine stand. The bolts got swapped today at lunch and I was determined to get the wheels on tonight, and I did. By the time I was done the 32 degree temps out there had my hands in extreme pain, however, so I called that enough. :) If I was going to stay out longer I guess I could have fired up the space heater, but the day has left me ready to crash (after attaching wheels, that is!). I need to get some pix up, but don't have any yet. Maybe after I put the "firewall" on.
Time : 0.5 hours

Drilled Real Firewall / Cut "Fake Firewall"
Today was slow going, but progress was made. The first thing I did this morning was cut down the panels for the "fake firewall". They the needed to be trimmed to the shape of the firewall ..... but I realized there was one task that had to happen even before that could be done. I had to drill the engine mount to the real firewall so that the holes would be correctly positioned.

Bear in mind that there are pilot holes already in the firewall (and in the steel weldments behind the firewall), but they might not be _exactly_ positioned for _your_ engine mount. What I did was open up one of the holes so I could put a full-sized 3/8" bolt in place. I then slipped a 1/4" bolt in the opposite far corner (with 1/4" happening to be the size of the pilot holes). I checked that the mount was level with respect to the fuselage and then started drilling all the other holes. There are six holes total, each through first stainless steel, then regular steel. They are ... to be honest ... a pain to drill. I used my regular twist drills to do the job and it was SLOOOOOOW going. Eventually my bits were not generating any steel chips at all, and I figured I had killed 'em. Sadly I still had two holes to go! *sigh* This drilling was done slowly and with cutting fluid and with breaks to allow my aching back to recover. During that time I did some final fitting on some other parts (the canopy latch, etc.) but nothing significant enough to warrant its own log entry. :)

Finally I went and bought a Dewalt cobalt bit with an integrated pilot bit. When I hit the steel with that, it was a world of difference! It cut like a hot knife through butter! Damn, I wish I had known it would be that big a difference on the first hole. It would have gone five times as fast and would have saved me a lot of pain. Oh well, lesson learned.

I did some initial trimming of the fake firewall, but when I went to grab my belt sander to shape the edges I discovered I had a bum belt. With the hardware stores closed (it was Sunday after 6:00) I decided to call it a day. It was a -good- day, even if progress seems minimal. :) Even so as I fiddled with the fake firewall .... I'm debating whether I actually want to use it or not. I've very little time in it, so can toss it without any real pain. As I look at it ... I'm just not sure. We'll see.

BTW, the week passed with -zero- work primarily 'cause work has, as has been so common of late, a bit nutty. Maybe next week will be less nutty. Ya think so? No .... I don't either. :)
Time : 6.25 hours

Finished Engine Stand
I finally finished the engine stand today. It isn't perfect (I won't point out its flaws) but will do the job nicely enough. Or so I believe. It took forever to get all the holes drilled in the steel, and then match drilling all the wood, and then acquiring all the bolts/nuts/washers, and then pulling it all together. Included here are a couple of pictures with the mount finger-tightened in place. Next step .... mounting the engine.

Did you catch the note at the previous entry? Notice I prognostocated? I dare say my prediction was accurate ... thus the huge gap (14 days!) since the last bit of work. *sigh* Gotta work on that.
Time : 5.25 hours

Engine Off Of Pallet
I finally got the engine off of the pallet today. To get it up onto a work surface (so I can be in a position to put the engine mount on, and yes I know this is an odd order of assembly) I had to first lift the pallet off the floor enough to get the legs of the engine hoist under it. I did this by taking some 10,000lb-rated ratchet straps (used to secure the engine box when driving the engine home from the freight dock) and slipping it under one end of the pallet. I then brought the two hooks up to the big steel hook on the engine hoist .... and I lifted one end enough to put a pair of concrete blocks under it. I then moved the strap to the other end, lifted it, and put another pair of blocks under that end. At that point the pallet was about 8 inches off the ground.

It was then a piece of cake to get the engine hoist legs under the pallet and lift the engine into the air. I had to modify my low rolling table to raise a cross-support enough that the engine hoist legs would go under it as well. With that done I was able to roll the table under the engine and gently lower it (using the foam block that it was shipped sitting on) to the table.

I left the front metal support (bolted to the prop flange) in place and clamped a 2x4 across the table to make sure the engine would not move around. With it secured like this I can push and shove and tug all I need to get the mount onto the engine. (Or so I hope.)

I'm really glad to have this slightly nerve-wracking step behind me!
Time : 4.5 hours

Engine Mount Installed
We have a lot of New Year's activities to do today, but I thought I would spend a little time working on getting the engine mount on the engine. I had asked around about what I'm doing (i.e. putting the mount on the engine WITHOUT it being on the firewall) and was told it would be a LOT easier than doing it the "traditional" way. As it turned out, it was a piece of cake. Note, I still need to torque the bolts and get the cotter pins into place, which won't be a lot of fun. But thousands have done it before me and I'm sure I'll work it out.

What I did was the following .... I first arranged to lift the mount into place off of my engine lift. I'm not SURE that was as much a help as one would have thought, but I did it anyway. I then used a couple of drift pins to do the first bit of crude aligning of the top donuts (putting the "hard" ones to the rear on the top). Some pushing and pulling were needed, of course, but in due time I got the top bolts in and finger tightened a few threads worth of distance.

The bottom ones are traditionally the difficult ones, but in my situation they were even easier. I slipped the first donut (the "hard" one forward on the bottom) in place and pushed in a drift pin. On the other side I did the same and had to use my dimpling mallet to tap it in. Then I realized I had a perfect setup for "pulling" the mount in place.

I used one of my quick-clamps to catch the back-side of the mount and the lip of the table ..... and tugged on the mount until I could slide a drift pin in with my fingers. I then came back with the rear rubber donut and it went in trivially. Moving the bar clamp to the other side I did the same thing with equally easy results. Way cool.

I've got to break now to do some family stuff ... but the next step is to torque, cotter pin, then put it on the engine stand. Worst case I hope to have that all done tomorrow.

Back at it today .......

Chris and I went out to do the wrap-up work on the engine. We torqued the bolts and got lucky on two (i.e. when the torque wrench clicked, we had the cotter pin holes lined up), got relatively lucky on another (just had to add a washer, and then it lined up), and had to struggle with the last. To get the last happy we had to grind down a washer to make a thin washer to get the cotter pin hole to line up. *groan* I really appreciate Chris' help and patience. I needed a strong helper to lend a hand with this and he was there at just the right time.

After that we used the hoist to levitate the engine again, and swung it over to the engine stand. With very little fiddling it went right on and when we finally took the weight off the hoist .... nothing moved. It all seemed rock solid and now I can wheel my engine around at will. To put it on the firewall, we'll do much the same thing (i.e. lift it with a hoist, swing the mount to the firewall, and slip the bolts in).

While I was messing with the engine I replaced the valve covers that got dented in shipping. That took all of 5 minutes, and I could feel like I had everything I needed to get done taken care of. I think I am done (FINALLY!) with "engine stuff" for a while. Back to work on the canopy frame!

What a GREAT way to end the year! Happy New Year, everyone! :)
Time : 3.75 hours

Cotter Pins Installed
This was a small task, but had been left lingering from the earlier engine work. I had a little time to kill this afternoon and installed the cotter pins in the engine mount bolts. No big deal, but now its done.
Time : 0.5 hours

Prop Arrives
Woo hoo! My prop has arrived! I had a voicemail at work when I got in yesterday morning telling me my prop was sitting on the FedEx freight shipping dock. I met Theresa and Marie for lunch and swapped cars with them (assuming the Suburu would be big enough to hold the prop) so I could head out after work to pick it up. FedEx is now the third freight dock I've spent time on (previously using both Yellow and ABF), and I think it'll be the last. This is the final "large shipment" I think I will be getting. Thanks goodness!

The prop box was -huge-, and barely fit in the Suburu. They, reasonably enough, package up the props quite well. Chris helped me haul it into the shop, and we poped the bands off the box. It is a -beautiful- Hartzell C2YR-1BFP-F7496-2 blended airfoil prop. Yeah, I know the AeroComposite and Whirwind props are supposed to be faster, but the Hartzell is a solid reliable prop for a reasonable price (at least considering what those others cost!). I'm -very- pleased.

Exhaust System Ordered
Since the canopy itself has finally come home to start being fitted, it was time to start ordering FWF parts. As fate would have it I ended up talking to Larry Vetterman to get some information, and went ahead and ordered my exahust system directly from him. I'll still be a month finishing up the canopy, but the goal is to have all my FWF stuff in hand by the time that task is done.

Firewall Forward Kit Ordered
I finally ordered my FWF kit today. I decided to drop all the hoses (I want to make my own, with professional help, exactly fit to my installation) and all the major control cables (I want to use the higher-qualify Cablecraft cables). I also made the various other adjustments needed to fit my situation (RV-7, constant speed prop, Superior XP-360, vertical updraft aluminum sump, and Airflow Performance fuel injection system). I started with the standard O-360 FWF kit and then added/deleted what I needed. For reference, my list of items ordered (starting with the current standard list) can be seen in the FF-7-O-360-CS.txt file. The grand total for this set of goodies was $3051.59, which reflects a good bit of expensive stuff dropped out of the order.

Firewall Forward Kit Arrives
The kit arrived with nothing missing, and everyting in good order. I did the inventory (the last "Van's Kit Inventory" I'll ever do, for this plane at least) and found space to store it in the shop. Everything is ready to go (except for those few other odds and ends I still need to order, of course)! :)

Advanced Flight Systems Sensors
My sensor kit finally arrived! That was one expensive box on a per pound and per cubic inch basis. *whew* But I wanted to have it as I started into my FWF exercise so I could get all the sensors mounted and various wiring runs completed as I did the engine install.

Superior Air Parts Bankrupcy
Today I heard the news about Superior, and it ain't good. Over the last year Superior has had a handful of setbacks. The first was the cylinder AD, with a number of recalled cylinders. The next was the disasterous aquisition by Thielert Aircraft Engines, and the follow-on revelations about Thielert's mis-management and deception. The final blow was the downturn in the economy. At this point Lycoming is picking up many of the assets of the company, and shutting it down. It is the end of a good company, a good product, and an era.

I'm honestly not too worried about _my_ engine. It is basically a Lycoming with the only problem being the roller tappets. If I ever have a problem in that area I'll need to replace the cylinders and the camshaft. Not a CHEAP thing to do, but not as bad as replacing the whole engine. I am more sad about the loss of a key player in the aircraft engine market, and the destruction of a good organization. My engine build was one of the keynote experiences so far as I have worked on the RV. Superior will be missed.

Continuing Engine Work Entries
I have essentially started to compile all the remaining engine work on my Firewall Forward section. To read about further engine activity go to that section of the website.
 

 

Total Time : 24.25 hours 


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