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First flight today after a MOH on my A65. Sure is stronger than before the overhaul. 100-125 more static rpm. 50 more rpm in flight. Not sure if it was the match porting I did on the intake and exhaust ports or the new mags, or the fresh rings, or, or, or.... Hard to tell when the whole thing is new. After 4 months of down time it sure was a great feeling to be back in the air in my own plane. I almost forgot how nice she handled. I did all my own cylinder work with the exception of boring them +.015 oversize. New guides, valves, OH rocker arms, New valves. Replaced the guides and cut the seats my self, Match ported the intake and exhaust ports. Many hours in just cleaning up the poor quality parts from the early 40's. After talking with every engine builder I know about how to ream the valve guides I decided how I was going to do it. All I can say is I don't like using reamers to get the final size and would prefer honing the guides instead. Oh well next time... I spent a lot of time cleaning up the inside of the cases as well. Chamfering holes and deburing every surface. Smoothing out rough spots in the castings. All the parts were painted before assembly so the new cad plated hardware really stands out! Had a small issue with the dry tappet clearance on reassembly. Had to dig through about 100 different push-rods to find 2 longer ones and one shorter one. Spent about 5 hrs doing the push-rod/rocker arm shuffle to get all the clearance in spec. Broke one inner push-rod tube seal clamp ring on assembly. Figured out a way to slide a new one on with out removing the cylinder!! Before putting the valve covers on I decided to pump oil back through the small hole in the end of the rocker arm with a syringe to make sure everything was pre-oiled. This pushed oil down past the rocker shaft, down the push-rod, into the oil galley. After hitting each rocker arm about 3 times I started to notice a puddle of oil on the floor. Seems like I had pushed enough oil through the motor to have it start running out the oil pressure hose that was to be connect to the bulkhead fitting on the firewall. This also filled up the oil screen area and primed the oil pump. Zero lifter noise and instant oil pressure on startup. I will remember to do that on the next engine I build also. I was surprised that it took me 4 months of screwing around to get the engine back in the plane, but I did move across town and start a new job at the same time. Also built a new set of inner cyl baffles and repaired the rest. Ron Coleman was nice enough to send be a form block he had started working on to build the rear engine baffle wall. I added to it and still was unable to make and acceptable part from it. Not my cup of tee I guess. Thanks anyway Ron 
I have a pattern to make new rear engine baffles out of flat sheet, and will try to make a new one later, Just wanted to get back in the air for now. I also may have found a replacement packing seal for the fuel valves. Give me some time to field test it before I send out free samples. Sabrina your the first one on the list if these things work. Thanks for your patience. Carl Ellis sent me his spare plastic cowl bump for his F19 so I could make a mold and fabricate fiberglass ones. Unfortunately the mold-release agent the fiberglass guy sold me did not work and the part was destroyed removing it from the mold. ( had to melt it down with M.E.K and wipe it off the fiberglass) As time allows I should have the mold repaired and be able to make the F19 style cowl bumps for over the ignition leads. If anyone has a N.O.S. F19 cowl bump I need buy it and send it down to Carl in Oregon. As mentioned before I have uncovered a ton of small cont. engine parts at my new job and the boss is willing to let me sell it off for him. Feel free to contact me if you need engine parts. We have 40' container full of stuff. I would like to sell large chunks off at a time. How about 50 A65 cylinders anyone??? Need cases. We also have a few complete engines for sale. Up exhaust A65, and a few lyc 0-145's in the mix. Anyway it's nice to be back in the air. Next project is VG's.
Jason
N43643
I have a pattern to make new rear engine baffles out of flat sheet, and will try to make a new one later, Just wanted to get back in the air for now. I also may have found a replacement packing seal for the fuel valves. Give me some time to field test it before I send out free samples. Sabrina your the first one on the list if these things work. Thanks for your patience. Carl Ellis sent me his spare plastic cowl bump for his F19 so I could make a mold and fabricate fiberglass ones. Unfortunately the mold-release agent the fiberglass guy sold me did not work and the part was destroyed removing it from the mold. ( had to melt it down with M.E.K and wipe it off the fiberglass) As time allows I should have the mold repaired and be able to make the F19 style cowl bumps for over the ignition leads. If anyone has a N.O.S. F19 cowl bump I need buy it and send it down to Carl in Oregon. As mentioned before I have uncovered a ton of small cont. engine parts at my new job and the boss is willing to let me sell it off for him. Feel free to contact me if you need engine parts. We have 40' container full of stuff. I would like to sell large chunks off at a time. How about 50 A65 cylinders anyone??? Need cases. We also have a few complete engines for sale. Up exhaust A65, and a few lyc 0-145's in the mix. Anyway it's nice to be back in the air. Next project is VG's. Jason
N43643
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