Things have taken a turn for the worse.
We were hoping that no evidence of damage to the wooden prop indicated the engine was fine. Yesterday the A&P checked the prop.flange for wobble (dial-out?) and found the crankshaft out of limits. He says the limit of wobble is .005 and I have .009. We don’t know if this new wobble was caused by me, or sometime earlier and just now found; in any case, the engine needs to be torn down, something done with the crank, and bearings replaced. He also stated that once the engine is opened, there is no telling what other things would found to be economical to repair. Because in addition to the engine problem we have a potential wing problem, a question about the prop’s condition, some bent tubing and the landing gear being hard to locate, the A&P feels the insurance folks will probably total the beast, and that unless I did all the work myself and didn’t mind not flying for some time, then it would be best if I simply walked away from the plane.
I’d love to putz around fixing this beast, but I know myself and it would never get completed.
We’ll get the formal word next week, so I’m open to any thoughts; I don’t have a place to work on the a/c, so I couldn’t work on it conveniently even if I had the time.
If the insurance company asks me if I want to buy it back for (I’m guessing) $5600, would anyone want to be informed? - Mike
We were hoping that no evidence of damage to the wooden prop indicated the engine was fine. Yesterday the A&P checked the prop.flange for wobble (dial-out?) and found the crankshaft out of limits. He says the limit of wobble is .005 and I have .009. We don’t know if this new wobble was caused by me, or sometime earlier and just now found; in any case, the engine needs to be torn down, something done with the crank, and bearings replaced. He also stated that once the engine is opened, there is no telling what other things would found to be economical to repair. Because in addition to the engine problem we have a potential wing problem, a question about the prop’s condition, some bent tubing and the landing gear being hard to locate, the A&P feels the insurance folks will probably total the beast, and that unless I did all the work myself and didn’t mind not flying for some time, then it would be best if I simply walked away from the plane.
I’d love to putz around fixing this beast, but I know myself and it would never get completed.
We’ll get the formal word next week, so I’m open to any thoughts; I don’t have a place to work on the a/c, so I couldn’t work on it conveniently even if I had the time.
If the insurance company asks me if I want to buy it back for (I’m guessing) $5600, would anyone want to be informed? - Mike
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