IanJ
Well-Known Member
I dropped by Arlington (AWO) today to see if I could find anyone flying an ultralight or kit. No one flying, but I did run into a few people on the ground who were more than happy to chat with me.
At one point, someone came over and asked, "any of you know anything about mags?" I volunteered that I might know something, so he dragged me over (I love this kind of stuff, btw).
Turns out his "right mag" was intermittently failing -- brand new Rotax 503 on a two-place rag-and-tube design I haven't seen before. The kit came with what appeared to be a fully TSOd mag switch, exactly like I've seen on the Cessnas and Pipers I normally fly. It was wired correctly, and after some poking and prodding we discovered that the switch itself was bad.
So, for those who know mag switches, how common is this? It seems really weird to me that a TSOd mag switch would be broken after about 10 operation cycles (off -> start and back). Did he get the rare exception? Did his kit supplier scrape the bottom of the reject pile?
Elmer (the builder) was understandably upset: he said that, but for this problem, the plane was ready to fly, and he was more than ready to fly in it. We were both vaguely tempted to play the Crusty Old Mechanic card and just wire both mags (actually CDIs, of course) to the left terminal and call it good (the right terminal was cutting out both in R and BOTH positions as the lock cylinder was jiggled). We didn't though, since that kind of MacGuyver technique is a horrible idea when you're trusting your life to the thing, and a new switch is only a few days away.
I'd appreciate any input. This is just my own curiosity, dunno if I'm ever going to see Elmer again.
At one point, someone came over and asked, "any of you know anything about mags?" I volunteered that I might know something, so he dragged me over (I love this kind of stuff, btw).
Turns out his "right mag" was intermittently failing -- brand new Rotax 503 on a two-place rag-and-tube design I haven't seen before. The kit came with what appeared to be a fully TSOd mag switch, exactly like I've seen on the Cessnas and Pipers I normally fly. It was wired correctly, and after some poking and prodding we discovered that the switch itself was bad.
So, for those who know mag switches, how common is this? It seems really weird to me that a TSOd mag switch would be broken after about 10 operation cycles (off -> start and back). Did he get the rare exception? Did his kit supplier scrape the bottom of the reject pile?
Elmer (the builder) was understandably upset: he said that, but for this problem, the plane was ready to fly, and he was more than ready to fly in it. We were both vaguely tempted to play the Crusty Old Mechanic card and just wire both mags (actually CDIs, of course) to the left terminal and call it good (the right terminal was cutting out both in R and BOTH positions as the lock cylinder was jiggled). We didn't though, since that kind of MacGuyver technique is a horrible idea when you're trusting your life to the thing, and a new switch is only a few days away.
I'd appreciate any input. This is just my own curiosity, dunno if I'm ever going to see Elmer again.
