Exciting first week as an instructor...

PropSettin'

PropSettin'

Low n Slow
... Including a real engine-out and the infamous "number to call"... welcome to flying for a living, eh? Still loving every second of it and wouldn't trade it for my old cubicle no matter what...

(we got the engine back on the first restart, and the number to call was to gather info on a supposed near mid-air that i was a part of at a towered airport, but no pilot deviation or anything on my record)
 
Wow! Hopefully you're getting all the close calls out of the way your first week! One guy I instructed with had to dead stick a 152 into a grass strip within his first month.
 
Yeah I am really going to focus on making the next couple weeks (and the rest of my career for that matter) go as smoothly as possible :D
 
Sounds like you have had your work cut out for you! Hopefully stuff will go smoothly for the most part in the future. It is fortunate to hear that both of your situations turned out okay though. Care to discuss what caused the engine out?


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We were in slow flight for what I consider a bit longer than normal just because my student wasnt holding headings/altitudes well, and I without-a-doubt smelled burning oil (piper warrior for reference) so i quickly scanned the guages and told student to transition to cruise flight just as a precaution. As soon as he lowered the nose and went full power the motor quite obviously was not running right, by the time he said "ummmm the engine...." the prop had stopped spinning. I said "my controls" and turned to the nearest airport about 5 miles away while raising the flaps and setting best glide (which was a best guess because this literally was my first time in a warrior). He had done his PPL in warrior so I told him to go through restart while I communicated. It came back on the first attempt.

I told the nearest airport that i wanted to make a straight in but once the engine came back it was making normal power and responding normally so I elected to overfly that airport and go another 5 miles back to base. In retrospect not the brightest idea but i felt comfortable enough with the way it was running and it sure saved alot of headache.

Mechanics said that the fuel selector was not fully in its detent but I'm not entirely sold that that caused the engine to quit. Others suspected carb ice but my chief instructor said not likely in that plane. Your guess is as good as mine in this instance!
 
I am surprised the prop stopped. I've intentionally stopped props in flight before and it required stalling the airplane to get the airspeed slow enough to stop turning the prop.
 
dakrt23 said:
... Including a real engine-out and the infamous "number to call"... welcome to flying for a living, eh? Still loving every second of it and wouldn't trade it for my old cubicle no matter what...

(we got the engine back on the first restart, and the number to call was to gather info on a supposed near mid-air that i was a part of at a towered airport, but no pilot deviation or anything on my record)
Click to expand...

If they asked you to call i am sure they are going to report it to the FAA. Complete a NASA report NOW.
 
jafra98 said:
Did you switched tanks before the engine malfunction happened???
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Yes, a few minutes prior to the engine stopping the student switched tanks. I remember he selected the left tank and it was still partially in that detent when we landed... so i dont think that it could have been the selector not fully in its detent that caused it.
 
rframe said:
I am surprised the prop stopped. I've intentionally stopped props in flight before and it required stalling the airplane to get the airspeed slow enough to stop turning the prop.
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Yeah we were just about to transition out of cruise flight so we were in the 40-50 knot range when it stopped.
 
will_fly_for_bandwith said:
If they asked you to call i am sure they are going to report it to the FAA. Complete a NASA report NOW.
Click to expand...

I was going to do this no matter what even if they didnt require it and my chief instructor called the tower and said that they said specifically I did not need to do that as I would have "nothing to contribute to the database"... basically it was another pilot in a cirrus that said his TCAS (or equivalent) went off and that I flew by within 200 feet. I had done a frequency change on downwind to Approach to get clearance through a bravo, they called out the traffic and then said no factor but i guess the other pilot called the tower to simply complain about me flying to close to him even though I was at pattern altitude on the downwind and he was approaching the airport from a perpendicular direction.
 
i almost got run over by a Cirrus while instructing in a tomahawk the other day, so i guess all is right in the world.

what was the ambient temp in the engine failure? Slow flight tends to heat the engine (less cooling, more work as thrust partially aids lift) so maybe the engine was overheating? Even on hot days you should get at least 3-4 minutes at MCA without any trouble. What did the dipstick read during preflight? for the 150/160HP, anything over 6 goes out the breather, so we keep our's around 6. If fuel was in fact the issue, did you have the electric pump on for maneuvers?
 
dakrt23 said:
Yeah I am really going to focus on making the next couple weeks (and the rest of my career for that matter) go as smoothly as possible :D
Click to expand...

My favorite aviation joke/saying is:
boy sees a pilot in uniform and says: Wow, your job must be really exciting.
Pilot: Not if I do it right. :)
 
sounddoc said:
i almost got run over by a Cirrus while instructing in a tomahawk the other day, so i guess all is right in the world.

what was the ambient temp in the engine failure? Slow flight tends to heat the engine (less cooling, more work as thrust partially aids lift) so maybe the engine was overheating? Even on hot days you should get at least 3-4 minutes at MCA without any trouble. What did the dipstick read during preflight? for the 150/160HP, anything over 6 goes out the breather, so we keep our's around 6. If fuel was in fact the issue, did you have the electric pump on for maneuvers?
Click to expand...

It was relatively cool so I dont think the engine overheated, the oil was at about 6 but the student noted it was practically BLACK as he checked it... i think they changed it after the incident though.

You nailed it on the head with the fuel pump though, I dont believe we had turned it on for maneuvers and another instructor asked me the same thing. He said the fuel pressure falls pretty noticeably during maneuvers if the pump is not on. All my single engine time has been 99% cessna (all twin time was in the seminole though) so learning the quirks of the piper will be interesting.
 
I did my private and commercial rating in pipers. I haven't ever been told to run the fuel pump during maneuvers and never had any hiccups related to that. Not saying that was correct, just that I have never heard it was needed.


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