Diesel vs Lycoming

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CFIDave
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Re: Diesel vs Lycoming

Post by CFIDave »

Karl wrote:I have checked the manuals and can confirm that both Continental Diesel and Austro engines require a data download to be emailed to the factory every 100 flying hours.
Yes, I agree that's what it says in the engine maintenance manuals.

Maybe there's a law or regulation where you live that makes these data downloads required for continuing airworthiness, but that's not true here in the US and I suspect most places. I'm unaware of ANY maintenance shops that routinely perform data downloads at 100 hour oil/filter changes; many local shops used just for normal 100 hour oil/filter changes don't even have the special diagnostic cable, software, or training to do this. Owners that perform their own 100 hour oil/filter changes (perfectly legal and routine in the US; I do this on my DA42) aren't equipped or trained to perform data downloads.

For Austros there's a similar requirement in the manual to take an oil sample at every 100 hour service and send it back to the factory (there's even a plastic bottle included in Diamond's 100 hour kits). However, maintenance shops and owners don't bother doing this since it's expensive to ship oil all the way to Austria and you never get any response from the factory -- they don't provide an oil analysis or get back to you with any feedback on the samples. Instead, I use a commercially-available service like Blackstone here in the US to analyze all my oil samples (they actually know how to analyze oil from diesel aircraft engines), but this is entirely up to the owner to decide if it's worth doing.

In summary, factories are not routinely provided with data downloads (or oil samples) despite what it says in the manuals.
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Colin
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Re: Diesel vs Lycoming

Post by Colin »

Wait, what do you mean "like Blackstone." Are they better than Blackstone? Who are you using?

Thanks.
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Re: Diesel vs Lycoming

Post by CFIDave »

Colin wrote:Wait, what do you mean "like Blackstone." Are they better than Blackstone? Who are you using?
Maybe I wasn't clear: I have been using Blackstone for oil analysis of my Austro engines. Austro Engines doesn't provide oil analysis despite the maintenance manual specifying that you should send oil samples to them after every 100 hour oil change.
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