DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Any DA62 related topics

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nworthin
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by nworthin »

wolfvoador wrote: Tue Mar 09, 2021 6:03 pm At midpoint of my trip, I had 91G left (with fuel efficient 50-60% settings first half), so would have had 1,060 nm range plus 45 min Res.
I'm curious what the fuel bladder set up was in the DA42 you were flying on this trip.
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wolfvoador
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by wolfvoador »

I own a 66G Turtle Pack bladder, and a small pump station, with 2 pumps (which can crossfeed if 1 pump ever failed), leading the fuel (ca 1G/min, similar capacity as the Aux pumps) into main return fuel line, in back of cowlings. That gives you about 140G useable, or about 9.7 hours plus Res. For the Hawaii-California, Turtle Pack lent me another 25G bladder which you can see "sitting" in the co-pilot seat, linked to pump station with a T-connection with valve (so I could decide from which bladder to pump). That gave me about 164G useable, 11.5hrs at 75% and no wind. But as mentioned, I started at 50%, and increased power slowly, as I saw tailwinds and weather confirming, and single engine possible to land, plus about 90 minutes reserve. Only the last 2 hours (almost land in sight), I burned a bit of those reserves, and arrived with 17G (70 min).
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by nworthin »

Wolfgang,

How did you plumb this into the tanks?
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by wolfvoador »

One fuel line each side connects from rear seats center console through fuselage, wings and cowlings to the return fuel line which is in lower back of cowling. So, when you start pumping from the bladders, you see (similarly to Aux tanks transfer) that fuel temp goes down a couple of degrees. Southtec/Glenn Lawler is the guy!
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by janders »

wolfvoador wrote: Thu Mar 11, 2021 8:36 pm Southtec/Glenn Lawler is the guy!
I’ve heard that many times about Glenn / SouthTec
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by CFIDave »

nworthin wrote: Thu Mar 11, 2021 7:55 pm Wolfgang,

How did you plumb this into the tanks?
As Wolfgang started his round-the-world trip in 2018 and happened to stop by KJYO, I took a few photos of his DA42NG -- because I was also interested in seeing how the fuel bladder was plumbed into the fuel system:
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by michael.g.miller »

nworthin wrote: Thu Mar 11, 2021 5:09 pm
dgger wrote: Tue Mar 09, 2021 8:49 am
VickersPilot wrote: Sun Mar 07, 2021 8:46 pm ETOPS - How far (in minutes) from land, at the one-engine speed (what is that number CFIDave?!) do we consider acceptable for "every Saturday morning" type flights in a DA62?
My pet peeve with the DA42 (not sure about the DA62) is the hydraulic system. There is a single pump and should you ever loose pressure the gear would come down resulting in added drag. The remaining range would take significant hit, then. On a long leg, halfway between two isolated fields that could easily be catastrophic.
Wouldn't you need to have a failed pump AND a hydraulic system leak for the gear to auto-fall?
Can anyone confirm this? Would the hydraulic system maintain pressure indefinitely if it is operating correctly?
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by Soareyes »

dgger wrote: Tue Mar 09, 2021 8:49 am
Can anyone confirm this? Would the hydraulic system maintain pressure indefinitely if it is operating correctly?
For the DA42:

As you note, the gear are held up by hydraulic pressure.

The hydraulic pressure is maintained by an electric pump. When you first turn on the electric master before flight you can hear the electric motor run for 5-10 seconds pressurizing the hydraulic system. The longer since the plane was flown the longer the pump takes to bring up the pressure. So there is a slow leak down of hydraulic pressure while parked on the ramp. How low does it have to get before the wheels come down and how long would it take to get that low? No idea.

According to the POH, in the event of complete loss of electrical power:
Screen Shot 2021-03-17 at 8.54.28 PM.png
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by VickersPilot »

To refocus this discussion - how many minutes offshore is everyone willing to go "routinely"?
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Re: DA62 - Personal ETOPS Discussion

Post by CFIDave »

VickersPilot wrote: Sat Mar 20, 2021 3:16 pm To refocus this discussion - how many minutes offshore is everyone willing to go "routinely"?
That's hard to answer, since it's not "routine" to fly more than an hour offshore, such as during a ferry or earth-rounding flight.

In North America, crossing the Great Lakes in a DA62 is no big deal because you're almost within gliding distance of land when up high. And when flying in the Bahamas or Caribbean, you're usually not that far from an island with a runway.

But I have considered the following routes:

1. To fly from the Washington, DC area to the Bahamas, we always fly first to Florida, and then launch from there. But a much more efficient route would be to fly south to Wilmington, NC and then launch directly south over the Atlantic to the Bahamas (bypassing FL). To do this, we'd need to equip with a raft that we don't normally need when flying to the Bahamas. And the return trip would be impossible because US Customs won't let you fly from the Bahamas to a US port-of-entry north of Florida.

2. I have a pilot friend who has suggested visiting his Mexican beach place on the Gulf of Mexico south of Cancun. The best way to do that would be to fly first to Key West, FL, and then fly southwest about 2.5 hours over the Gulf (off the north shore of Cuba) to Cancun. Besides the concern about parking the DA62 in Mexico, I'd have to figure out how to get permission to transit Cuban airspace. So we haven't seriously planned this trip yet.

These 2 examples show that sometimes the biggest impediment to offshore flying may not be the risk of flying long distances over open water, but dealing with airspace and Customs issues.
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