Made a couple of changes to my Bandit

[Bandit 286]

I was running a IVO 3 bladed prop. Wanted to get a little better cruise, called IVO. They said remove one blade and try that. After adjusting the pitch, I am now getting around 6200 rpm on take off and at cruise speed at 5850 rpm I am now getting around 5 mph faster cruise which is about 73 mph. Nice improvement. After the prop change I noticed a gap between the engine mount and crankcase. Turned out that the washer was missing. Cut my safety wire on the engine mount bolt and the bolt pulled right out. It had sheered off and then the washer fell out. This might be something you might want to check before every flight. After removing the broken bolt and replacing it with a new one I figured I better inspect my oil pump injection arm a little better. This has always been a high wear area and a pain in the ass. Sure enough my bolt was just about worn through the pump arm. Also the spring would not return the pump to full rich if it broke. So I made the decision to pull the pump and switch to pre mix. Now I have one less problem to worry about.

[Av8r3400 1179]

Sounds good, Mark!

Now that baby will be fast enough to fly over to OSH next year and your lovely bride can bring the camper, right?

[C5Engineer 1170]

I premix also Mark. Those injectors are just another place for a mechanical failure that will lead to a catastrophic engine failure. I also have a theory that the oil in the fuel will help protect the fuel system from ethanol. Get yourself a measuring cup to carry in the plane. I am running full synthetic at 100:1. Once quart of the oil lasts me quite a while. When going cross country I isolate my tanks and just write down what I put into each tank on the pump. It's 1.3oz to the gallon or 6.5oz in a 5 gallon can. I keep a little notebook and calculator in the plane. Do the math, pour in the right amount,shake the strut, and blast off. Takes an extra couple of minutes at the pump when I'm away from home but not bad at all. The look on the spam can drivers faces as you pour oil into your gas tank at the pump is worth the extra time it takes to do

[Bandit 286]

I agree with you Joey, never did like the oil injection pump arm. It is just to much of a wear point with all that vibration. I am using Amzoil HP injector oil at 50 to 1 mixture. I did buy a mixture cup that has all of the mixing ratio's on it. Now I feel much better when I don't have to worry about the pump any more. Only time will tell if it was a good decision. Another nice thing is I got rid of my oil tank and took some weight off my airplane which doesn't happen to often.

I premix also Mark. Those injectors are just another place for a mechanical failure that will lead to a catastrophic engine failure. I also have a theory that the oil in the fuel will help protect the fuel system from ethanol. Get yourself a measuring cup to carry in the plane. I am running full synthetic at 100:1. Once quart of the oil lasts me quite a while. When going cross country I isolate my tanks and just write down what I put into each tank on the pump. It's 1.3oz to the gallon or 6.5oz in a 5 gallon can. I keep a little notebook and calculator in the plane. Do the math, pour in the right amount,shake the strut, and blast off. Takes an extra couple of minutes at the pump when I'm away from home but not bad at all. The look on the spam can drivers faces as you pour oil into your gas tank at the pump is worth the extra time it takes to do

[Bandit 286]

After flying 7hrs with my 2 bladed prop, I seemed to have a bad vibration around 4700rpm and even noticed roughness at cruise speed. I put the 3rd blade back on tonight and it seemed much smoother through all throttle settings. I did lose some cruise speed, but I just run it a little harder now. Maybe thats why my engine mount bolt broke, not sure.

[akflyer 1427]

Did you loose any climb when you went to the 2 blade?? I tried going to 2 blade with my brothers old KF and the climb went way down. Very interested in your results!

[C5Engineer 1170]

300 hrs on my two blade