Last week Dave started working on getting his airplane, affectionately known as Spike, ready to fly again. Spike was put in mothballs two years ago when we left Seattle. He needs a full inspection which means Dave has to tear apart the whole airplane to get it ready for the mechanic to come and do the inspection. Upon his own inspection Dave felt the need to replace is the fuel pump which he has never been happy with since he bought the plane. And when the inspector came, the plane failed compression test - which means that one of the engine cylinders isn't working right. More work to be done...
The first step in fixing the piston that failed the compression test is to take the engine shroud off. In the pictures below you see the shroud - the metal plate that directs airflow over the engine in place, and in the second photo it is missing - exposing the piston that needs to be pulled. Just doing this was a full day job.
Next...the cylinder has to be removed from the engine.
Then the piston has to be removed. Then the whole assembly is ready to go into the machine shop to be worked on.
The only shop in the area that fixes them is way over in Bremerton, so Dave had to go on a day long road trip. There it will sit for the next two weeks awaiting someone in the shop to get time to work on it. Meanwhile Dave is dying to go flying...