A couple of squawks...

[cozzmo81]

Smcnutt,

I am in need of a small quantity of the Ekobond as well. Id be interested in splitting a quart with you if you are interested. I am in the Indianapolis area as well.
Thanks

[Crash]

Agreed, generator isn't functioning correctly. My check of the circuit breaker was static -- engine off; this might make sense if the generator setup requires the circuit to be energized for it to function correctly. Alternators make sense to me, but this is my first time with a generator outside of an old John Deere 4020... If I had my way, I'd replace/swap in an alternator, but that appears it would also require an oil cooler re-location. So for now I stick with what I suspect is a 20A gen.

Fuses all looked ok bases on visual inspection; didn't check continuity (dumb me).

What's more likely to suddenly fail on these: Voltage regulator (this seems likely to me) or a generator? Looks like my oil cooler has been seeping some oil, so the generator is a bit wetter than I'd like to see it....

[Gilbert Pierce]

Ground the field coil wire F at the regulator with the avionics OFF, engine running and a volt meter on the BAT terminal. If the regulator is bad the output voltage at the BAT terminal will jump to 16+ volts. Just do this momentarily.
If nothing happens something else is bad like the generator brushes or wiring.

[SMO22]

When I pull the generator breaker, it has the same effect as turning off the master switch.. all electircal power off. Does that sound right?

That is not wired correct, or mine is wired incorrectly. I had to go to hangar last night and I checked, when I pulled my 30amp gen breaker I still have battery power to the system.

My gen charging wire goes from the gen to the top of that 30amp breaker, than out the bottom of the breaker to one side of the ammeter, and through the ammeter back to the master switch and circuitry to the battery to charge it. From the same terminal on the ammeter that the gen wire goes to from its 30amp breaker, the outbound battery power to the main buss is also on that terminal, but pulling the gen 30amp breaker cannot open the battery to buss circuit.

[rocket]

#1 failure is broken field wire at generator.

If if it was working before I wouldn't be too concerned about being misswired... yet.

instant failure usually means somthing broke as apposed to genny or reg failure, the darn things are really robust.

I would do the basic power off and power on DC generator voltage checks first.

basicly do you have voltage going to your regulator and is there voltage coming out of the F termanal of it? Should tak about 60 seconds to check.

Rocket

[rocket]

Ha! Guess I'm a little late on this one

dont freez ecobond and it's the only Stewart's product with a good shelf life. We share it out a the airport to keep stock in rotation.

rocket

[Crash]

Updated findings: It looks like the field wire from the generator was riding up against the exhaust (not sure how that happened), coating melted and caused a short. It also appears my suspicions were correct and the system is incorrectly wired; thus when the short occurred the breaker did not trip to prevent any damage. So now the shop suspects the generator is damaged/burned out. Further, as I mentioned previously, the plane was re-wired during its rebuild, and thus we do not have a wiring diagram for what "right" looks like.

The shop happened to have a spare voltage regulator on hand, and we did a swap to test things, and that does not appear to be the problem (or at least the only problem). So now they're going to pull the generator and have it tested.

At this point, I'm mostly venting. Anyone have any concept of how expensive a generator overhaul is? Replacement? What about advice for dealing with getting the plane wired correctly? It's already in the shop racking up the $$, so now I'm looking for the best path to getting it flying safely without completely destroying my wallet... It's unfortunate that it wasn't found in the pre-buy inspection, but frankly everything was working correctly, so there wasn't any indication for something TO get caught. *sigh*

[Steve Pierce]

14706 Tri-Pacer Wiring.pdf

Do you have the Short Wing Piper Drawing CD? Depending on what serial number you have the schematic is there.

[ysifly2]

Delco-Remy Service Bulletin 1R-116.pdf
don't remember where I got this, but may be of some help as well..

I also have the generator and regulator that I removed when I changed to alternator. Was working when removed, just haven't taken the time to try and sell off yet


Bryan

[SMO22]

What country are you in? You have more options if you go owner maintenance in Canada, in the U.S. we are much more limited.