HOW HOT IS TO HOT.
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_96.../tm.htm#964307

I barrowed a CHT unit from a friend and tested every 2 cycle yard equipment I own. They all ran over 300 degrees. So how hot is to hot is relative to the individual engine. It could be the 110 is meant to run with a hotter temp, but i do not know this.

Customer service is a different story. If the engine is sent to the customer with defective parts that can cause it to cook then the engine should be covered, or the manufacturer should have contacted the customer with a fix or repair. Service is paramount to selling a product and keeping customers.

If you didn't cook it in the first 12 flights it seems odd to the casual observer (and maybe BME) that it probably failed from something related to operator error.

“Ray, I just received your message from my wife. I am sorry but my time is valuable to me and I am not going be on the phone arguing about an engine."

To talk to a customer like this doesn't seem very smart. To type this in an e-mail that can be shown to everyone is just foolish. Maybe the customer did do something wrong but I would never tell a customer I don't have time for them.

Keith, you may not have time for us (the customers). But your competitors do. I'll stick with the competitors.

Hi Ralph,
That was certainly one of my points. If the engine did not overheat during 12 flights with the same set up, then it is unlikely to have been operator error. It would have been nice to have had the opportunity to discuss this with Keith Baker. If there was a problem in manufacture then BME needed to be aware of it, this would have allowed for correction in the future. If the problem rested with the method and usage application, then I would have needed to be aware of it. No opportunity for discussion was granted to me, or Ray Johns.
Regards
Mike

its real sad the way keith conducts buisness i cant even post what i emailed him due to the family friendly atmosphere here.i also got a bunch of polite bull excrement.I spent good money on a repair and got a non running engine of course i didnt want to wait another six to eight weeks ,thats their usual turnaround time.and never did keith say im sorry,send it in and we,ll fix it immediately as he should have Im a buisness person and when a customer has a problem, i stop everything and take care of it unlike bme i want all of my customers to be happy or at a minimum to get what they paid for.i even attempted to fix it myself i asked keith to send me some gaskets heck i cant even depend on bme to do that either .i finally decided never do buisness with those idiots and recomend no one else take an unnecesary chance with a company who is out for your money for sure and apparently with no backbone or concious.

Six to Eight weeks? My repair took 7 business days in the middle of the summer at peak flying time. Maybe you should not have sent him that nasty e-mail.

RTK has it dawned on you that Keith has his favorite customers (you being one) and some others can go jump in the lake. At least from the posts that I have read this seems to be the case.

I don't ever recall reading any bad comments on the service from DA. Makes you wonder doesn't it? Do you think all of these guys are lying about their service problems with Keith just to give BME a bad reputation?

I have seen several 110's and they are super engines. There is no doubt that this is a great product. What happens with service when something goes wrong seems to be the problem.

That's what I'm seeing here too. I have been looking into a 50cc gas engine and BME is ruled out. I don't need these head aches.

In defense of BME..I am not a BME owner...I HAVE been working on 2 strokes for MANY years..
The only engine I have ever seized was a 289 racing twin, running on a test stand.We had switched from FAI fuel to 5% nitro and were trying for the last 50 rpm.We were running wide open at about 8000 rpm, slowly tweaking the high speed needle...It started to slow down, but we were not fast enough on the needle to get it rich again..Broke the cylinder base clean off and also destroyed the piston..The engine had been previously run with no problem....The piston clearance on the engine is less than .002...It takes very little lean time with an engine this tight to do the damage...I don't know what the clearance is on the Keith's cylinders, but if it's close and the engine gets lean at all it WILL stick..The previous flights show that it must have been OK..I haven't heard of any other 110s with this problem, but with the fins turned down so far it could happen....
An engine, ANY engine, should be run just a little rich just in case..
I can sympathize with Keith, I get calls all the time and in a 1 person shop it sometimes gets old....

NO I AM NOT HIS FAVORITE CUSTOMER! Just a customer and probably a big pain in the ***** to him. Do you think that DA has never asked someone to pay for an engine when they cooked it??? Maybe DA customers know when they do something wrong or accepted the manufactures assessment of the damage. If the manufacture can tell what happened to the engine, then why should he keep arguing about it. In society today people don't want to take responsibility for the mistakes.

I have only read about a few problems with BME service and I believe they all dealt with cooked engines, seems funny no? Operator error maybe?

Why don't you harp on all those people that carry on and on and on and on about the great service DA has. I have just stated how my dealings with Keith have gone. I'm not acting like a cheerleader as some DA fans do.



I own 2 businesses, so I know all about customer service. One disatissfied customer will tell 10 people, One satisfied customer might tell 1 person. This is just a fact of human nature, and might not reflect how things really are. This is all I am saying. (but now with the internet you can tell THOUSANDS, great huh.)

Ralph

I am sure you guys realize that there are two sides to every story. Its sad that one can get on the internet and smake a false claims then get others to believe it. As for the individuals on here badmouthing us this is our reply. We spoke with the customer and explained to them what happened to their engines. The customer refused to accept what we had told them so we offered to send the engine to an engine expert of their choice for evaluation. Customer did not take the offer and only demanded he did nothing wrong and wanted the engine replaced or repaired under warranty. The 110 in question was so severly overheated we had to break the cylinders to remove it. I have pictures if anyone would like to see the damage. When you talk several times to an unreasonable customer its like talking to a brick wall and there is no need for further arguments. We are a small company and I can not spend my time on the phone with a customer who refuses to take accountability for his actions. We offered several times to repair a 50cc for the customer on this thread. He would not send the engine to us and insisted on working on it himself. We cant fix it over the internet. Then he wants go on here and say negative things about us. We do our best and are more than willing to help but you just cant help some people.

Keith Baker
BME

Keith, thanks for your reply. Looks like I was wrong.

Ken

Thanks for the rest of the story Keith, when the 55's are ready I still want one.

Thank you for the reply Ken. We are human and yes our service needs improvement. In the hands of a competent pilot one could have no finer engine than the BME 50 or 110 being two pounds lighter with more power. One more detail that should be pointed out in this thread is the rumor that the BME110 runs hot. This is absolutely not true. We spent two years testing the 110cc engine before we released it. The last thing a manufacturer wants to do is release an engine with problems. The cylinder manufacturer that made the cylinders for us also make the DA and 3W cylinders. The manufacturer said that the BME cylinder is the best design and has a more expensive plating. CH ignitions tested different brand engines on a stand and when all tuned properly and run at wide open throttle the cylinder temps were 300-340 degrees. We performed the same tests and found the same results. Go cart racers tune their aircooled 100cc engines to run head temps at approximately 300 degrees. Anyone who thinks their engine is running at 180-190 degrees is misinformed or using a lazer type temp gun to take the readings. The reflectivity of the cylinder and location have a huge impact on temp readings. I can get 100 degrees variation of temps in less than one half inch movement on the cylinder. The only real way to check temps is to use a thermo coupler and a inflight data loger.


Keith
BME

Now we have heard both sides of the story.

I do not know too many small businesses owners that are not willing to try and resolve a problem. There are just some customers that you can not please, period.

The internet is a great tool, but a lot of un-truths can be spread. Thank you Keith for letting us hear the other side of the story.

Hi Keith,
It is nice that you responded. Your facts are a rather out of sequence and as such tend to obscure certain issues. When General Johns called you, you did not take his calls. You will recall that the only conversation with you was prior to your receiving the return of the 110 engine. In other words you diagnosed the engine without seeing it and then maintained that diagnosis. Ray Johns did ask you to consider refund or repair during this one conversation and said he would send the engine back to you, he also told you as was related in my initial post that we did not believe there was a user error. Keith, after you received the engine, you never spoke with General Johns or myself, not even once. You received numerous phone calls and did not take a single one. You did send a couple of e mail, which was quoted verbatim in the post, please correct me if anything was omitted from your e mail. You did indeed offer to send the engine to an expert, this to was quoted in my post, along with the relevant response. I am not conversant with your comments on the 50cc engine, it is certainly not me your are referring to, perhaps you need to make that clear. I think you still need to deal with the issue of comments such as the value of your time when a customer reasonably attempts to communicate with you. It is good that you did respond. The comment of can't help some people (sic) is a bit of a cliche Keith, I think you need to talk to customers before you determine whether they are too problematic for you to put further time in with them. There are indeed two sides to every story, lets here your side in a more accurate format.
Regards
Mike Selby

Mike, I dont know how to make things any clearer for you. I am sorry you cant understand our response to your unwarranted actions. There was no reasonable communication from you just Ray insisting he did nothing wrong and demanding his money back. I have other customers to serve and phone time is valuable to me. I can not spend it on the phone arguing with someone who can not and will not accept the truth. We did have several email conversations with Ray. Ray called and told me the condition of the engine. I did diagnose the engine on the phone for him. He was requesting his money back before we even received the engine. After I received the engine and inspected it I found that I was correct in the diagnosis. If had I been wrong about the diagnosis I would have repaired the engine no questions asked. You will note that your facts are out of sequence and misleading. We did talk with Ray Johns about the engine on more than on one occasion and remain firm on our diagnosis. We also explained what caused the failure and how it is not a manufacturing defect. How many people have to tell you what caused the failure before you stop this nonsense? I dont believe I mentioned anything about your name or relation to the 50cc engine. I said it before and I will say it again I am not going to argue with you about this any further. You simply dont want to take responsibility for your actions and think you can go online to pressure us to pay for your mistakes. Again I will send the cylinders and pistons from your engine for others to see if you like. This is not how we wanted things to turn out but we hold our head high and stand our ground. Why would you buy so many BME engines if they were junk and you thought we were crooks?


Thank you
Keith Baker
BME

Hi Keith,
Interesting phrasing. I never said you were a crook, the introduction of this unfortunate terminology is soley by you, and appears for the first time in your most recent post, nor have I bashed your company. I correctly observed that I had purchased a number of engines from you and had not had a problem with any of them prior to the 110. It also implies that I was able to set up and operate these various engines without incident. It is therefore of some question as to why according to you I would have fallen prey to engaging in such manifest operator error on the 110. You did not speak with me after the original phone call inquiring about the purchase of the 110's, nor have I said you did; you would not take my calls. Your e mails are contained within the post and speak for themselves, as does the attitude you evince within them and within your posts. My facts are directly in sequence and are neither misleading or inaccurate, but you and I both know this. We will obviously not settle this issue within this forum nor is it appropriate to engage in pseudo litigation. You did not speak with General Johns on more than one occassion, but I will let him address that fact directly if he wishes. Your characterization of the issues here as nonsense again reflects a level of arrogance which is less than conducive to building customer relations. I have not gone on line to pressure you to pay for anything. You have been paid $400.00 to repair the engine, and you have already returned the engine. You have received no demands from me whatsoever, please do not attempt to obfuscate, it does you no credit. My post lays out a series of events. It does not insult or demean you, it does state the facts, and does present the correspondence in sequence. It allows any reader to review and reach their own conclusions. I will not argue the issue of responsibility with you. There are clearly two different views here, and neither one of us is going to move the other off of their respective positions. Your customer relations are a more transparent issue. Your communications in e mails and in this forum speak for themselves. Please feel free to stand by them; you made them, you should stand by them. Right?
Regards
Mike

OK, so we know the pistons seized. I won't take sides, but there are several possibilities for seizure. Some are created by the owner and some by the manufacturer. It may be very difficult or impossible to determine the cause. The manufacturer doesn't really know what the customer did.
1. lack of oil or poor quality oil
2. lack of cooling air flow
3. wrong needle settings on carb
4. wrong piston clearance during manufacturing or very tight clearance by design
5. wrong alloy for piston or cylinder by design or by mistake during casting
6. air leaks from case or cylinder porosity
7. air leaks from bad gaskets
8. air leak from bad bearing seal
9. detonation from advanced timing
10. detonation from very low octane fuel
11. detonation from carbon buildup
12. too large a prop load
13. lack of fuel flow from bad fuel tank setup or leaky lines
14. lack of fuel flow because of dirt in the fuel system
15. lack of fuel flow from sealant blocking carb pulse port
16. lack of fuel flow because of bad carb or misassembled carb
17. restrictive exhaust system

Mike

Yours and or others interaction with BME may leave something to be desired IMO, every case has its own merit and there are always two sides to the equation. The initial contact with respect to your engine, indignation and demands may have been akin to further constructive interaction.

It’s plausible the engine was run lean via the tune-up, the engines physical condition denotes same (other things can cause this damage too). All that said I don’t recall any instance were you suggest it was possible for the engine to have been miss-tuned? You simply suggest it must have been something other than and or a problematic engine…

The information you have provided as well as Keith’s inspection leads me and others I suspect to believe the engine damage was the result of a lean run like it or not. To steadfastly deny same and point fingers is unwarranted IMO because it’s possible, nothing more. When and where did you accept the possibility of a lean run? You cannot be absolutely sure this was not the case, nobody can! I will acquiesce to the fact the something other was at play, but its unlikely IMO.

Let’s look at the facts:

Two hours or so on the test stand.
Twelve uneventful flights.
Gas was proven in other engines.
Engine ducting, installation, exhaust system and setup were proven with second engine.
Engine physical condition, i.e., hung cylinders.

All the above leads me to believe the engine was proven based on the previous run time and subsequent flights. The only variables left are the engines tune-up, its new environment and human error (Diablo’s comments are viable too). That said I’m not taking sides just attempting to bring another perspective to an unfortunate situation. You maybe wrong it’s that simple, on the other hand BME maybe at fault we’ll never be absolutely sure of either....

Keith
Regarding the postings, as you stated yes we did have an initial conversation after I returned from Top Gun and yes during that one and only conversation you did offer a diagnose of the problem (prior to seeing the engine) as excessive heat from one of the three conditions: running too lean, insufficient cooling, or finally insufficient oil. I believe Frank Tiano posted in the scale forum we had been sharing his properly mixed fuel along with many crews without issue--That eliminates the fuel. We discussed the cooling and you can see from the pictures in the magazines the engine had ample cooling --as many would attest. That leaves running too lean. We went in detail about the rpm 6800 using a 27x10 Mejzlik prop--tach reading--during our engine run after uncrating the aircraft upon its arrival in Florida. In discussions with others that prop and rpm combination is within expected and normal tolerances. Plus during the practice flight the day before competition the profile I was flying was a low power demand routine--i.e. not requiring high power/full throttle. These factors led to my considering that this specific engine had an anomaly.

I did in fact ask for a refund or repair under warranty during our call, but after your phone diagnosis, I was willing to wait until you inspected the engine. At no time did we have anything but a civil and business-like conversation. I sent the engine to BME with a letter asking to be contacted upon your inspection. After several weeks I had not heard back and after several attempts to contact you by phone I did follow with an e-mail request to be contacted. In turn you responded with the e-mails that Mike included in his posting. Don't believe that you or I had spoken directly though I would have appreciated that opportunity.

RJ

Hi Mike,
Thank you for your post. You are correct, I have taken the position that I do not believe the engine was too lean or that I was at fault. You will note I observed in an earlier post, that in the ground test setting at Top Gun, the engine was set up slightly rich. I have also said that we will never actually know what happened. My concerns as expressed several times are the fact that no discussion ever was allowed by BME to attempt to determine the cause. BME diagnosed the engine by phone. That was the first and only discussion. With respect to the initial contact with BME, I believe that Ray Johns has addressed this in his post. However, consider the following. I have quite a few BME engines. I purchased the BME 110 for a major competition project. When the problem with the ignitions took place, I did not make any demands upon BME, and made no negative comments in any forum. Prior to this episode I have never made a negative post with regard to any manufacturer. Inotherwords, I was well disposed towards BME. Neither Ray Johns or I was hostile, aggressive, demanding, or anything less than polite in contact with BME. Here perhaps I must ask you to take my word for it, but there was nothing by any stretch of the imagination that could have created the basis for the manufacturer to refuse further contact. When Ray spoke with Keith Baker, (the sole referenced phone call) the phone call ended with Ray confirming he would send the engine back for evaluation, and Keith Baker promising to get back to him. Keith Baker did not revert to Ray, until the receipt of several emails, and the phone calls that he deigned not to take. A considerable period of time elapsed after BME received the engine.
Lets now synthesize my concerns which I believe I have expressed in past posts.
After receipt of the engine, it would have been reasonable for Baker to get on the phone and discuss the situation. If there was a user error, and one must always consider this possibility, then it would have been useful to know what it was. Baker refused to take any calls, and his e mail responses and the tone taken speak for themselves. If there was a problem with the manufacture of the engine, it would have been useful for Baker to know this. You will note there was an issue initially with the ignitions. It is useful for the parties to be aware of problems such as these, and to be in a position to rectify them. This is not a case of devolving blame in some immediate fashion.
My concerns remain, that the engine was in my view probably defective, and the customer treatment and tone taken was again in my view highly defective. As Diablo observed there are many potential causes, including operator error. I would be a fool to totally discount this. What then of someone who diagnoses a problem by phone, receives the product, and refuses any form of discussion whatsoever? Having rendered his phone diagnosis, has Keith boxed himself into a rather untenable position? I had no difficulty with the concept of paying for a repair. I have had a 3W engine and a Taurus engine that were sent back for repair. The damage was my fault. The response envelope was rather different than what transpired here. I suggest that you review the tone of my posts, and Keith Bakers posts, and consider the measure of what has been said by each party.
Regards
Mike Selby

Thank you MIKE, I could not have said it better.

Now my observations. I just wish I could write as eloquent as some of the previous posts.
What do you mean "expected and normal tolerances"? Maybe I missed something in the first few posts. DID you peak it and back off a couple hundred? or just tach'd it and thought it was fine thru consensus. You can't do that with any engine.
More reasons to point at a lean run at FULL throttle.
This is the kettle calling the pot black. Apparently you can do no wrong either, how can you call someone arrogant when you can not accept the fact that you "might" have had something to do with this problem too.
I have never seen a proven engine "seize" to anything other than operator error as mentioned in the above posts by others.

This is going now where. Many post have been made telling you it could have been lean or heat that caused this. Keith says the same, he was willing to send it for a "second opinion" if that would have come back with the same answer what then. Would you have accepted that? (now you have the upper hand on this forum) I will reserve my opinion, and you know the old saying.

This will turn into nothing more than a pi$$ing contest which no one will win and everybody will leave with a bad taste in there mouths,too bad I do not have the power to make this go away. Man I must be in a bad mood, for some reason I also feel that the eloquence of some posts almost looks like a ploy.


Ralph

Hi Ralph,
Part of your post actually responds to Ray. However I will take the liberty of responding. As I have said we ran the engine slightly rich. That means we peaked it and backed off slightly. The engine seized in practice flight, not during the competition. The profile Ray refers to is the profile that he was flying when the engine seized, it was no where near full throttle. I have never had an engine seize before, let alone one that has been broken in and had 12 flights. There are a number of posts here, that point to possible set up error, there are a number of posts that indicate other possibilities. I have said that I do not believe it was operator error, Keith Baker believes otherwise. With regard to the pot calling the kettle black, I believe that my second issue was the tone of the response was disturbing. You have indicated in your past posts that your experience with BME has been good to date. You were therefore not at the receiving end of this particular episode, but are certainly entitled to your own conclusions. With regard to what I take to be your comment on the quality of English in the posts, I don't think that good grammar should be characterized as a ploy, and I am sure that is not what you intended.
My purpose in my initial post was to flag a disturbing issue, we are indeed heading towards unconstructive territory. Absent the need for direct response, I will rest here.
Regards
Mike

This thread has just about covered every point. It's not progressing any. It's time for us to move along and talk about something else?

So I'm Locking the thread up.

Enjoy,

Jim