A friend of mine is flying a brand new P60-SE in a Jet Legend CT-114 Tutor. We did a test run on the engine a couple of weeks ago and everything went smoothly. However, we took it to the field to fly twice this week, and the engine has failed to start several times.

The engine gets into the acceleration phase of the startup, and after 8 to 10 seconds, it suddenly shuts down. The GSU says "Acceleration Slow," apparently indicating that the engine didn't reach idle RPMs (50,000) in the time allotted. Last Max RPM usually reads around 32,000. When this happens, we shut down, wait a few minutes, and try again. Usually after a couple of failed starts, the engine starts just fine. Once it starts, it runs just fine throughout the flight.

We've watched the fuel line carefully, and there appear to be no bubbles causing the shutdowns. We've also tested the fuel pump, and it is working fine. Just before shutdown occurs, we hear a noise like flames shooting down a pipe. But there is no flame visible coming from the engine.

Any idea what's going wrong and how to fix it? The engine has three flights on it now, and if my count is correct, it has 4 successful starts and 6 or 7 failed starts.

Sorry for the double post. My Internet connection timed out and I thought the post had failed. Moderator, can you delete?

Is the P60SE Gas or Kero start?
When you test started it and all went fine, was that in the airframe or on the test bench?
Did you note the EGT when it failed to start?

Mike

It is propane start. We test-ran the engine in the airframe, not on the bench.

I didn't check the EGT, only the last max RPM. I'll check the EGT if it happens again. Are you thinking that the EGT might be too high, and that that's what's causing the shutdown?

What I was thinking is that the start up had not happend correctly and the EGT would show that the temp had not been reached to transfer to Kero.

How are you controling the gas flow? soliniod or straight from the can? Have you got the coils of the glowplug out far enough? all things to check.

Mike

Gas flow is controlled by a solenoid valve. I haven't checked the glow plug coils, but lighting the propane hasn't been a problem at all. Shutdown stops several seconds into the process, with idle RPM almost achieved.

After perusing other threads, and based on experience gained from owning three JetCats myself, I thik the next step is to try upping the u-accel2 parameter on the GSU. I wanted to try that at the field yesterday, but I couldn't remember how to get to it in the Limits menu.

Jeff

My P70 started doing that with 42 minutes on the engine. It would take 3 attempts every time to get it going. I got the same error message as you. I was putting the Powermax in directly from the can to the solenoid. Someone told me to make a rig with the little onbard tank and plug it in for the start. Seemed to work better, at least I was able to start it reliably, but, the next time out, everytime I tried to start the engine, flames would shoot out the back and it wouldn't run. The Turbine wheel was rubbing on the NGV. I had to send it in to Bob to have it fixed. It had less than an hour on it.

Bob

Problem apparently solved. We increased u-accel2 from 5.5 to 6.0 and had three perfect starts in a row. Would have tried this earlier but couldn't remember how to get to the u-accel parameters on the GSU.