Hi Gang, Received a little mail from the FSDO saying that tests on a bunch of planes showed that many older tachs are indicating from 100 to 200 rpm low. This means the pilots with these tachs are running their engines at higher rpms than needed and these inefficient power setting consume more fuel than the gain in speed warrants. Seems fuel exhaustion - even though the figures indicated the fuel on board should have been adequate for the trip - due to the higher rpms has caused a few accidents.
Went on to say that the tachs only maintained accuracy for a year or two; should make all of us with our 50 year old planes ( and most probably tachs that have never been calibrated since new) feel good. Course in the Coupe you always have the good old wobbly stick on the tank up front to tell you when the gas is going down and that you should too. But being real cheap, I want to know (especially now that I have the 100 hp O-200) when I'm actually using the correct rpms to develop the 65/75 or 85% power setting shown in the books. Anyone know of anyone in the Oregon area that has a calibrated strobe tach that can be used to verify in-plane tach accuracy without removing it and sending it in for calibration. If so, we could possibly arrange to use it at one of our fly-ins and verify the tachs on all attending planes in short order. Got the knee joint fixed on the plane and actually test flew it for about an hour last friday, then came down with a bad case of strep throat when the good weather showed up and have been inside all week. If I get over this Strep in time will join all for a good lunch in Albany at 1pm this Sunday. Bring extra money since Bob will have the new shirts and caps! Dan N2735H
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