Hi Ben, thanks for being so honest. I'm still saving up to upgrade my Aerovee with a turbo. I've been trying to find as much extra information as possible other than the standard marketing stuff. You've helped sell me on it. I feel your pain and frustration throughout the early stages. Thanks for posting it helps the rest of us out big time.
Got the detonation figured out because I was running a number to needle instead of a now on a full-powered take off when it's cold I get detonation so now I think one of my 16 hose clamps is coming loose leaking air.....NOT...I assembled the rings wrong. it was preignition from lead on the head.
Hi Ben, I appreciate your video! It reflects some of the same problems I am working through with my AeroVee Turbo. Specifically, I was not getting the full 40" MAP that was specified and like you found that the supplied wastegate spring was weak. I also went to Kinugawa and ordered the standard .3 BAR spring and the .5 BAR spring. When I got them I also discovered that the original spring was different and weaker than the .3 BAR spring, so I used the .3. I now see, with some tweaking of the pre-load, 42" on take off and have to back off the throttle a bit to stay under 40". With more preload, I can go higher. I also find that after the under-cowl temperature warms up, full throttle gives about 38" MAP, still a good boost. For reference, I built a legacy Sonex, first flight in June of 2019. I have about 20 flight hours and 39 on the Hobbs. I am using an MGL Discovery lite system and an Aero Injector with the 2.5 needle. I have all four cylinders fitted with EGT and CHT sensing as well as TIT and Turbo cooling sensors. I am still chasing high EGT and Turbine Inlet temperatures however and am wondering if I am running lean at full throttle. I have adjusted the needle again and will test the result on the next good flying day. I could not tell from your video if you installed the turbo cooling system. I installed the recommended turbo cooling system and it works well.
I think i figured out that the spring will hold it's rating PLUS ambient. So if ambient pressure is 30" and google says a .3bar spring is 8.85" then 30 + 8.85 is all I will get with the spring at sea level. So if pressure decreases at 1"hg per 1000ft then at 5000' I will get 25" + 8.85 = 33.85. There ya have it! I"m putting in the .5 bar = 14" so at 5000' I will have 39" availiable. In Michael Farley's vid he adds map at will at 7000'. Man i'm going to get it all figure out at once!!! I hope all this works I"m getting excited now.. I've been running a #2 needle and not over heating but also not able to go over 35" MAP but I cannot lean at all..Again in Michael's vid he is running in the 1300's range. YOu might confirm you have full throw on your mixture---but yaa definately the needle I mess with that soooo much--small changes make a big difference one way or the other when you are close. Nope have not installed the turbo cooler. I faithfully idle 3 minutes before shut down..
Hey Jay you mentioned your chasing high EGT my buddy sent me a link to Mike Bush The savvy aviator and he talks about egts and they are not critical your CHT he says is an indication of how hard your engine is working and that is critical. So recently I confirmed this with Sonex and keery said lean to best performance and egts will go wherever. My hot EGT was number three and I would always try to keep it under $1,500° when the manual says 1400. I can't complain too much because I $8,000 ft I was doing 160 mph and my fuel burn was 7.5 gallons per hour. I'm excited to see how leaning will improve my performance this next flying season.
Thanks, nice vid. Your Crater Lake picture brought a fond, very intense memory in full color. I sold my RV-4 18 years ago, and one of the high points of the 600 hours over 6 years of tearing up the sky was a very low, high speed pass on the lake, rim to rim. Low enough to still see the wing tip vortices on the glassy water over my shoulder on climb out up the North rim. If that opportunity presents itself to you, enjoy. Adrenaline junky heaven.
wow what a rush! It was enough of a rush flying that low time VW up there---KEEP RUNNING! I had a 3' poster made of the North side of that crater lake pic @ 27:22. The north side had a skiff of snow all over really great picture. I just talked to Rotax Rick in florida and he said he bought an RV3 in the 70's because that's what pappy boyington was flying. Crazy flying history!
@@1bengrubb Yeah, Chuck Yeager was running his -4 at that time. Inspired me to build. Good times. That was back in the '90's. likely the only time period that ever was or will be that a common tradesman could own a toy like that. Kit was $6600.00, some assembly required. I put it together for under $27,000 with a 300 hour Lyc 150 and CS prop and started flying it a week after I got my license with 62 hours total time. not counting 3000+ hrs flying hang gliders before. Cruise climb was over 1000 fpm at 160 mph thru 5000 ft.....I do like the Sonex stuff though.
“I put the experiment in experimental”…perfect. Sounds like aerovee wasn’t as helpful as you would hope when forking out the money…. You’d think that they would have this thing dialled in??
Yep! In Ohio right now. 2250 miles of clear skies and tail winds. 9 stops about 200 a leg 150mph. Last few legs had to be conservative so dropped rpm from. 3450 to 3200 and speed dropped to 140 and fuel from 6gph to 5gph
Watching your video every time you had a new solution for the boost I was yelling at the screen 😂. To mitigate detonation, you should have went to a higher octane fuel to stop the detonation while you located the reason for the detonation. Keep in mind every time a cylinder detonated its equivalent to hitting your piston on the head with a hammer, it’s extremely damaging and ends up breaking off a ringland. Hopefully you have it figured out by now but it’s rather simple to correct the problem you were having being a turbo guy myself if you need some direction I’d be glad to help you out.
Yes I was yelling at myself!!! Finally just had to tear off the head and look----there it was staring my right in the face---LEAD ON HEAD! The scope could onlly see the piston and not the head.... I would immediately pull power when it would happen so no damage. Another guy he did not reduce power and his engine lasted only 60 seconds. I had power to spare so I could run at a lower setting. I'm running Decalin now. (like tcp)
Hope you nailed down the detonation problem! If I had that problem, I would start at timing and compression ratio. Not over 25 degrees. I would then go to spark plug heat and as you did, air leaks and mixture. I'm retired and I've seen marine and truck engines with melted listens and valves. Good !luck.
GOT IT! it was lead in the head (see the pictures! pretty crazy). I"m running av gas. Now I have all the power I want at my finger tips! ruclips.net/video/cNxu301ukvY/видео.html
Hey Ben. This is Dwight Hoover. Good to see you flying your onex. I sold my Waiex (350 hrs) and everything else and moved out of state. Flying a Kolb firestar 2 now in Mississippi. For me the the experimental stuff wore me out. Great memories tho…
Hey Dwight! Someone asked me about transition training and you were my one ride. I told them It was predictable and responsive. Is it hot and muggy in Mississippi?
@@sawdust466 yes plan b... Yes I just flew 2000 miles back to Cincinnati and the only place there really wasn't any landing options was the forest between Eugene and bend.. I got some great video of that trip I'll post it soon
very cool. I was discussing with some people about what is done on airlines but we really had no clue. Is "edge" tape pretty good stickem? Turns out its holding absolutely fine. even the little corner that I did not get on properly in the first place is not coming up at all. Very happy with the stick.
Hi Ben, Thanks for the update. I'm at the end of a Onex build and feel a little bit "out of gas". Your enthusiasm is contagious! I'll be back at it tomorrow. I look forward to an update once your get the aeroinjector dialed in. Thanks Again, Wes
At the end!!! Another month or 2? One of the reasons my engine was a challenge was because I bought the kit from someone else and they had a lot done but didn't remember what wasn't done. Turns out that they had the mag plate on but the flywheel wasn't torqued. Flywheel wasn't torqued because crank shims weren't in. Crank shims weren't in because the alternator had a bad chamfer and the flat head bolt wouldn't sit flush..... that's when previous owner gave. Up.....got all that done and sonex Kerry said it's better to run lower compression.....so heads off jugs off add shims. Finally back on for the 5th time! I joined the local was in Feb 2018 and told them I'd be done in April....I was putting on the vynil that December..Ha!! Finally got it to the airport in Jan and when I decided to put that belly skin on my heart went pitter patter! That was exciting. That really felt like the home stretch....All that to say Keep Going!!!
@@wesragle1618 hey if seating is your concern youre doing great! I still have a temporary seat cushion in mine. Had nothing for the first few hours except for a booster pad
Hi Ben, just stumbled across your Vinyl update. I am getting ready to wrap my Zenith CH750 (using Avery Dennison product). Because I have a number of protruding structural connecting elements that will be hard to wrap, I ordered from MyPerfectColor.com a 'rattle can' for 3 separate colors I am using. I will just spray paint the small interconnecting items that will be hard to wrap. All I provided them was the manufacturer paint code for each colored wrap (their website helps you do that), and they produced an exact match in a can. You can even get little 6" cans if desired. For small order like mine, I did have to pay a batch production fee of 19 bucks for each color, but felt it was worth it to save the pain and agony of wrapping in hard to reach (but visible areas).
Hey tthanks Dave that a very good tip. At some point I'll freshen up the paint on my cowling. The paint is really durable but I have all kinds of screwdriver dings and scratches from my taking my cowling on and off
Great video man! Nice to see the vinyl is holding up well, will be doing some graphics on my Sonex shortly. Same with polishing. Was "worried" I'd have to polish weekly. Thanks for the tip on masking off the vinyl when polishing, something else I was wondering about.
Nice airplane! Try mineral spirits for cleaning polish from the surfaces where you don't want it. It should be less aggressive on the vinyl than acetone.
I have two couple ideals for you. I would try a three or four blade prop. This will real help on p-factor on high power setting and turning tendency. It same problem two bladed props on Mooney. Add a Turbo exhaust temperature and engine head temperature sensors. Running the engine will make the engine run hotter and will lead the cylinder heads to crack. Same with the turbo, need to have inlet and exhaust temperatures with in limits to be safe. At higher altitudes that turbo will be glowing red hot. One more item, look for throttle bodies with a separate jet/value for idle control. Nice video
I'm a year late to the party but for anyone reading u can smoke test your intake tubing to test for boost leaks and u can also get a fine tune air regulator and hook shop air to the waste gate and slowly add pressure to verify at what pressure the waste gate actuated
Thanks for the tips Wes. I might try the blow off tip. I have one set of heads off now lapping in the valves so now might be a good time to try that. I haven't gotten it up to 45" yet but I think it would get there. I seem to have all the manifold pressure I want now. So 45-30=15/2=7.5 pounds of boost. Not as much boost as those street racers!
I might buy a Sonex kit, but I did not wish to do the experimental work you did. But your video is 3 years old, maybe by now Sonex would have all that worked out.
Well... I definitely do some extra things but I also enjoy it... In this particular case I had detonation because I assembled the oil ring incorrectly see the link in the description.... So I guess if you don't want to do the work on your aircraft make sure you have a mechanic you can afford..... It's all about money when it comes to airplanes... Another guy mentioned his engine died six times and now he hates vw's so he will never fly anything with the VW in.
in another video of turbo aerovee operation the guy said 197 is the "do not exceed" speed for the air frame so I don't know how to evaluate engine choice. i guess that as i get closer to making a decision on what kit to buy i'll have to contact the makers. i am torn between aerobatic planes and a solid STOL kit like the CH750 super duty.. so many kits and so little time! '
I guess s t o l would be fun if you have a lot of places to do that kind of thing or if you just like competition. Trent Palmer his channel is awesome.. but if you want to fly cheap Sonex is a great deal... I think there's one on barnstormers right now for $23,000...... Add the turbo though it makes the engine performance amazing
That's a pretty little plane. I am no longer impressed with$300,000 super cars, but am insanely jealous of you. I think I have run out of excuses. It's time to get enrolled in ground school.
Plexus is a great product but I’ve found that lemon Pledge is great on Plexiglas and way cheaper. I use lemon Pledge and a micro fiber towel to clean my windscreens on my plane, motorcycle, and even my motorcycle helmet visor. $4/ can vs $20.
Ben, I'm color blind, but- the vinyl looks awesome! I agree, I think there was grease or something under the canopy edge- super small & only visible to you! The wheel pants look incredible- I wouldn't have known that you didn't wrap them- that's how close they are! Just a stranger, appreciating how 'tight' your Onex looks- no way to tell!
Hi David thanks a bunch for the compliments. So you arer color blind but you can tell the paint on the wheel pants is close is it pretty obvious to you that the paint on the cowl is not close? The painter in our club sat right next to it and did not realize it was not paint although he didn't have his glasses on either. He was impressed-- that was the best compliment I had! His name is John Starr his work has been featured in some magazines.
@@1bengrubb So, yeah, color-blindness is an odd thing. I, like 70% of all men, am red/green color blind, which means that I struggle with shades of those colors. (Trust me, if my wife didn't dress me- I'd get laughed at!) But, Yellow I can see. Now, having argued with those not afflicted with color blindness, I will correct my statement and say "The yellow in the wheel pants look identical to the wrap job on the Onex body of your plane!" (Sadly Ben- that compliment has absolutely no value to anyone, but- it WAS well intended!) Hahaha! I really appreciate the time you took to show the difficult parts of mounting things inside the cowling, I definitely didn't realize just how tight the space is in there. Thanks for taking that time. P.S. Some nice greased landings at 80-85MPH- scha-Weet! Clearly, you are enjoying the fruits of your labor!
Thanks Lee i"m super happy with it. Learned some more about leaning this year but haven't done serious test yet. Also my buddy is training me on my valves---they are pretty bad so hope to get a boost with proper leaning and boost with better valve seating this next year.
@@1bengrubb well I wish you all the luck, and great flying up in that blue sky. I'm thinking about buying a Sonic, either the one you got like that one or a Sonic LS two passenger. I got a friend of mine also he's going to go get his pilot license he is talking about getting a Cessna. I'll have my sport license, we've been talking about starting a business shuffling people City to City town to town, picking up parts, transporting small dogs to town to town city to City within a five state. area, if we go longer cross country overnight he'll be licensed to fly night I only have daytime flying, I'll just fly with him to be his co-pilot at times. That's our plans hopefully they'll work out it all depends how the economy goes.
You might need a manual mixture control in the cockpit? I'm seriously considering a Onex with the AeroVee Turbo engine. I, too, wanna go fast. I think there was a video with either Jeremy Monnett or another of his test pilots that said the Onex can easily go 180 mph. But their ads say they limited its speed to 135 mph cruise to comply with Sport Pilot regulations. Not good! I'm not aware of which carburetor the Aero Vee comes with, but if its the centuries old Posa (looks like yours might be -- same kind of mixture setting needles), that was a big problem on my Sonerai many decades ago! The basic Posa has no manual Mixture control. The needle is supposed to adjust mixture for every throttle setting. Mine never did. The Revmaster VW engines DO have a manual mixture control on their Posa carbs. It includes a control (much like the old push-pull choke knob) in the cockpit. I was having difficulty with my engine cutting out during test flights at Chino airport in 1980, and lucky there was Revmaster on the field (they moved up to Apple Valley or Victorville now). Joe Horvath looked at my VW with Posa and said I needed a mixture control and he had one for sale! I installed it and found I could find a mixture setting for every throttle position that ran very good at all rpms! The problem was that it was a DIFFERENT MIXTURE setting for every change of rpm or throttle! The mixture for 1500 rpm was great for final approach, but when I pulled the throttle back to idle in the flare.... the engine would QUIT unless I was really quick to lean out the mixture again! Too much to do while landing the airplane (especially in a crosswind -- tail dragger), and the engine would die on me at the most inopportune moment! The Sonerai had NO starter. Didn't even have an electrical system until I bought Monnett's 10 amp alternator thing mounted on the back case of the engine and added a motorcycle battery to create an electrical system for my radio and transponder. So, there I was on an 10,000' runway at El Paso with dead engine. As usual, I leaped out, pushed the plane off the runway to a taxiway, and attempt to restart (hand prop always). But if that failed (often failed) I had to push it all the way to the FBO! But... the hand operated mixture control was the greatest to keep the engine running smoothly. I flew it low-level all the way from Los Angeles to Patuxent River Maryland in 1981.
HI Dan check into the viking 130 also--I think it's same price as aerovee turbo 12ishGs but 130hp. I dont' think you can get the prop that Jeremy was running on that test turbo---that was a factory test setup---they had that thing dialed...Its like the pictures of McDonald burgers---they don't really look like that. But believe me I'm working on it! I think 160 cruise(@2500') might be doable but not economical??? Again check my link to Mike Farlyeys tests. YEP the AeroInjector they make comes with mixture control but it's not linear so it has a really thin sweet spot for idle. Before I got full boost out of the turbo I could go full throttle to idle and it would run great. I"m asking a bit much but I want it all!
Never heard that one before! I resealed my intake manifold for cyl 1&2 and it did not help I thought I had an air leak on that side. I still think I do though I may replace all my flexible couplers...I'm just confused
Shortest landing I've done so far is first taxi way at cottage grove 61S made the first taxi on 33 right at 700' with approach at 70mph. shortest take off as far as i can tell is 800'. Haven't had done any serious tests with watchers but at least I know I'm comfortable with 1000'. The turbo on take off is amazing--feels like I could do a 50' obstacle in 50'. Bummer is I can't keep it cool so right now I think realistic climb to 5000' is 600'/min@90mph with my stubby wings. More testing this spring. My buddies RV 12 keeps 1000'/min 90-100mph easy so he left me in the dust on our climb to 3500.
hmm i had a friend who had a zenith and always played with the engine trying to get more hp out of it he asked me if i wanted to go flying one day but i couldnt go because i was painting a piper pa11 thank god i didnt he tinkered with that dam engine so much he bent that bird some how on landing i think the throttle got stuck but anyway got the plane fixed and such and be damed about 2 months latter he finally spun the bearings out of the engine my advise would be if your not sure about leaning or richening the engine or turbo work take it to an expert
By now I'm certainly becoming the expert! 4000 miles to ohio and back in July...great trip great performance.. no problem with density altitude...love my turbo.. video soon!
Ben - Very helpful info - thanks !! RE: the rusty turbo - I am wondering how a periodic shot of Corrosion X Thru your exhaust port would work when you anticipate a down time period.
thanks Ben, great insight!!! I'm doing the Model B Turbo. So the needle information was priceless. I like the addition of the port on your exhaust to introduce the fogg solution. Do you add the solution post shut down cool down or put it on when the turbo is still hot?
I haven't tried to light the stuff and see how flammable it is but when I'm done messing around and get the cowls off I can almost touch the turbo by then and squirt the stuff in there.
Brake lever doesn't work as good as I hoped. Just made up a mechanical linkage to the regular handle that is still there. But it does hold the plane still up to 1600 rpm. So it's enough for taxing and gentle stops and starting the engine and exiting the runway at the NEXT exit. When it wasn't working I REALLY missed it. So even though it won't hold at full power just so handy to leave your throttle/radio hand free. I have a rans S14 with the reserviour and everything on the stick--really want to do that somehow.
The engine was mostly assembled when I got it. Had to remove the cylinders to decrease compression and sent pic to sonex to confirm I had the forged pistons for the turbo. Had to add shims on crank to get rid of play. Found the chamfer on the alternator holes were done wrong so had to get a new one. Piston rod rework was done when I got it and my oil pump did not require the mod that Aerovee sent out. When I started it found out I had faulty coils that would not turn off and they sent me a new set. Also went through 4 oil pressure sensors till I went to a solid state sensor.
Thanks, Do you want more of a cruise prop or are you happy with 54x50. I recently bought a Sonex w/ turbo and 54x50. I haven’t been able to cruise much faster than 120 mph indicated, but I have been to 13500’ and could still pull 35 in. MAP. I think I need some more experience tuning the whole machine.
@@gregbuckmaster7233 I want more cruise! At takeoff power I can climb a thousand feet a minute turn downwind and be 150 mph by the end of the runway pull out the power come around the land! The key is manifold pressure and RPM. the same RPM will pull the same speed at the same conditions..BUT as your engine wears out you keep increasing manifold pressure to get the same RPM. So at 2000 ft what are all your instruments at 120 mph? Both me and my buddies arrow v heads the valves were bad. I've seen several vW guys on RUclips say that heads from the factory are often not the best quality in the valve seats need to be recut which is what I did and it's been awesome. Also the claim with the ptip prop is that effectively adds 2 in to the propeller so it's an equivalent to a 56-in prop
@@gregbuckmaster7233 also what is your GPS ground speed? My IAS is about 5-10 mph fast at 2000... Maybe your GPS ground speeds way faster and that would cheer you up!
@@gregbuckmaster7233 do the leak down test and listen at your carburetor your exhaust or your case breather tube and you'll know where the power is leaking
Im at 140mph now at 2500'. I finally figured out I'm running to lean with the turbo once I get that down then 150 maybe even 160! If I can get 160 at 8 gallons an hour that would be pretty good...hmm but 140 at 6gph.
avgas all the time since I"m at an airport with100LL. I imagine pump gas will work since they put turbos on cars with twice the boost or more but haven't needed to try it.
Right now March 2022 155 mph is doable 140 is pleasant. Just a couple hours on my valve job and porting and new leaning technique. Got a noticeable difference but I'll quantify itt this spring.
Hi Ben, thanks for being so honest. I'm still saving up to upgrade my Aerovee with a turbo. I've been trying to find as much extra information as possible other than the standard marketing stuff. You've helped sell me on it. I feel your pain and frustration throughout the early stages. Thanks for posting it helps the rest of us out big time.
If I did it over I might try the Viking 130 same price as aerovee turbo
Got the detonation figured out because I was running a number to needle instead of a now on a full-powered take off when it's cold I get detonation so now I think one of my 16 hose clamps is coming loose leaking air.....NOT...I assembled the rings wrong. it was preignition from lead on the head.
Hi Ben,
I appreciate your video! It reflects some of the same problems I am working through with my AeroVee Turbo. Specifically, I was not getting the full 40" MAP that was specified and like you found that the supplied wastegate spring was weak. I also went to Kinugawa and ordered the standard .3 BAR spring and the .5 BAR spring. When I got them I also discovered that the original spring was different and weaker than the .3 BAR spring, so I used the .3. I now see, with some tweaking of the pre-load, 42" on take off and have to back off the throttle a bit to stay under 40". With more preload, I can go higher. I also find that after the under-cowl temperature warms up, full throttle gives about 38" MAP, still a good boost.
For reference, I built a legacy Sonex, first flight in June of 2019. I have about 20 flight hours and 39 on the Hobbs. I am using an MGL Discovery lite system and an Aero Injector with the 2.5 needle. I have all four cylinders fitted with EGT and CHT sensing as well as TIT and Turbo cooling sensors. I am still chasing high EGT and Turbine Inlet temperatures however and am wondering if I am running lean at full throttle. I have adjusted the needle again and will test the result on the next good flying day.
I could not tell from your video if you installed the turbo cooling system. I installed the recommended turbo cooling system and it works well.
I think i figured out that the spring will hold it's rating PLUS ambient. So if ambient pressure is 30" and google says a .3bar spring is 8.85" then 30 + 8.85 is all I will get with the spring at sea level. So if pressure decreases at 1"hg per 1000ft then at 5000' I will get 25" + 8.85 = 33.85. There ya have it! I"m putting in the .5 bar = 14" so at 5000' I will have 39" availiable. In Michael Farley's vid he adds map at will at 7000'. Man i'm going to get it all figure out at once!!! I hope all this works I"m getting excited now..
I've been running a #2 needle and not over heating but also not able to go over 35" MAP but I cannot lean at all..Again in Michael's vid he is running in the 1300's range. YOu might confirm you have full throw on your mixture---but yaa definately the needle I mess with that soooo much--small changes make a big difference one way or the other when you are close. Nope have not installed the turbo cooler. I faithfully idle 3 minutes before shut down..
Hey Jay you mentioned your chasing high EGT my buddy sent me a link to Mike Bush The savvy aviator and he talks about egts and they are not critical your CHT he says is an indication of how hard your engine is working and that is critical. So recently I confirmed this with Sonex and keery said lean to best performance and egts will go wherever. My hot EGT was number three and I would always try to keep it under $1,500° when the manual says 1400. I can't complain too much because I $8,000 ft I was doing 160 mph and my fuel burn was 7.5 gallons per hour. I'm excited to see how leaning will improve my performance this next flying season.
Thanks, nice vid. Your Crater Lake picture brought a fond, very intense memory in full color. I sold my RV-4 18 years ago, and one of the high points of the 600 hours over 6 years of tearing up the sky was a very low, high speed pass on the lake, rim to rim. Low enough to still see the wing tip vortices on the glassy water over my shoulder on climb out up the North rim. If that opportunity presents itself to you, enjoy. Adrenaline junky heaven.
wow what a rush! It was enough of a rush flying that low time VW up there---KEEP RUNNING! I had a 3' poster made of the North side of that crater lake pic @ 27:22. The north side had a skiff of snow all over really great picture. I just talked to Rotax Rick in florida and he said he bought an RV3 in the 70's because that's what pappy boyington was flying. Crazy flying history!
@@1bengrubb Yeah, Chuck Yeager was running his -4 at that time. Inspired me to build. Good times. That was back in the '90's. likely the only time period that ever was or will be that a common tradesman could own a toy like that. Kit was $6600.00, some assembly required. I put it together for under $27,000 with a 300 hour Lyc 150 and CS prop and started flying it a week after I got my license with 62 hours total time. not counting 3000+ hrs flying hang gliders before. Cruise climb was over 1000 fpm at 160 mph thru 5000 ft.....I do like the Sonex stuff though.
I like your checkerboard non skid pad on the wing. Very informative troubleshooting video.
I looked on eBay for skateboard tape. There are tons of designs!
Thanks for explaining the turbo and mixture debugging process!
“I put the experiment in experimental”…perfect. Sounds like aerovee wasn’t as helpful as you would hope when forking out the money…. You’d think that they would have this thing dialled in??
Turns out I assembled it wrong. I overlapped one of the oil rings and that caused lead build up... ruclips.net/video/cNxu301ukvY/видео.html
Really good video. You clearly love your little plane andit shows. Happy
landings
Yep! In Ohio right now. 2250 miles of clear skies and tail winds. 9 stops about 200 a leg 150mph. Last few legs had to be conservative so dropped rpm from. 3450 to 3200 and speed dropped to 140 and fuel from 6gph to 5gph
Watching your video every time you had a new solution for the boost I was yelling at the screen 😂. To mitigate detonation, you should have went to a higher octane fuel to stop the detonation while you located the reason for the detonation. Keep in mind every time a cylinder detonated its equivalent to hitting your piston on the head with a hammer, it’s extremely damaging and ends up breaking off a ringland. Hopefully you have it figured out by now but it’s rather simple to correct the problem you were having being a turbo guy myself if you need some direction I’d be glad to help you out.
Yes I was yelling at myself!!! Finally just had to tear off the head and look----there it was staring my right in the face---LEAD ON HEAD! The scope could onlly see the piston and not the head.... I would immediately pull power when it would happen so no damage. Another guy he did not reduce power and his engine lasted only 60 seconds. I had power to spare so I could run at a lower setting. I'm running Decalin now. (like tcp)
Yeah, detonation is really bad for the engine. REAL bad.
that's what "Experimental" means - I guess. Thanx for sharing your experience.
Awesome. Thanks for sharing your troubleshooting. I’m sure it will help someone folks. I’m considering a Sonex turbo in the future.
You should try using some edge tape to hold the vinyl edges down. It work great on vehicle wraps etc.
Actually I'm at 80 hours and it's all fine just that little corner must have been dirty when I installed it
Hope you nailed down the detonation problem! If I had that problem, I would start at timing and compression ratio. Not over 25 degrees. I would then go to spark plug heat and as you did, air leaks and mixture. I'm retired and I've seen marine and truck engines with melted listens and valves. Good !luck.
GOT IT! it was lead in the head (see the pictures! pretty crazy). I"m running av gas. Now I have all the power I want at my finger tips! ruclips.net/video/cNxu301ukvY/видео.html
Thanks for the update Ben!
Hey Ben. This is Dwight Hoover. Good to see you flying your onex. I sold my Waiex (350 hrs) and everything else and moved out of state. Flying a Kolb firestar 2 now in Mississippi. For me the the experimental stuff wore me out. Great memories tho…
Hey Dwight! Someone asked me about transition training and you were my one ride. I told them It was predictable and responsive. Is it hot and muggy in Mississippi?
Yes it is muggy here but winters are great.. Not a lot of plan Bs here, trees and swamps. Willamette Valley is the best for flying…
@@sawdust466 yes plan b... Yes I just flew 2000 miles back to Cincinnati and the only place there really wasn't any landing options was the forest between Eugene and bend.. I got some great video of that trip I'll post it soon
Wrap some edge tape or edge coat along the wind edge. That's what we do on airliners when we do decal wraps
very cool. I was discussing with some people about what is done on airlines but we really had no clue. Is "edge" tape pretty good stickem? Turns out its holding absolutely fine. even the little corner that I did not get on properly in the first place is not coming up at all. Very happy with the stick.
Hi Ben,
Thanks for the update. I'm at the end of a Onex build and feel a little bit "out of gas". Your enthusiasm is contagious! I'll be back at it tomorrow. I look forward to an update once your get the aeroinjector dialed in.
Thanks Again,
Wes
At the end!!! Another month or 2? One of the reasons my engine was a challenge was because I bought the kit from someone else and they had a lot done but didn't remember what wasn't done. Turns out that they had the mag plate on but the flywheel wasn't torqued. Flywheel wasn't torqued because crank shims weren't in. Crank shims weren't in because the alternator had a bad chamfer and the flat head bolt wouldn't sit flush..... that's when previous owner gave. Up.....got all that done and sonex Kerry said it's better to run lower compression.....so heads off jugs off add shims. Finally back on for the 5th time! I joined the local was in Feb 2018 and told them I'd be done in April....I was putting on the vynil that December..Ha!! Finally got it to the airport in Jan and when I decided to put that belly skin on my heart went pitter patter! That was exciting. That really felt like the home stretch....All that to say Keep Going!!!
Yea, another couple of months :-) Hope it's not December. Main concern is making the seating comfortable. I really don't have a good idea. We'll see.
@@wesragle1618 hey if seating is your concern youre doing great! I still have a temporary seat cushion in mine. Had nothing for the first few hours except for a booster pad
Hi Ben, just stumbled across your Vinyl update. I am getting ready to wrap my Zenith CH750 (using Avery Dennison product). Because I have a number of protruding structural connecting elements that will be hard to wrap, I ordered from MyPerfectColor.com a 'rattle can' for 3 separate colors I am using. I will just spray paint the small interconnecting items that will be hard to wrap. All I provided them was the manufacturer paint code for each colored wrap (their website helps you do that), and they produced an exact match in a can. You can even get little 6" cans if desired. For small order like mine, I did have to pay a batch production fee of 19 bucks for each color, but felt it was worth it to save the pain and agony of wrapping in hard to reach (but visible areas).
Hey tthanks Dave that a very good tip. At some point I'll freshen up the paint on my cowling. The paint is really durable but I have all kinds of screwdriver dings and scratches from my taking my cowling on and off
Great video man! Nice to see the vinyl is holding up well, will be doing some graphics on my Sonex shortly. Same with polishing. Was "worried" I'd have to polish weekly. Thanks for the tip on masking off the vinyl when polishing, something else I was wondering about.
Polish holds up great 👍 so happy with that. Masking will be easy with the long edges graphics maybe a little more tedious
Nice airplane! Try mineral spirits for cleaning polish from the surfaces where you don't want it. It should be less aggressive on the vinyl than acetone.
thanks for the tip. Initially my main concern was the vinyl not sticking well but so far it sticks great--over 60 hours now.
I have two couple ideals for you. I would try a three or four blade prop. This will real help on p-factor on high power setting and turning tendency. It same problem two bladed props on Mooney. Add a Turbo exhaust temperature and engine head temperature sensors. Running the engine will make the engine run hotter and will lead the cylinder heads to crack. Same with the turbo, need to have inlet and exhaust temperatures with in limits to be safe. At higher altitudes that turbo will be glowing red hot.
One more item, look for throttle bodies with a separate jet/value for idle control.
Nice video
4 blade prop is like 4 times the price!
I'm a year late to the party but for anyone reading u can smoke test your intake tubing to test for boost leaks and u can also get a fine tune air regulator and hook shop air to the waste gate and slowly add pressure to verify at what pressure the waste gate actuated
Thanks for the tips Wes. I might try the blow off tip. I have one set of heads off now lapping in the valves so now might be a good time to try that. I haven't gotten it up to 45" yet but I think it would get there. I seem to have all the manifold pressure I want now. So 45-30=15/2=7.5 pounds of boost. Not as much boost as those street racers!
Hello from Central Point. Nice plane Ben...
Hey central point! I got a buddy in dredford i plan to visit this summer. Got half the engine tore off now....
I might buy a Sonex kit, but I did not wish to do the experimental work you did. But your video is 3 years old, maybe by now Sonex would have all that worked out.
Well... I definitely do some extra things but I also enjoy it... In this particular case I had detonation because I assembled the oil ring incorrectly see the link in the description.... So I guess if you don't want to do the work on your aircraft make sure you have a mechanic you can afford..... It's all about money when it comes to airplanes... Another guy mentioned his engine died six times and now he hates vw's so he will never fly anything with the VW in.
in another video of turbo aerovee operation the guy said 197 is the "do not exceed" speed for the air frame so I don't know how to evaluate engine choice. i guess that as i get closer to making a decision on what kit to buy i'll have to contact the makers. i am torn between aerobatic planes and a solid STOL kit like the CH750 super duty.. so many kits and so little time!
'
I guess s t o l would be fun if you have a lot of places to do that kind of thing or if you just like competition. Trent Palmer his channel is awesome.. but if you want to fly cheap Sonex is a great deal... I think there's one on barnstormers right now for $23,000...... Add the turbo though it makes the engine performance amazing
That's a pretty little plane. I am no longer impressed with$300,000 super cars, but am insanely jealous of you. I think I have run out of excuses. It's time to get enrolled in ground school.
The kits for these are affordable too. I believe the sonex-b 2 seater is around $45,000
Great video! Loved the detail and lessons learned. Thanks!!!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Plexus is a great product but I’ve found that lemon Pledge is great on Plexiglas and way cheaper. I use lemon Pledge and a micro fiber towel to clean my windscreens on my plane, motorcycle, and even my motorcycle helmet visor. $4/ can vs $20.
Wow! thanks for the tips.. the cleaners are realy expensive
Ben, I'm color blind, but- the vinyl looks awesome! I agree, I think there was grease or something under the canopy edge- super small & only visible to you! The wheel pants look incredible- I wouldn't have known that you didn't wrap them- that's how close they are! Just a stranger, appreciating how 'tight' your Onex looks- no way to tell!
Hi David thanks a bunch for the compliments. So you arer color blind but you can tell the paint on the wheel pants is close is it pretty obvious to you that the paint on the cowl is not close? The painter in our club sat right next to it and did not realize it was not paint although he didn't have his glasses on either. He was impressed-- that was the best compliment I had! His name is John Starr his work has been featured in some magazines.
@@1bengrubb So, yeah, color-blindness is an odd thing. I, like 70% of all men, am red/green color blind, which means that I struggle with shades of those colors. (Trust me, if my wife didn't dress me- I'd get laughed at!) But, Yellow I can see. Now, having argued with those not afflicted with color blindness, I will correct my statement and say "The yellow in the wheel pants look identical to the wrap job on the Onex body of your plane!" (Sadly Ben- that compliment has absolutely no value to anyone, but- it WAS well intended!) Hahaha! I really appreciate the time you took to show the difficult parts of mounting things inside the cowling, I definitely didn't realize just how tight the space is in there. Thanks for taking that time. P.S. Some nice greased landings at 80-85MPH- scha-Weet! Clearly, you are enjoying the fruits of your labor!
Sweet little 1 seater scooter you got there.
Thanks getting it dialed in should be a fun little pocket rocket
Wat the old saying is, don't fix nothing if it ain't broke
That is a nice looking plane
Thanks Lee i"m super happy with it. Learned some more about leaning this year but haven't done serious test yet. Also my buddy is training me on my valves---they are pretty bad so hope to get a boost with proper leaning and boost with better valve seating this next year.
@@1bengrubb well I wish you all the luck, and great flying up in that blue sky. I'm thinking about buying a Sonic, either the one you got like that one or a Sonic LS two passenger. I got a friend of mine also he's going to go get his pilot license he is talking about getting a Cessna. I'll have my sport license, we've been talking about starting a business shuffling people City to City town to town, picking up parts, transporting small dogs to town to town city to City within a five state. area, if we go longer cross country overnight he'll be licensed to fly night I only have daytime flying, I'll just fly with him to be his co-pilot at times. That's our plans hopefully they'll work out it all depends how the economy goes.
You might need a manual mixture control in the cockpit?
I'm seriously considering a Onex with the AeroVee Turbo engine. I, too, wanna go fast. I think there was a video with either Jeremy Monnett or another of his test pilots that said the Onex can easily go 180 mph. But their ads say they limited its speed to 135 mph cruise to comply with Sport Pilot regulations. Not good!
I'm not aware of which carburetor the Aero Vee comes with, but if its the centuries old Posa (looks like yours might be -- same kind of mixture setting needles), that was a big problem on my Sonerai many decades ago! The basic Posa has no manual Mixture control. The needle is supposed to adjust mixture for every throttle setting. Mine never did.
The Revmaster VW engines DO have a manual mixture control on their Posa carbs. It includes a control (much like the old push-pull choke knob) in the cockpit. I was having difficulty with my engine cutting out during test flights at Chino airport in 1980, and lucky there was Revmaster on the field (they moved up to Apple Valley or Victorville now). Joe Horvath looked at my VW with Posa and said I needed a mixture control and he had one for sale!
I installed it and found I could find a mixture setting for every throttle position that ran very good at all rpms! The problem was that it was a DIFFERENT MIXTURE setting for every change of rpm or throttle!
The mixture for 1500 rpm was great for final approach, but when I pulled the throttle back to idle in the flare.... the engine would QUIT unless I was really quick to lean out the mixture again! Too much to do while landing the airplane (especially in a crosswind -- tail dragger), and the engine would die on me at the most inopportune moment!
The Sonerai had NO starter. Didn't even have an electrical system until I bought Monnett's 10 amp alternator thing mounted on the back case of the engine and added a motorcycle battery to create an electrical system for my radio and transponder. So, there I was on an 10,000' runway at El Paso with dead engine. As usual, I leaped out, pushed the plane off the runway to a taxiway, and attempt to restart (hand prop always). But if that failed (often failed) I had to push it all the way to the FBO!
But... the hand operated mixture control was the greatest to keep the engine running smoothly. I flew it low-level all the way from Los Angeles to Patuxent River Maryland in 1981.
HI Dan check into the viking 130 also--I think it's same price as aerovee turbo 12ishGs but 130hp. I dont' think you can get the prop that Jeremy was running on that test turbo---that was a factory test setup---they had that thing dialed...Its like the pictures of McDonald burgers---they don't really look like that. But believe me I'm working on it! I think 160 cruise(@2500') might be doable but not economical??? Again check my link to Mike Farlyeys tests. YEP the AeroInjector they make comes with mixture control but it's not linear so it has a really thin sweet spot for idle. Before I got full boost out of the turbo I could go full throttle to idle and it would run great. I"m asking a bit much but I want it all!
If you lower octane, you can burn more gas to avoid knock. You won't likely go any faster, but...
Never heard that one before! I resealed my intake manifold for cyl 1&2 and it did not help I thought I had an air leak on that side. I still think I do though I may replace all my flexible couplers...I'm just confused
i watched another guys video with the turbo and he is getting 197mph in level flight at 40 inches
Oh man. That would be awesome.....i Max out it 170moh in nice calm morning air.
Fascinating video!
Thanks got another one soon!
What is your take off and you’re landing distance
Shortest landing I've done so far is first taxi way at cottage grove 61S made the first taxi on 33 right at 700' with approach at 70mph. shortest take off as far as i can tell is 800'. Haven't had done any serious tests with watchers but at least I know I'm comfortable with 1000'. The turbo on take off is amazing--feels like I could do a 50' obstacle in 50'. Bummer is I can't keep it cool so right now I think realistic climb to 5000' is 600'/min@90mph with my stubby wings. More testing this spring. My buddies RV 12 keeps 1000'/min 90-100mph easy so he left me in the dust on our climb to 3500.
hmm i had a friend who had a zenith and always played with the engine trying to get more hp out of it he asked me if i wanted to go flying one day but i couldnt go because i was painting a piper pa11 thank god i didnt he tinkered with that dam engine so much he bent that bird some how on landing i think the throttle got stuck but anyway got the plane fixed and such and be damed about 2 months latter he finally spun the bearings out of the engine my advise would be if your not sure about leaning or richening the engine or turbo work take it to an expert
By now I'm certainly becoming the expert! 4000 miles to ohio and back in July...great trip great performance.. no problem with density altitude...love my turbo.. video soon!
Ben - Very helpful info - thanks !! RE: the rusty turbo - I am wondering how a periodic shot of Corrosion X Thru your exhaust port would work when you anticipate a down time period.
Sonex said try the Stable fogger so that what I did..now at over 200 hours I don't worry about it anymore.
Nice vid, good info...Too many commercials. Follow your excitement
Thanks for suffering through the commercials I actually get a little bit of gas money from them!
Awesome
thanks Ben, great insight!!! I'm doing the Model B Turbo. So the needle information was priceless. I like the addition of the port on your exhaust to introduce the fogg solution. Do you add the solution post shut down cool down or put it on when the turbo is still hot?
I haven't tried to light the stuff and see how flammable it is but when I'm done messing around and get the cowls off I can almost touch the turbo by then and squirt the stuff in there.
After 60 hours I had forgotten to use the fogging solution and the turbo was fine. They suggested after 100 hours the turbo would be "seasoned"
I was doing ok until about the second snot swallow.
Haaaaaaa!! Habit I noticed that too..
stretching a spring hmmmm you took the life out of that spring you couls be asking for problems
Does the spring move at all? and what happens when it fails?
Noticed you did put the brake lever on this stick. Was wondering how that was working out for you
Brake lever doesn't work as good as I hoped. Just made up a mechanical linkage to the regular handle that is still there. But it does hold the plane still up to 1600 rpm. So it's enough for taxing and gentle stops and starting the engine and exiting the runway at the NEXT exit. When it wasn't working I REALLY missed it. So even though it won't hold at full power just so handy to leave your throttle/radio hand free. I have a rans S14 with the reserviour and everything on the stick--really want to do that somehow.
I am sorry, who cares for the vinyl and the polish? But the needle information is great! :-)
A little something for everyone!
I am building S/N 189 Onex, but I am a long way from building the engine. Did you build the engine? any problems there?
The engine was mostly assembled when I got it. Had to remove the cylinders to decrease compression and sent pic to sonex to confirm I had the forged pistons for the turbo. Had to add shims on crank to get rid of play. Found the chamfer on the alternator holes were done wrong so had to get a new one. Piston rod rework was done when I got it and my oil pump did not require the mod that Aerovee sent out. When I started it found out I had faulty coils that would not turn off and they sent me a new set. Also went through 4 oil pressure sensors till I went to a solid state sensor.
What length/pitch is your prop? At top speed what is your rpm, cht, egt, map?
Thanks for the update.
Prince 'P' tip 54" length 50" pitch. At 2000' 32"map=3200rpm = 142 mph IAS 370 cht 1400 egt. 35"map 3500= 150 IAS 390 cht
Thanks, Do you want more of a cruise prop or are you happy with 54x50. I recently bought a Sonex w/ turbo and 54x50. I haven’t been able to cruise much faster than 120 mph indicated, but I have been to 13500’ and could still pull 35 in. MAP. I think I need some more experience tuning the whole machine.
@@gregbuckmaster7233 I want more cruise! At takeoff power I can climb a thousand feet a minute turn downwind and be 150 mph by the end of the runway pull out the power come around the land! The key is manifold pressure and RPM. the same RPM will pull the same speed at the same conditions..BUT as your engine wears out you keep increasing manifold pressure to get the same RPM. So at 2000 ft what are all your instruments at 120 mph? Both me and my buddies arrow v heads the valves were bad. I've seen several vW guys on RUclips say that heads from the factory are often not the best quality in the valve seats need to be recut which is what I did and it's been awesome. Also the claim with the ptip prop is that effectively adds 2 in to the propeller so it's an equivalent to a 56-in prop
@@gregbuckmaster7233 also what is your GPS ground speed? My IAS is about 5-10 mph fast at 2000... Maybe your GPS ground speeds way faster and that would cheer you up!
@@gregbuckmaster7233 do the leak down test and listen at your carburetor your exhaust or your case breather tube and you'll know where the power is leaking
Would a manual boost controller work?
Not sure what that is. I have the spring so tight now I'm not sure what it would blow out off at or if it would! I have all the boost I want
WHATS THE CRUISE SPEED with the turbo?
Im at 140mph now at 2500'. I finally figured out I'm running to lean with the turbo once I get that down then 150 maybe even 160! If I can get 160 at 8 gallons an hour that would be pretty good...hmm but 140 at 6gph.
@@1bengrubb OUTSTANDING!!! What a thrill ride!
What type of gas do you use most of the time?
avgas all the time since I"m at an airport with100LL. I imagine pump gas will work since they put turbos on cars with twice the boost or more but haven't needed to try it.
How fast are you going in it nowadays?
Right now March 2022 155 mph is doable 140 is pleasant. Just a couple hours on my valve job and porting and new leaning technique. Got a noticeable difference but I'll quantify itt this spring.
That 155 and 140 is at 1500 ft altitude. At 5,000 ft it's easy to overspeed the engine so I'm thinking real hard about a faster prop
Thanks! Good info in your videos and comments!
J