Made my first flight tonight on a Continental O-470R that I just installed with 0SMOH on my Cessna 180. It ran great and I was able to pull 24 inches of M.P., which isn't always possible on a warm day here in Central Oregon. The shop used ECI heavy head nickel cylinders, which are supposed to be the most forgiving to deviations from optimal break in conditions...

I have two questions:

1. The oil pressure was out of the green arc, but on the high end (approximately 75 PSI). Should I accept this or make adjustments? What is the drawback of excessive oil pressure?

2. Climbing at 100 indicated to about 1000' agl and transitioning to a cruise setting so that I stay low enough to maximize mean brake effective pressure, my CHT on Cylinder number 3 (the "hot" one) never even reached 300 degrees, where the bottom of the green arc starts on my gauge. Of course the CHT is not the barrel temp, and the rings seating is more a factor of the conditions on the barrel surface, but if things are too cool, can the rings seat properly? The information available on engine break in is like the info circulating on ROP/LOP operations- widely varying and often contradictory. There are certain things that most people agree upon, for instance: the biggest concern is not exceeding the CHT limits. If my CHTs are too low, can that be detrimental as well? Might be able to close up the cowl flaps and climb slower for hour number two to elevate temps a bit.

Run the heck out of it. Simple. Don't run less than 70 % power, if you can get there, during break in.

I watch oil temps more than CHT during break in. You should see pretty high oil temps, that then level off and drop again.

I would get the oil pressure adjusted to stay within the "normal" range. High oil pressure may put undue stress on seals, etc. There's a reason they put a green arc on that gauge. That is, of course, assuming the gauge is indeed accurate.

I've broken in twelve or so engines, and never had a problem with any during or after. It's not rocket science.

Run lots of power to help seat the rings, watch the temps and change the oil at ten hours or so.

If your CHTs are low, close the cowl flaps some.....CHTs should be in the green as well.

MTV

I agree with everything MTV said and will add that our most recent engine break-in instructions said not to do flights less than 30 minutes.

This is just like asking which oil is best to use. Everybody has a different opinion but most agree on running fairly hard. Climb slow to keep temps cool. Run rpm at the top of the green for at least the first hour. Then I like to vary the rpms between top of the green and cruise every 10 minutes or so for the next couple of hours. Check filter at 10 hours (no oil change) then again at 25 hours along with an oil change.

My 2 cents.

Follow the brake in procedure the engine shop provided. They are the ones you have to deal with if something needs fixing.

If you need to have it worked on in the warranty period and they ask how you broke it in and if you followed their procedure, and you say I did what my expert friends on BCP said to do.

What do you think they will say about your warranty? My guess, voided.

When I had my 540 done the shop was explicit in writing how to brake in.

On a side note. PAE Premier Aircraft Engine at the Troutdale airport did an engine for a friend of mine 12 years ago!!!!! He put 350 hours on it. It broke some rings. They fixed it for free, parts and labor, after 12 years!!!!! This happened 3 months ago. No shi$

http://www.premieraircraft.net/

Cheers

Breaking in engines is fun ! Keep it fire-walled and stay under 3000-4000 ft. MSL. turn the prop rpm back to 2450 and leave the MP as high as you get. Keep nose down and cool as much possible .Depending on type of cylinders and rings you should be "broken in" in 3-5 hours. After hour or 2 in local airport (with everything in green ) try a short 2-3 hour cross country .Take extra oil -your going to use . 75PSI when you first crank up is ok -after 10-15 min. pressure should drop to 40-50 psi. on back of engine is oil pressure and can be turned up or down.

When I had the C-145 engine in my old 170 overhauled years ago, the new ECI cylinders came with a 20-page "break-in instructions" booklet. You shold have gotten one with your new cylinders-- read it. If you didn't get one, I'm sure ECI can send you one or maybe it's available online.

Great information! I have followed the break in instructions from the engine shop. They are really nothing more than power settings for durations and servicing intervals. The general consensus is run it hard and keep it cool.

Hotrod150 - I did see ECI's document on their website. Good background info.

Basically they say keep it cool, no extended taxiing ops, run it at least 75% power for the first 30 minute flight. Then 65-75% power for the next 50 hours. They recommend Phillips XC20-50. They also say that a one-to-two hour "run-in" is very important. Unfortunately, most non-engine-specialty shops don't have a test stand or test clubs with which to do this.

hotrod150 wrote:Basically they say keep it cool, no extended taxiing ops, run it at least 75% power for the first 30 minute flight. Then 65-75% power for the next 50 hours. They recommend Phillips XC20-50. They also say that a one-to-two hour "run-in" is very important. Unfortunately, most non-engine-specialty shops don't have a test stand or test clubs with which to do this.

The shop that overhauled my 470 put two hours of test cell time on the engine. It's running great with very low oil consumption after 5 hours.

One thing I did at my last overhaul was bleed the oil pressure line to the gauge. There was 40 years of crud, sludge, funk and ??? so I removed the whole line and gave it a wholesale flush. Some of it didn't resemble engine oil. Now its clean-

Just my .02

182 STOL driver wrote:Keep it fire-walled and stay under 3000-4000 ft. MSL.

So what do you do if you are based at a higher elevation? Say something above 6K.

whee wrote:
So what do you do if you are based at a higher elevation? Say something above 6K.

I spoke with someone here yesterday who said he had to get two cylinders rehoned from flying too high during break in...we are based at 5k'. Said I should plan on staying 'as close to the ground as possible' for a few hours, perhaps on the way to Nebraska to stay low so I can generate more MP to start breaking in the engine tomorrow.

whee wrote:

182 STOL driver wrote:Keep it fire-walled and stay under 3000-4000 ft. MSL.

So what do you do if you are based at a higher elevation? Say something above 6K.

I found this article to be very informative with the illustrations of how adequate BMEP is so critical to seating the rings: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/document-pr ... id=3662002

I live at 3500', and was concerned about being able to pull enough M.P. My plan was to fly down the river valley from home base until I could reach adequate manifold pressure. I was able to reach 24+ at pattern elevation in on a cool evening, which allowed me to fly the first half hour within gliding distance if anything were to go wrong. At about 5000' it began dropping off significantly. I probably wouldn't plan on staying at 5000' plus to break in a new engine. You could probably fly for 15-20 minutes without doing irreparable damage to the engine, then get low and run it hard. Others might have understanding to the contrary. How far is it to lower elevation Whee?

Can anyone tell me if the peak BMEP would equal manifold pressure times the compression ratio?

Scolopax wrote:How far is it to lower elevation Whee?

Couple hours to get below 4k, couple more to below 3k. All well outside the phase 1 test area. Have to put 40hrs on an engine within 50 miles of an airport that is at almost 7k. 9.5msl would be required to get out of the area.

whee wrote:

182 STOL driver wrote:Keep it fire-walled and stay under 3000-4000 ft. MSL.

So what do you do if you are based at a higher elevation? Say something above 6K.

Stay under 7500 -DENSITY ALTITUDE -Higher and you can't get 75% power with full power. It would be a good idea to TOW airplane to Near runway --- DON"T sit in a Conga line taxing ! Call the tower on the phone if necessary and get them to get you a "direct to runway departure " -do a runup /mag check on the roll .

Well I imagine that the top on this engine is already toast if things are that sensitive. I made its second successful flight last week and the engine already had over 10 hours hours on it. That is a lot of time on the ground. Guess I will just do the best I can and budget for an early top overhaul

Extended ground running and low MAP approaches are the usual problems running an engine in. Don't 'plan' on a top though because chances are it'll be fine. Things to look out for are obviously excess oil consumption, fouling plugs and the oil turning black real quick. What does the oil look like after 10 hours?

whee wrote:Well I imagine that the top on this engine is already toast if things are that sensitive. I made its second successful flight last week and the engine already had over 10 hours hours on it. That is a lot of time on the ground. Guess I will just do the best I can and budget for an early top overhaul

I wouldn't assume that all is lost Whee. I'm not sure how sensitive the process is. If you are running a lower compression engine, the temps never get too high unless you are running high power settings with little airflow. If the hatching on the cylinder wall oil glazes, that's when the rings will not seat. If that has not occurred, you can still probably seat them. I've heard that the engine is not fully broken in until 50-100 hours. If I were in your position, I would consider flying to the lowest spot that is a reasonable distance and run it hard on a cool high pressure day and put some pressure on it.

I talked to the guy who built the engine, and has been building them for years, and he said just fly it. Only thing to worry about is keeping the CHT under 425.