big,

I agree with most of your post, but I think there's more to this adapter stuff... Niagra is good, so I won't knock them, but if I were in the market for an adapter right now I'd be calling Aircraft Specialties. They have the adapter thing down to a science.

A faster starter is just a band aid... perfect timing is wonderful... sooner or later the stars are not going to be aligned and shes gonna try and turn the wrong way (albeit for a nano second). Having a tolerant starter, and an adapter that "survives a kick back better than new" (your words) is about as logical as it gets to me

I wish you luck with that one.... Notice any similarities between your broken unit, Scaly's, and NZ's 2 broken units? They're all the same ... same as your new one

I think one of the problems is that when people talk adapters, they say old vs new.... The problem with that is that there are about 12 different adapters that could be on an O-470 thru O-550... So it's not just as simple as old vs new..

That is also the problem with the SB you linked to, It is in fact for both new and old style adapters, but not all the new or old adapters. Mine is an xxxxx-A4. It does not fall under that SB Is that good? I duuno, what I do know is I have watched it spin backwards on many occasions with no ill effect. I wouldn't recommend hand turning an xxxxA-18 like I believe you have purchased backwards... Oh, and incedently.. the xxxxA-18 falls under that SB

Anyways... an honest best wishes from this end of the internet

Thanks Rob. Fingers crossed that it wont happen again.

I did go back and forth RE: A4 vs/ A18, and did in fact speak with Aircraft Specialties. Everyone has pretty much the same thing to say. MT is just too light to create a flywheel effect. Getting a starter that can turn fast enough along with exact timing (some even choose to retard a bit) is the only hope when using the MT.

FWIW, its not that the A4 can "survive" the kickback, its that when the spring does get insulted, it tends to bend rather than break. This deformation can score the surface underneath and produce metal. For me, I'd rather the spring on the A18 act like a fuse and break clean than push thru and possibly lunch the entire engine. After all, I can always hand prop (ouch) and fly home.

Some good comments here. Most of which I agree with. I have had another operator contact me with multiple spring breaks on a new adapter also, so I don't think it was just bad luck on my behalf. I have also redone mags and double checked timing and since going to an old adapter have seen the prop spin backwards on several occasions.
When I talk new and old style I'm generically referring to one that allows backward movement or not.
I believe the "fear" of the old adapter is having the spring bind up by using a starter that doesn't release adequately, and yes that's a bigger problem than just a broken spring. Happened lots with the iskra starter.
Like bigrenna says changing components in a proven system leads to other consequences, it's understanding what controls to put in place is the key.
BTW other brand (alloy) props also break new adapter springs.
Be interesting to see the longevity of either 'solution' either way.

So.....maybe someone can prescribe for me what should go on the plane. After reading through these 5 pages, I'm a bit confused.

Continental IO-520d.
3-blade MT prop.

Which starter and which starter drive should be on the motor? Specifics would be much appreciated.

+1 on specifics. I have no idea which adapter we have but we have over 800 hours on an MT with no issues. I will now find out which one. Do I understand correctly that the -A4 is the older one and the A-18 is the newer one? We went back to the old style starter after trying the new Hartzel (twice) which was a disaster. We are however suffering from slow cranking. We have the small battery on the firewall, which is new. All leads and groundings checked and starter reconditioned. Could this be an adapter issue? It is not slipping, just struggling to get over the first few compression's?

Current production "old style" motor, or original production motor?

Corporate made a change in field coil wiring maybe 20 years ago. Saved them maybe 4 inches of wire.

May not be your issue.
I had a slow cranking motor, continous starting problems brand new, fought it for a year.
Shop old-timer rewired the field coils to what the original design was. 200% cranking improvement. No starting issues at all 5 years, (but not enough hours) on a O470K w/ 88 inch mac

shows wired that old way in older books and service manuals, so no paper work needed.

HTH
--Bill

Trying to decide which is the best adapter again...having engine tore down and going ahead with a major overhaul and "new" cylinders while its in the engine shop.

Thinking I'll go with the classic style adapter this time. Motor will be done in next couple weeks.

Edited post...stuck with the new style adapter.

JamieG wrote: We went back to the old style starter after trying the new Hartzel (twice) which was a disaster.

Which Hartzell starter was this? The energizer style? What was the disaster?

Hartzell M-Drive. Got a dozen or so starts out of it. Cranked like crazy. Then started to slip to the point where it would'nt turn over at all. Sent it back for another one which did the exact same thing. Gave up and put the original one back on. Been good ever since.

See also
https://www.backcountrypilot.org/forum/ ... junk-16937

JamieG wrote:. We are however suffering from slow cranking. We have the small battery on the firewall, which is new. All leads and groundings checked and starter reconditioned. Could this be an adapter issue? It is not slipping, just struggling to get over the first few compression's?

I had something similar Jamie with my firewall battery, tried swapping out starters and checking, rechecking all groundings, starter adapter etc. Turned out it was the battery had dropped a cell or such like. It would charge and show full voltage, but put a load on it and it dropped like crazy. Could barely make it crank over in the end. Simple check, worth a look?

Thanks Ivor. I did put a new battery in not so long ago, I might try another and see if that's it.
Jamie

all you big engine guys are giving me an education but I have the IO 360 in my Maule with a sky tec lightweight starter... just this week it started to slip on start up... prop turns then stops while starter still whines... do all the fixes and symptoms in the past pages relate to my IO 360 and in talking to my mechanic his preliminary guess is it's the adaptor and mor likely the spring...the sky tec has been on for several years without a problem ...and I still have the old starter in a box...

I'm assuming that you are running a Lycoming engine. The Lycoming 360 series doesn't have the same issues as the large continentals due to the orientation difference between the starters. On your Lycoming, it is possible that you can shear a pin on a kickback, but many new skytec starters have the replacement pins attached to the starter so that you can replace it. On a continental with a new style drive adapter, if you break something, it's going to be a lot of work getting to it to repair.

In other news, I'm pulling the 185 out this morning to fire up the new MT for the first time with my mechanic since we did a bunch of stuff to the engine and he wants to make sure everything is attached well. If all goes well I should have a pirep coming in the near future.

Iceman has a TCM IO360. Yes, almost all the info here applies to the IO360.

Forgive me if I missed it, but has anyone suffered a broken starter adapter when using an MT prop and the old Energizer starter on a 180, or is it 100% correlated to lightweight starters?

In 10 years I haven't had a single kickback on my o470, but I have the Energizer starter and a McCauley prop.

thanks whee,,, i'm beginning to think it might just be a weak battery... it's a concord RC 25 xc and it's been in for 4 years... starter engages , prop turns and stops while the starter motor still whines... put a battery charger on tonight and needle went to 5 amps and after an hour was at 2.5 amps... could a weak battery keep the starter whining but not spin the prop...

I flew the 185 yesterday with the MT 3 blade. I installed a new energizer-style starter and overhauled the mags. I left the new-style starter adapter. Net change to weight was -10 lbs.

My first start was a nail biter. I didn't want any kickback problems. That new starter just worked amazingly well and flipped that prop right over and she lit up. Damn that prop spools up fast. I had the throttle pushed in a little high and the engine jumped to life and hit 1300 rpm in what seemed like a sixteenth of a second. My Husky with an MT doesn't even spool up that fast.

Takeoff and climb performance seemed slightly better. Hard to say exactly since my plane flies so differently at different weights. Cruise performance at same power settings was about 3 mph slower, but again, probably not an apples to apples comparison. I will need to fly the plane a while to really see if performance is different.

I am hoping that in one particular area the performance is improved and that is in power off glide. My 3-blade black Mac is a serious air brake when the power comes off. It is great when trying to slow down quickly but not as good if you lose an engine. I am hoping that my glide ratio will increase with the MT.

I was also hoping that my noise imprint would be reduced. That 88" prop is a real screamer. However, after taking off yesterday, my friend called me and said, "did you take off at 1132 from Soldotna"? He lives 4 miles away from the airport....and he was inside his house.

The MT prop is smooth as is and hasn't been dynamically balanced yet. My black Mac was super smooth and in some ways smoother. With the MT, I now feel as if the engine has an occasional almost imperceptible shake. On the initial test flight, my mechanic said he couldn't feel it. But I could because it was different. I think the heavier Black Mac just dampened it out.

I did three hot starts without kickback problems, but the engine did do its usual sputter and cough dance before stabilizing and I was worried the entire time.

I'm hoping the prop will continue to perform as well as it looks.

Engine crapping out...would pulling the prop knob out to coarsen the pitch help the glide? Assuming enough oil pressure to operate the hub, or course.

Noise...what's the diameter of the 3-blade MT?

Shake.... last June I installed a fresh 88" Mac C201 prop. Took off great, cruised nicely, but just about the time I turned base to land the rpm came down below 2000 and I got a shake. Seemed to be between 1700 & 2000, not a range I see much except when landing but any shake any time can't be a good thing. I called the prop shop and he said the first thing "they" tell you to do in that situation is to pull the prop, turn it 180 degrees, and reinstall. I did so and it smoothed right out. Does MT or Cessna specify an orientation for the 3 blade? Maybe turn it one blade & see what happens, if no joy then turn it another blade & re-try?

PA12_Pilot wrote:

Skalywag wrote:My IA who has replaced many drives said I should be fine and it's almost always a clean break with the new style drive, I sure hope he's right.

At work we have starter drive adapters fail with regularity (our planes fly 80 - 120 hours per month). The end of the spring gets worn and won't engage or the spring breaks. In either instance, our mechanics remove and replace the starter drive adapter and send us on our way: no angst about metal in the oil. So I don't think you have any metal contamination issues to worry about.

Symptoms of the end of the spring wearing: when you engage the starter you'll hear a whirring sound, but the prop won't spin. Often if you re-engage the starter you'll get a good start. From my experience, when this happens you have between zero and ten more starts before the end of the spring is worn too much to engage.

this is exactly what i'm experiencing...starter engages, prop starts to turn then stops while starter whirrs away... stop and re engage the starter and she starts... so i would surmise the spring is worn.. or wearing... although I have a TCM IO 360 with a McCauley prop and a sky tek lightweight starter....if the starter is the problem I would gladly go back to the old boat anchor starter but I'm not sure the sky tek is the problem... have had the starter on for a couple years so it isn't a new install....

I didn't read the entire thread so maybe I'm off here.
I think sky tec starters must have some kind of a clutch in them?
I had problems with mine slipping.
Held the starter in a vise and put a wrench on the drive, supplied power to it and could keep the drive from turning.
The motor was turning though.