Two weeks ago, I sputtered while I was flying from the Seattle area to Idaho. In retrospect, it was no big deal, but it sure gave me an adrenalin surge at the time.

I was crossing the Cascades, looking down at the Alpine Lakes Wilderness area, marvelling at the incredibly rough, jagged terrain, thinking how much fun it would be enjoying the solitude there on the ground.

All of a sudden, the engine went from very smooth to very rough, and so I pulled the carb heat knob. Instantly, the engine went silent, the rugged peaks started getting bigger, and my sphincter achieved a new personal record on the pucker factor scale. I cycled the carb heat again to no avail, then cycled the throttle, at which it roared back to life.

I played around with it a bit, and discovered I could easily reproduce the engine roughness with low throttle and no carb heat. Full throttle, or low throttle with carb heat, produced no problems. After about 20 minutes, I was over the central Washington Basin, and I could no longer reproduce the problem.

Other pilots had told me that they occasionally got carb ice while crossing the Cascades, but it was the first time in my life that I've experienced it. I was quite surprised that I didn't have more warning. I thought that the onset of engine roughness would be more gradual.

That's called "mountain fever", aka "auto-rough"--very similar to the "sea-sickness" experienced over large bodies of water. The "city shakes" is the same thing experienced over large urban areas with no landing sites available.

I've had fuel injectors clog a couple of times, no big deal, it does run rough, but it does run, and a gas generator rotor burst on a turbine, but I did have another engine
Knock on wood

Not a sputter, but still kind of a pucker moment.

I had just taken off in the Cherokee 180 and was in the pattern when I suddenly caught a strong whiff of smoke, the acrid electrical-insulation smoke. The cabin seemed clear, but I went ahead and made the 'not sure if I'm gonna explode in midair or what' message on CTAF, and made an abbreviated slip-to-final.
By the time I rolled up to the maintenance hangar, the smell was gone. We checked everything underneath (I'd checked the breakers right after I smelled the smoke) and couldn't find a source for the stink.
The mechanic cleared the plane for flight, and I took her up again. I also
looked down some, and one of my suspicions was confirmed. I'd flown through the smoke column from someone's trash fire.

I'm glad I was able to keep my head together and to get back down safely. This was my second solo flight, by the way.

No sputter, just normal engine noise and then suddenly.... silence. Very peaceful. Very unsettling. Boost pump on, switch fuel tanks, then VROOM, engine roars back to life. When that old RV-4 ran out of fuel in one tank it didn't warn you, it just quit.

Oh well, I deserved it.

Just flying along today, and suddenly everything goes utterly silent- Oh wait, that's just my new Lightspeed Zulu

I have a sputter story.....I got a 152 as my first plane, and it was a doozie that we got CHEAP off the old ebay. I was flying it local one day with a buddy who had never been in an airplane before, well we hit some nasty turbulence as we reach the foothills of the Adirondacks, so we said we might as well turn back.

We were about 1300' agl 4 miles from the airport when it all went quiet . I had about 150hrs at this point, luckily there was a field nearby. I didn't have enough alt to go in upwind so downwind it was, and it was about 15kts on our back. We chewed up the first half of the field FAST, at which point I pulled my flaps back in to get it on the ground. It was a corn field and we went in parallel to the rows, but sill burried the nose wheel and did a very graceful ground loop over the nose.

We came to rest upside down. I popped my belt, hit the switches off and got the F**K out of the plane. After running 20 ft away I looked back and my passenger is still hanging there...... . So I got him down, and we both walked away w/o a scratch. I believe on the walk out of the field I told him that "not that I want to do this again but that was F$%*ing awesome" must have been the adrenalin. But it was definitely a chance to see what your made of.

I think it probably was carb ice that stopped the engine, the faa didn't get really deep into it since no one got hurt, but we did test and find continuity. I was a really low time pilot, got lucky and am quite happy. My passenger who had never flown before (ever) had quite the experience, though said he never really worried the whole time since I kept my cool and told him what was going on.

NEVER AGAIN DO I WANT TO HEAR THE SILENCE, and it definitely effects the way I fly now for better and worse.


Mike

I had considered a motorglider... some look a lot like
'normal' airplanes, and would be a hoot if ya shut the mill
down with a passenger aboard.

denalipilot wrote:Just flying along today, and suddenly everything goes utterly silent- Oh wait, that's just my new Lightspeed Zulu

I was looking at a snapshot of BCP from 2008, and saw this thread on the homepage. Good memories here.

Rocky. Question, Are you getting your fuel from 1 source, If so have you looked at there filter system?
Good Luck!

M6RV6 wrote:Rocky. Question, Are you getting your fuel from 1 source, If so have you looked at there filter system?
Good Luck!

I haven't heard from Rocky in years. Last I heard he sold his 180 and quit flying. Prove me wrong, Rocky!