UPDATE!!The 310 Kate made it home Wednesday, October 19th, on the bed of a truck. It was decided that it would much more economical to bring her home for repairs rather than travel back and forth repeatedly to Safford, AZ, from San Marcos.
The damage wasn't all that bad. The lower nose cowl section is beyond repair. A number of ribs on the flaps will have to be replaced. The oil cooler scoop and mounting bracket will need some work. We'll have to put the wings back on. The horizontal surface and elevator were removed and will have to be re-installed. Unfortunately, the control cables for that assembly were cut for convenience (certainly not ours!) and that will be a headache. The prop has seen better days, as you can see.
The bomb slung under the plane was destroyed, but held on tenaciously to the belly of the plane. The tail end of the bomb was damaged but appears to have separated on contact with the ground. We're deciding on whether to replace it with another bomb or a torpedo. We will have to fabricate it, either way.
After we pulled an amazing amount of cotton out of the bomb and the engine, we began dismantling the front end to remove the prop and engine. We were looking closely for anything that could have caused the loss of power that the pilot reported. The engine was removed on the 22nd and loaded for the trip up to Covington Engines. Below is pilot Bill Fier attaching the hoist to the crankshaft. I lifted and lowered the rear of the engine with a forklift.
Having found absolutely nothing that could have caused the power loss in the engine's fuel or electrical system, we were pleased to get a call today informing us that they found a broken exhaust pushrod in the #7 cylinder this morning. That will definitely cause an engine's induction system to back up and do exactly what Bill described. The #5 cylinder was going to be replaced because a rocker box was cracked open when the nose cowl section was pulled away on impact.
We will be doing a thorough inspection of the airframe and will roll the annual condition inspection into the repair of the aircraft. She already has some show dates scheduled in March of 2012 and she'll definitely be ready for them!
Thanks for your interest! Come see us at the Cobra Den, the CAF Centex hangar at the San Marcos, TX, airport.
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
