Avid 582 Cold Start

[BryceKat 125]

Ok Guys,

I'm at my wit's end. Why does it take so damn long to start my 582 in my Avid when its below 50 degrees? I love my 582-runs great, smooth, simple to operate, until it get's cold! Well at least cold for this Southerner. Go ahead and laugh, we think 20-30 degrees is gonna kill us! The engine will start just fine above 50, usually 2-3 blades and she's going. The plane is in my garage, with a 100 watt bulb in the cowl with some blankets over it. Today it took probably a minute of cranking, 10-15 seconds at a time, to get her started. Had to jump it off my truck and when she finally started, there was a good bit of blue smoke till she cleared up. Today's temp was 40 degrees, last night was in the 20's. Once i get her started and warm, she will start just fine. Leni, What do you Alaskans do with your inverted 582's after your 3 weeks of summer? I think this engine might never start up there ! Thanks for your help, Bryce

[akflyer 1427]

Ok Guys,

I'm at my wit's end. Why does it take so damn long to start my 582 in my Avid when its below 50 degrees? I love my 582-runs great, smooth, simple to operate, until it get's cold! Well at least cold for this Southerner. Go ahead and laugh, we think 20-30 degrees is gonna kill us! The engine will start just fine above 50, usually 2-3 blades and she's going. The plane is in my garage, with a 100 watt bulb in the cowl with some blankets over it. Today it took probably a minute of cranking, 10-15 seconds at a time, to get her started. Had to jump it off my truck and when she finally started, there was a good bit of blue smoke till she cleared up. Today's temp was 40 degrees, last night was in the 20's. Once i get her started and warm, she will start just fine. Leni, What do you Alaskans do with your inverted 582's after your 3 weeks of summer? I think this engine might never start up there ! Thanks for your help, Bryce

hahaha, 50 degrees..no preheat needed!

OK, that was just cause you said I would laugh.

#1 do you have primer or mixture enricheners?

#2 Blue smoke is OIL. The oil from the cylinder walls will creep down and soak your plugs on the inverted engine. It is normal for the lil puff of blue smoke for a minute or two as it burns out of the cylinders and exhaust.

Here is my procedure for starting in temps down to -25 without preheat!

Crack throttle open just a tad, hit the starter and pump the primer a few times till she fires. You want to get enough gas in there to wash the oil off the plugs but not flood it. I have found that priming without cranking leads to easy flooding. I cant ever remember having to crank it more than 10 seconds to get it to fire off unless I have flooded it when I was first learning the inverted starting and got a lil carried away with the primer.

I have only had an issue one time where it would not start, and that was due to a bad battery connection.

Now I am cheating and have a clutch so I dont have to get that prop swinging when it is cold, but if you have a good battery, it should not matter as we have all flown out and had to start side by side at -25 and the other guys started up almost as easy as mine.

If you dont have the primer, I would say spend the 20 or 30 bucks and install one. If using the mixture enricheners, make sure the throttle is at a dead idle or they will not work properly to really get the mixture rich.

What model bird you have? looks like a MK IV. Dont be afraid to post up pics over here!

[BryceKat 125]

HI Leni,

Thanks. I do have a primer. I hit the starter then give her a couple of shots of primer while cranking. Yesterday about 5 shots of prime, and then i quit priming to prevent flooding. Once the engine finally fired i had to prime 2 more shots to keep running initially. The time before last, i kept priming and of course flooded it!

When you crack the throttle, what rpm does that translate to?

What plugs are you using? I run the solid cap BR8ES. Was thinking of trying the BR8EV with the precious metal tips recommended by CPS. But if ya'll are using normal plugs that doesn't make sense for me to have to use those special plugs.

My plane is a MK IV w/ stol wings. Have you rolled an Avid w/ stol wings? I've looped mine, but am waiting for some testical enlargement to roll her. Roll rate seems a little slow! Thanks for your help, Bryce

hahaha, 50 degrees..no preheat needed!

OK, that was just cause you said I would laugh.

#1 do you have primer or mixture enricheners?

#2 Blue smoke is OIL. The oil from the cylinder walls will creep down and soak your plugs on the inverted engine. It is normal for the lil puff of blue smoke for a minute or two as it burns out of the cylinders and exhaust.

Here is my procedure for starting in temps down to -25 without preheat!

Crack throttle open just a tad, hit the starter and pump the primer a few times till she fires. You want to get enough gas in there to wash the oil off the plugs but not flood it. I have found that priming without cranking leads to easy flooding. I cant ever remember having to crank it more than 10 seconds to get it to fire off unless I have flooded it when I was first learning the inverted starting and got a lil carried away with the primer.

I have only had an issue one time where it would not start, and that was due to a bad battery connection.

Now I am cheating and have a clutch so I dont have to get that prop swinging when it is cold, but if you have a good battery, it should not matter as we have all flown out and had to start side by side at -25 and the other guys started up almost as easy as mine.

If you dont have the primer, I would say spend the 20 or 30 bucks and install one. If using the mixture enricheners, make sure the throttle is at a dead idle or they will not work properly to really get the mixture rich.

What model bird you have? looks like a MK IV. Dont be afraid to post up pics over here!

[akflyer 1427]

HI Leni,

Thanks. I do have a primer. I hit the starter then give her a couple of shots of primer while cranking. Yesterday about 5 shots of prime, and then i quit priming to prevent flooding. Once the engine finally fired i had to prime 2 more shots to keep running initially. The time before last, i kept priming and of course flooded it!

When you crack the throttle, what rpm does that translate to?

What plugs are you using? I run the solid cap BR8ES. Was thinking of trying the BR8EV with the precious metal tips recommended by CPS. But if ya'll are using normal plugs that doesn't make sense for me to have to use those special plugs.

My plane is a MK IV w/ stol wings. Have you rolled an Avid w/ stol wings? I've looped mine, but am waiting for some testical enlargement to roll her. Roll rate seems a little slow! Thanks for your help, Bryce

By cracking the throttle I mean giving it a couple turns in, when it fires it will hit about 2200 RPM. After the last shot of primer I feed it I leave the plunger out if it is real cold out and slowly push it in once it fires to keep it going for those first few seconds.

One other thing, I notice that the primer lines will run dry after a little while of running, so when you first go to prime it it takes a few extra shots to get the first bit of gas to the carbs. I have found that I had to work real hard to flood the engine if I only prime while cranking. If it does not light right off, give her a few more shots.

What oil are you running? Full on synthetic does not stick to the cylinder walls and will really run down and goo up the plugs.

I just run the BR8ES (3961 solid caps) Make sure the plug gap is closer to the .016" instead of .018".

I never rolled or looped mine. I figure I push the envelope far enough with my normal flying One of these days I will get the balls to loop it maybe, but most of the time it is on floats and that really takes away from the vertical performance! I had an RC trainer with an under cambered wing and it HATED to roll. Anytime it was inverted, I dont care how much down elevator you gave it, she would just head for the ground.

How many RPM are you turning when you are cranking? You have to hit that magic minimum of 250 to get a good spark on the 582. I wish someone would come up with an electronic ignition for these so it did not matter what the RPM was it would fire. I have several older RC gas engines that I converted to electronic ignition and WOW did that make a difference in starting (and over all perfromance).

[BryceKat 125]

Hey Leni,

I noticed that (running dry) on my old primer, i had to replace it this summer, and just swapped it with a new one. I never verified the amount this new primer is dispensing.

Oil is all synthetic j-tec 4 from citgo. Trying to keep Hugo Chavez in power That might be causing a problem. What oil are you using?

I ordered some ngk iridium plugs today. They replaced the ones i mentioned. The guy at NGK said it would help starting in a fouled situation. So we'll try throwing $$$ at the problem

Yesterdays minute plus starting ordeal had the engine spinning @ 600 rpm according to the tach. I remembered what was mentioned about the rpm requirement, so i verified that.

Do you still fly RC's? My last was a great planes Super Stearmen w a FPE 2.4, smoke and even a banner tow set up. An awesome combination until i took off one day with out doing a proper preflight and pulling my head out of my Ass! My longest banner was 30 feet long and 18 inches tall, the plane probably could have handled another 10 feet of banner. I gotta get another Stearmen, it was great!

I was looking at your heat muff set up, you got anymore pics of your set up? I tried something similar by cutting a hole in the firewall behind the muffler, but i didnt do the heat shroud. I definitely couldn't fly in -15, Hell that's ok cause i couldn't even get started in +15

Thanks for your help. Bryce

By cracking the throttle I mean giving it a couple turns in, when it fires it will hit about 2200 RPM. After the last shot of primer I feed it I leave the plunger out if it is real cold out and slowly push it in once it fires to keep it going for those first few seconds.

One other thing, I notice that the primer lines will run dry after a little while of running, so when you first go to prime it it takes a few extra shots to get the first bit of gas to the carbs. I have found that I had to work real hard to flood the engine if I only prime while cranking. If it does not light right off, give her a few more shots.

What oil are you running? Full on synthetic does not stick to the cylinder walls and will really run down and goo up the plugs.

I just run the BR8ES (3961 solid caps) Make sure the plug gap is closer to the .016" instead of .018".

I never rolled or looped mine. I figure I push the envelope far enough with my normal flying One of these days I will get the balls to loop it maybe, but most of the time it is on floats and that really takes away from the vertical performance! I had an RC trainer with an under cambered wing and it HATED to roll. Anytime it was inverted, I dont care how much down elevator you gave it, she would just head for the ground.

How many RPM are you turning when you are cranking? You have to hit that magic minimum of 250 to get a good spark on the 582. I wish someone would come up with an electronic ignition for these so it did not matter what the RPM was it would fire. I have several older RC gas engines that I converted to electronic ignition and WOW did that make a difference in starting (and over all perfromance).

[SuberAvid 617]

Hey Leni,

I noticed that (running dry) on my old primer, i had to replace it this summer, and just swapped it with a new one. I never verified the amount this new primer is dispensing.

Oil is all synthetic j-tec 4 from citgo. Trying to keep Hugo Chavez in power That might be causing a problem. What oil are you using?

I ordered some ngk iridium plugs today. They replaced the ones i mentioned. The guy at NGK said it would help starting in a fouled situation. So we'll try throwing $$$ at the problem

Yesterdays minute plus starting ordeal had the engine spinning @ 600 rpm according to the tach. I remembered what was mentioned about the rpm requirement, so i verified that.

Do you still fly RC's? My last was a great planes Super Stearmen w a FPE 2.4, smoke and even a banner tow set up. An awesome combination until i took off one day with out doing a proper preflight and pulling my head out of my Ass! My longest banner was 30 feet long and 18 inches tall, the plane probably could have handled another 10 feet of banner. I gotta get another Stearmen, it was great!

I was looking at your heat muff set up, you got anymore pics of your set up? I tried something similar by cutting a hole in the firewall behind the muffler, but i didnt do the heat shroud. I definitely couldn't fly in -15, Hell that's ok cause i couldn't even get started in +15

Thanks for your help. Bryce

Bryce,

I used the NGK EVX plugs in my 582 ; kind of spendy but they are very hard to foul and run a long time before you need to change them. With the standard NGK plugs I would get an occasional miss after about 40 to 50 hours and the EVX's never did that; plus they fire in that pool of oil they sit in after the engine sits for a while. I had to pump the primer a few strokes before the gas got to it but I could feel it start pumping he gas; then gave is 5 strokes on a cold motor but had to be careful not to go any more. I think Leni's prcedure of priming while cranking is better to keep from flooding it though.