"Mortimer Schnerd, RN" wrote in message
. com...
Matt Barrow wrote:
AVweb's John Deakin takes aim at yet another OWT (Old Wive's Tale).
While
running a fuel tank dry in your recip powered plane may serve to
increase
your heart rate, John explains why it's not such a bad thing at all, and
it
is probably a really good idea for most of us. In fact, John explains
why
it's one of the first things you ought to do with a new plane and how it
could save your life someday.


Flying the old Cherokee Six with four fuel tanks, you'd end up with almost
10
gallons unusable if you didn't run a tank dry occasionally. I tried to
never
let it happen with passengers on board. Screwed up once though...
probably
scared the hell out of them though nobody said anything about it once I'd
explained what had happened. Mea culpa.


You might want to try Deakin's approach of gathering fuel data when alone
and then be rather cautious of warning passengers that the engine will
"burp" before it happens. One aside is that I'd not recommend it with
passengers that are "Nervous Nellie's" to begin with.

Of all the people that I take as passengers (family and business partners)
all have been around GA a long time and so are comfortable with GA (that
might be a good thread: Those who will fly airlines but not GA). two of my
partners have private tickets, my son has his IR, my daughter her PVT, and
my wife has soloed. They have NO problem with an engine burping.

It is reassuring to know that my useable fuel is actually eight gallons more
than the specs portray...not that I push that foolishly.


--
Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO