Post-Annual Flight

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 22:27:27 GMT, "Jay Honeck"
wrote:

I thought placarding as "INOP" was only legal for non-required
equipment? Required equipment being what is listed in 91.205 ANDed
with the aircraft equipment list?

Apparently having three other fuel tanks to choose from makes a single
tank's fuel gauge "non-required"...

Not if the regulation says *EACH* tank guage. Does your equipment
list have R, S, or O next to the guage for the tank?

On Feb 21, 7:13*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 22:27:27 GMT, "Jay Honeck"

wrote:
Apparently having three other fuel tanks to choose from makes a single
tank's fuel gauge "non-required"...

Not if the regulation says *EACH* tank guage. *Does your equipment
list have R, S, or O *next to the guage for the tank?

As far as I know, typical small personal planes don't even have
approved MELs. But even if the PA-28-325 had one, the wording of
91.213a only allows an MEL to impose ADDITIONAL requirements for
airworthiness; an MEL doen't override the basic reqirements of 91.205.
(When a regulation says "You can't do X unless Y", that doesn't mean
that Y is the ONLY requirement you have to meet. For example, if a
regulation says "You can't be PIC unless you have a current medical
certificate", that doesn't mean that medical certification is the ONLY
requirement for being PIC; rather, all requirements stated elsewhere
are still in force as well.)

The Cessna was just as bad. In the wing root and a pain in the ass.



Jay Honeck wrote:
Nice design, Mr. Piper. Beech Bonanza you take off the access port on
the top of the wing to expose the top of the bladder where sender is
located. Remove 6 or 8 more screws and sender comes out. No need for
tank to be empty, down 5-10 gallons helpful. Sender out in 5 minutes.

Agreed. Making the sending unit inaccessible without removing the tank
is crazy. But it's just another goofy thing in aviation, non-specific
to Piper products. I suspect every owner can tell a maintenance story
about "stupid-design-induced-headaches" on their brand of airplane.

Thankfully, the sending units on our tip tanks are much easier to work
on, should that ever become necessary.

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 17:01:25 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

On Feb 21, 7:13*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 22:27:27 GMT, "Jay Honeck"

wrote:
Apparently having three other fuel tanks to choose from makes a single
tank's fuel gauge "non-required"...

Not if the regulation says *EACH* tank guage. *Does your equipment
list have R, S, or O *next to the guage for the tank?

As far as I know, typical small personal planes don't even have
approved MELs. But even if the PA-28-325 had one, the wording of
91.213a only allows an MEL to impose ADDITIONAL requirements for
airworthiness; an MEL doen't override the basic reqirements of 91.205.
(When a regulation says "You can't do X unless Y", that doesn't mean
that Y is the ONLY requirement you have to meet. For example, if a
regulation says "You can't be PIC unless you have a current medical
certificate", that doesn't mean that medical certification is the ONLY
requirement for being PIC; rather, all requirements stated elsewhere
are still in force as well.)

An equipment list is different from a MEL. Cessna 172 S model, for
example, has an equipment list which lists installed equipment from
the factory with it's weight and whether it is Required (by type
certificate), Standard (installed by factory) or Optional (owner
request, wheel pants for example).

Still is.

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008 18:21:59 -0700, Newps wrote:

The Cessna was just as bad. In the wing root and a pain in the ass.



Jay Honeck wrote:
Nice design, Mr. Piper. Beech Bonanza you take off the access port on
the top of the wing to expose the top of the bladder where sender is
located. Remove 6 or 8 more screws and sender comes out. No need for
tank to be empty, down 5-10 gallons helpful. Sender out in 5 minutes.

Agreed. Making the sending unit inaccessible without removing the tank
is crazy. But it's just another goofy thing in aviation, non-specific
to Piper products. I suspect every owner can tell a maintenance story
about "stupid-design-induced-headaches" on their brand of airplane.

Thankfully, the sending units on our tip tanks are much easier to work
on, should that ever become necessary.

No way it's legal to fly with an inop fuel gauge. No way would I ever
placard one as inop. Just fly it until you can get it fixed. I went
thru this last fall when one of mine went belly up. That gauge was
always working until someone important says it's not.




Jay Honeck wrote:
Yikes. You didn't even take the precaution of always using the other
tank when landing, rather than using the one that doesn't tell you if
it's about to run dry?

Placarding INOP is for optional devices. Working fuel gauges are
required for airworthiness.

IMO having four gas tanks makes a single one of them "optional". After
the gauge went TU, we notified our A&P, who agreed that we could wait
until the annual inspection to fix it. We placarded it as INOP, and
didn't use it on take-off or landings.

How do visual inspection or your timer tell you if you've got an in-
flight fuel leak? That's an important reason for the fuel-gauge
requirement.

That's why we didn't use that tank for take-offs or landings. In cruise
flight, if the thing ran dry, we could always change tanks. It never
did, of course.

In article
,
wrote:

As far as I know, typical small personal planes don't even have
approved MELs. But even if the PA-28-325 had one, the wording of
91.213a only allows an MEL to impose ADDITIONAL requirements for
airworthiness; an MEL doen't override the basic reqirements of 91.205.
(When a regulation says "You can't do X unless Y", that doesn't mean
that Y is the ONLY requirement you have to meet. For example, if a
regulation says "You can't be PIC unless you have a current medical
certificate", that doesn't mean that medical certification is the ONLY
requirement for being PIC; rather, all requirements stated elsewhere
are still in force as well.)

The float detached from the sender in the right main tank on the
PA32-300 I flew to Florida a year ago. The gauge was therefore inop.
The aircraft is equipped with a FS-450 fuel flow monitor. I used this in
place of the specific fuel gauge. The FS-450 is accurately calibrated to
within 0.2 gallons, much better accurate than the manufacturer's fuel
gauge.
Was I legal?

wrote:

On Feb 21, 4:21 pm, Ray Andraka wrote:

It should tell you if the tank is empty. The fuel gauge is required to
read correctly for an empty tank.


There's an urban legend that the fuel gauge is only required to be
correct for an empty tank. The legend apparently arises from a bizarre
misreading of 23.1337b1. What 23.1337b1 actually says is just
clarifying that the 'empty' reading must correspond to zero USABLE
fuel, as opposed to zero TOTAL fuel. There is nothing whatsoever to
suggest that non-empty readings needn't be correct--that would be
absurd. (If it were true, a gauge that ALWAYS says 'empty' would be
legal! You could just write 'empty' on a piece of paper and call that
your fuel gauge!)

The requirement for indications of a tank's fuel level (not just on
empty) is stated in 91.205b9, 23.1305a1, and 23.1337b.

OK, I was loose with the words. Fact is, if there is only unusable fuel
left in the tank, for all intents it is an empty tank to the pilot while
the plane is flying.

I didn't say that the gauge could be inoperative. All I said was that
there was nothing in the FAR that says it must be calibrated to a
certain tolerance. The only requirement for calibration is that it
indicate empty when there is no usable fuel left in the tank. If the
gauges are operative, indicate empty when on an empty tank, and increase
monotonically when fuel is added, I think the letter of the reg is met.
Of course they have to move far enough to discern an empty (unusable
fuel) tank from one that still has some amount of usable fuel in it I
think the intent is met. I doubt there are many general aviation fuel
gauges that are accurate to better than 5 or 10% of a full tank

On Feb 21, 8:29*pm, John Smith wrote:
In article
,
The float detached from the sender in the right main tank on the
PA32-300 I flew to Florida a year ago. The gauge was therefore inop.
The aircraft is equipped with a FS-450 fuel flow monitor. I used this in
place of the specific fuel gauge. The FS-450 is accurately calibrated to
within 0.2 gallons, much better accurate than the manufacturer's fuel
gauge.

Was I legal?

Offhand, I don't see why not. FAR 91.205b9 only requires a working
fuel gauge for each tank. It doesn't prohibit an additional, non-
working gauge.

On Feb 21, 8:23*pm, Peter Clark
wrote:
An equipment list is different from a MEL. *Cessna 172 S model, for
example, has an equipment list which lists installed equipment from
the factory with it's weight and whether it is Required (by type
certificate), Standard (installed by factory) or Optional (owner
request, wheel pants for example).-

Ok, fair enough. But an equipment list can't override the 91.205b9
requirement, right? Nothing in 91.205 says "unless an equipment list
says it's optional".