A lot of small businesses bought Dukes and hired the
cheapest high time pilot they could find, usually it seems
that was a retired B47/B52 Colonel who didn't know better
than to slam the throttles open - closed just like he did in
those other airplanes. The Dukes that I saw, that were
flown by civilian trained pilots usually flew pretty trouble
free to TBO. The ones that were flown by retired jet jocks
needed turbo replacement at 600-800 hours and new cylinders
at 1,000. They saved a buck on the salary and spent a ton
on maintenance.


--
James H. Macklin
ATP,CFI,A&P

wrote in message
oups.com...
| There's also a guy in Germany working on a conversion
of the Duke to
| twin Thielert diesels - the big ones doing 350 HP. He's
got one
| flying.
|
| I read the article - wow that's a huuuuge bump in range
over the
| gassers eh? Didn't know Lyc wasn't supporting the TIO-541
anymore (I
| think the P-Navajo has the same engine?) but doesn't
surprise me as
| I've heard they're quite finicky and must be babied more
than most high
| HP turbo'd piston engines.
|