Fuel tank sloshing done.

[Jfquebec]

At the end of the service bulletins #60 that said...

" Tanks that do not have serial numbers etched in the side of the tank were manufactured prior to November 2007. Do not use Acetone in these tanks. They do need to be rinsed thoroughly but rinsing with AVGAS would be the suggested rinse media."


Be carefull with acetone..

[Paul Z]

Agree 100%. There seems to be such a wide experience range on this issue that testing is absolutely necessary for each individual situation. It's really not accurate to proclaim that everyone should avoid it.

Paul - So did you land doing 85 knots with the engine running or did you dead stick it?

The first time I encountered the problem was when I was giving a guy from OK a ride. He was interested in buying a Kitfox, and then I had this problem. When I pulled it out of the hanger and cranked her up she was idling a little rough. We went for a flight, I was trying to demo slow flight, and I couldn'tt chop the throttle. We headed back to the airport, and we had a fun landing at about 80. when the mains hit, I hit so hard it slammed the nose wheel down really hard. I pulled back on the stick to try and hold the nose up, I got a really bad shimmy, turns out it broke the Nose Wheel pant, and it was grabbing the whose wheel causing the shimmy.

The second time it had occurred, I had drained the tanks and put in AvGas, and used Carb Cleaner to unstick the carbs sliders. It seemed to be OK but when I went around the patch they stuck again. This time I opted to kill the engine on final and dead stick her in, much better landing.

After that I sloshed the tanks, replaced fuel lines, cleaned the Carbs again, and again, avoiding taking them apart. I finally got it idling pretty good and it wasn't sticking any more. When I went to Weyers Cave for the Rotax Class, it started it again on the trip. When I got to Weyers Cave I pulled th Carbs and had them rebuilt before the problem went away.

[ken nougaret]

i looked up this thread because i'm about to rinse my tanks before installing in my ss kit. my manual says to fill the tank 1/4 full with ???. the word water was crossed out. and then on the picture page is a green sticky that says use acetone 3 times, and do not reuse acetone. it sounds to me like i have to put approximately 3 gallons of acetone in each tank 3 times. that's 18 gallons of acetone! is this right?
thanks, ken

[Dorsal]

I used 1/2 gallon per tank each time, ran pretty clear on the last rinse. Also my tanks were built ~2000 and the acetone worked great. The tank were sticky originally, not so after rinsing. My story on this is on another thread somewhere.

[ken nougaret]

thanks dorsal. i know common sense says you don't need 18 gallons, it's just the way it's written. i'll pick up a couple of gallons at home depot.
ken

[cap01]

When I drained the acetone I used a paint strainer to see what came out . Amazing how much junk came out .

[jiott]

I did the same with a paint strainer but didn't see anything; it looked like fresh acetone. Of course my tanks were fairly new, bought in March 2011.

Jim

[cap01]

i was amazed at how much came out with the acetone rinse . the first two a lot then the third time it was good .

[Dorsal]

I did not get particulate but my first rinse came out the color of coffee

[Paul Z]

It look like a very weak coffee.