Paul McAllister a crit :
> Some time ago someone posted a few pictures of blue silicone hoses for
> the rotax engine and radiator. I was wondering who that was and if
> the hoses turned out to be a success.
>
Paul and all,
When installing our 914, someone had installed blue silicone hoses, and
showed really great pictures of his engine. As the price of those
"racing-car" hoses was high, we were induced into thinking that we would
get what we were paying for from this race-car online shop.
The result was disappointing :
- Those hoses are slippery, and tend to slip out of their fittings
despite dual hose clamps. Scary when it concern oil lines. They needed
constant surveillance.
- They are rather bulky, and hard to route in our really cramped
cowling. But I understand that the Europa is somewhat larger in this
respect.
- They are very flimsy, and this may prove critical concerning oil
aspiration from the oil tank when cold (see relevant Rotax SBs)
- The soft material gets cut by the clamps we were using.
- And most important, this multiple layer blue material was porous : it
started "sweating" oil through the hose walls from day one on every
line. No measurable amount, though, but enough to make things a bit
untidy, and make us worry about our circuits liquid-tightness. Nothing
visible with radiator
Bottom line, we finally replaced them with regular rubber-based hoses,
and dumped the sticky blue stuff. No problem since.
Took some pictures at the time, for a future information page on Contrails.
Caveat builder ;-)
FWIW,
With Best Wishes,
--
Gilles
http://contrails.free.fr
