Used to do that years ago in Wichita, KS when I worked for TWA. We had to tow aircraft on and off the single gate we had, often. I would motor the engine on the DC-9's we'd get in to scare the hell out of my coworkers thinking I was going to light it off. LOL
You can actually motor the engines without the engine bleed valves open. The engine bleed valves are only to allow bleed to come out of the engine compressor section. The starter control valves get their air directly from the pneumatic manifold.
Good video, but in my days during dry runs, or full start, N2 would be monitored, instead of N1, as N2 is what the started turns, while N1 up to that is just going along for the ride. Hopefully that airplane is still airworthy and flying.
It's been used for training and unairworthy since the late 1990's. Thanks for the info. I was never trained on turbine engines and was more or less self taught on this process through reading the manuals and help from several people who had done it before
unfortunately not. However, I plan to change that towards the end of spring. Having my students do maintenance on the aircraft with hopes of getting it running once again.
I haven’t run a -200 but on the NG’s the battery switch should be turned on before applying AC power. Does that not make a difference on the -200 models?
It doesn't seem to make a difference on the -200 as long as the dc batteries are physically connected at the elcon. but that's not to say the dc battery switch shouldn't be flipped anyway. The downside of inheriting such an old aircraft is that there isn't anyone to train you on it. I've relied on the jrh and some tattered paper manuals to teach myself most of the aircraft systems. Luckily it is a very forgiving aircraft and is quick to warn you if you're ever doing something blatantly wrong. At the time of this video our dc batteries had failed due to age and were too weak to do anything. Hence why we used ground pneumatic power instead of using the apu. We have since replaced the dc batteries and successfully ran the number 1 main engine after a decade or more of storage. That video will be posted shortly
The starter itself runs the risk of becoming damaged if rotating the engine for longer than 1 minute at a time. It takes a lot of energy to rotate these engines up to the rpm required to self accelerate. Not to mention you are using hot air to feed the starters. That heat builds up the longer the engine is cranked. The apu, which is automated, will actually cut it's starter out automatically if the engine has not started after 1 minute.
Unfortunately no. However a new group of students has been investing a lot of time and money getting it as close as possible to an airworthy aircraft again.
