Lycoming 320 Engine Failure 

The cam lobe engages the lifter from the side.

The amount of dirt in that thing I'm not surprised , I would say the lifter seized and then the cam pushed it any way it could, being old if it had some play in it then it may have locked sideways . But this could be a lubrication issue that had it run a little dry in that part . Chuck bottle of lifter turn up in it It'll be fine.

Divco

@@PatrickLipsinic cheers

Is it possible that automotive oil was used containing minimal amounts of zinc and phosphorus? PennGrade the exception.

I think it ran an Moment to much out of Oil for the upper Part of this lifter! This Part gets only oiled, going down, closing the Valve. Starting without full Oilpressure and Mags in, can cause that after a Periode of Standing. Older Engines need some Rounds of turning without Ignition to get enough oil in every Part of the Motor! But Guys, I am fixing only Oldtimer Eng ines on Cars. But it is interesting how similar the Airplane Engines are. Build to Work for a Long Time ! The Bore of the lifter can be welded and Rebored new. But check the Valve and the Spring, If it is not closing correctly. This could be be another foult ! Pleased excuse my Writing.....the Correction worked in German....

Instablaster

I went to A&P school 30 years ago and we torn down and rebuilt radial engines out of tanks. An engine is an engine, but would have been nice to actually work on a modern aircraft engine...

@@GamingwithGamerGirls The only "modern" engines we have are the Rotax 912ULS and 912iS. The engine in my 2001 car is more advanced than anything bolted to an aircraft at our hanger =(

100% man, I grew up building SBC's and 6BT's but an engine is an engine, some just run a little different

Davco are the folk I use for problems like that, excellent work. The h2ad and the rest of the 76 series motors are pigs for cam and follower problems due poor lubrication, the only time I've seen cam and followers this bad on an e2d like this though is pilot abuse or "that nut behind the column"

@@turboconqueringmegaeagle9006 It's Divco not Davco. The cam and lifter issue has become such a problem that Lycoming has gone to roller cams and lifters. The 76 series are such pigs that Lycoming won't touch them anymore- turn in a H2AD and you'll get an O-320 D2J back.

@@bsrktm1 it's pretty rare for my customers to go with factory re-man, I'm in the UK so shipping both ways kills it but with Divco (thanks for that) I can send my case with a parts supplier and it only costs $1000 for the re-worked case including all the shipping, can't speak highly enough of the service I've had from them. In private hands an h2ad can get to it's tbo and beyond but with training it's unlikely and the rollers still haven't been stc'd for older engines here unfortunately. I've got seven 172N's on the books still operating with the h2ad and three of them are on the school/hire, the only saving grace is being able to pull the followers without splitting the case, and with the integral accessory cover, it's a quick engine to build up if it does need splitting. With filter inspections which are mandated on those things, I know when it's time to book it out for a couple of days to start throwing spanners about.

@@turboconqueringmegaeagle9006 I've seen lots of H2ADs make it to TBO. They are easy to build and aren"t terrible if they've had the T mod done. However, Lycoming doesn't really want to support them, plus all the parts are getting harder to get and more expensive every day. If you ever get a chance, trade it in for a D2J. It'll be cheaper in the long run.

Ron Tucker certainly my friend, thank you for watching. Just goes to show the importance of following manufacturers recommendations; they aren’t kidding

That was my first thought!

leather's a great idea. chop a bit off an apron lol. Maybe melting some rubber onto the plier teeth would work better than strips of innertube. In-fact filing the teeth down on a set of grips then coating what's left with rubber is going to be a useful piece of kit. I'm not going to tell that pilot guy how to do his job but a large crap smeared towel with who knows what old stuff floating around on it doesn't seem pro and looks awkward at best...

Most mechanics usually have a shop towel or rag of some type around and grinding the teeth off a good pair of pliers or applying rubber to them isn't a good option either and if you have worked around aircraft everything needs to be accounted for so having less things around is better You were in the right Pilot guy.

John Novis most mechanics also have more than one of the same common tool which (for the want of a special tool), can in a pinch be sacrificed for the greater good. Pilot guy uses a modified tool in a vid I recently saw. I'm not here to complain about the three seconds of music in the intro either but surely you too can see the potential for contamination by using such a large and fluffy piece of towel as if it were an old sock or a piece of blue paper?!

consider duck tape, masking tape or teflon abrasion tape

Hey Juan, you don't have time to view videos...get back to work making them! :-)

Thank you for saying that. I am not an A&P, but I have built many auto engines over the years. When I saw him take the pliers to that rocker shaft, I just cringed.

Our teachers could care less. Maybe people should use some common sense

Excellent spotting, mate!

Mark Smith This aircrafts engine owner(s) may have been cheap bastards (“CB”) but were practical. Such franken-motors are common in most commercial aircraft powerplants. So many people waste $$$ by replacing serviceable parts that have nearly new limits with brand new parts. At $2-3k per cylinder, that adds up quick.

Also noticed the different paint colors on the jugs. Those are codes for if the jugs have been bored over size. I think some of the jugs had different bore sizes. Green means 0.01" oversize. Don't recall the other codes. I would suspect that lifter boss failure to be due to spalling on the cam lobe putting side loads on the lifter.

@@sblack48 Might have been a green 10 over, mistake it for a blue nitrite. Orange is hard chrome, Two orange and a silver is cermachrome(rare) Blue is nitrite bore (factory Lycoming). Two orange and a silver is cerma nil (more rare). No marking is thru hardened (Superior Air Parts). commonly). Yellow on upper fins on the head would be long reach spark plugs.

Nobody puts on one P10. Gotta be pairs, and then nobody worth working with does P10's. Cylinders are relatively cheap in the long run. This aircraft has been neglected for a long time. Freshing up the powerplant will make sense if the airframe is good.

I was cringing the whole time those pistons were just sitting there waiting to hit a ring on the case! I didn't see the Lycoming Overhaul manual at all during the video... that might have helped him with the correct order of disassembly and the proper names for major parts like the accessory case and the oil sump.

I could certainly go more in-depth and I might in future videos when the times comes, but I am still trying to keep the channel more based on entertainment than educational in regards to the maintenance videos as a precaution from a liability standpoint.

For a time lapse segment tunes are fine.

Agreed. Likely poor maintenance, but my guess is from gross excessive valve lash that further precipitated a hot stuck valve or perhaps a broken valve spring, resulting in piston / valve interference, and spiking of the valve train. An over-speed event is possible but unlikely since valve prints couldn't be seen on any piston tops. Unfortunately the piston top that matters wasn't shown so evidence of valve / piston interference can't be determined from this video. A shattered lifter is almost always the result of a piston smacking a valve, but it doesn't preclude a lifter fracturing by itself from accelerated fatigue, again from excessive (and continuous) valve lash. Those on board during this failure were fortunate a valve didn't break, leaving them powerless at best, or on fire at worst.

Hydraulic lifters on a 320. They will stick valves pretty easily though.

A&P IA, here, Right, not serviceable........

Yeah, I was wondering what the plan was to keep both halves from falling off while splitting... but it turned out the plan was dumb luck. Next time a case splitter would be handy. I gather the other end of that lifter was seized in the bore; one thing I'm pretty certain of is that a lifter doesn't just pop out of the side of a bore because it's old. Overall, I'd say this is pretty shade-tree but I feel like that's a bit insulting to the reasonably talented shade tree-mechanics.

Guy said it was a spare engine, it could have been sitting awhile. But I agree that engine was abused, there's no way a tappet that large and substantial snapped in half from being "worn out". From the galling on the aluminum bore of the tappet, we can assume that the aluminum was so hot that it got soft and allowed the tappet to go sideways, which developed a crack. You can see a shiny area in the upper corner of the broken tappet shaft where the crack started and the grain pattern in the rest of it where the tappet was pulled apart. You can see burned oil residue on the piston connecting rod upper end and on the valve springs. That type of damage usually occurs from lack of oil flow or not changing the oil at regular intervals. The broken tappet bore can be repaired, but it'd be pointless, that whole engine is trash. Once an engine has been that badly overheated, it's not going to run right ever again.

all the time would be better....

Don't add "music" to your productions. It adds NOTHING, especially when you don't appear to know how to set levels or mix so the "music" doesn't drown out your voice. Would wayyy rather just listen to the fast forward audio than that crap you call music. Otherwise, an interesting video..

Or altogether!!

From what I can tell it was a partial failure in flight.

Oh thats interesting, I didn't know that. The folks to spoke to on the phone with the company doing the work had told me otherwise, either way its no big deal because they were able to successfully repair it.

Awesome! Have fun brotha!

Foureyed Fox I WOULD AGREE WITH YOU ON THIS!! MIXING CASES WOULD BE LIKE MIXING RODS AND RODCAPS OR MAIN CAPS AND BLOCKS! MACHINED TOGETHER? STAYS TOGETHER!!!!

@@thatpilotguy4995 & Foureyed Fox. Look at the engine split at 09.40 ish. How do mirror image parts come out of the same mould?

that case will never be reassembled. It's history.

Many do samples as every oil change and our shop recommends it. Up to the owner to do it though. About $30 a sample. A few piston engines have magnetic plugs, I’ve only seen a single plug on turbo engine.

@@TheReadBaron91 Oil sampling could prevent many engine failure's and also save quite likely save a very expensive engine rebuilds . We get told what component may be failing or if its fuel or coolant contaminated its a very good diagnostic tool

@@tiggy2756 Most definitely. We can tell what metal it is and find out what component is coming from.

It wouldn't ... the main bearing other half is holding up at least 3 areas and the piston connecting rods are still attached.

Yes too. That would be bad.

That is repairable, I've used Divco in the past on such repairs.

This isnt like a car engine, these engines are essentially run at redline for the majority of their life and need overhauled far more often that auto engines. If those high mileage engines you did had ran at redline all there life, they would look 10 times worse than this lycoming. General avation pilots also tend to be really cheap on their matinence

@@TheFlick175 Redline?? You call 2700rpm redline? 3000rpm?? That is relatively slow for an engine. Camshaft rotates at half the speed of the crank, so at 3000rpm, camshaft is doing a leisurely 1500rpm and the valves are opening n closing every 375rpm. These engines are designed for high torque, not horsepower, that's why HP numbers look dismally low compared to automotive engines. Two things that kill an engine is high heat and lack of lubrication. By lack of lubrication I mean not changing the oil frequently enough. The maintenance schedule may say change after so many hours or in automotive after so many miles. If it starts looking dirty waay before the scheduled time, CHANGE IT. Oil is waay cheaper than an engine overhaul or worse, engine failure while flying. I've built engines for a living and the most prevalent cause of failure is not changing the oil often enough. And if your oil gets dirty soon after an oil change, your engine has "blowby", bad ring seal, and causes carbon to contaminate the oil fairly quickly... Preventive maintenance is key. The maintenance schedule is just a guide, not Gospel...

@@Pork-Chopper You do know that aircraft engines get their oil changed every 25 or 50 hours, right?. That is something like the automotive equivalent of every 1000-2500 miles. And this engine does have a redline RPM that low, it may be slow for an "engine", but not for this engine. It is like saying that the world's largest engine, the Wartsila RTA-96C runs too slow just because it only turns at 15-106 RPM. It was designed that way. Sure it could theoretically turn faster, but not at 100% load, which is what happens when you put a properly sized propeller on an engine and run it at full throttle. Most GA airplanes run full throttle for at least the first several minutes of the flight, with the remaining cruise flight at 75% power for potentially hours. Or when running laps in the pattern, cycling from full throttle to idle as quick as every 5 minutes. Try that in your car with a trailer attached at the base of a hill - start up and after a 5 minute warm up, give it full throttle for 15 minutes and then drive for 2 hours at nearly full throttle without stopping or letting off the gas at all. Or come to a stop at the base of a hill and go full throttle for 3 minutes, then idle for three minutes, then full throttle up hill for 3 minutes, over and over and over. And then do that for 2000 hours and see what the engine looks like inside at overhaul time.

@@MattRogersdesigns I understand what you are saying, Locomotive engines idle at 250rpm and redline at 950rpm, However, they are 5000 horsepower engines. Long stroke, low rpm engines are built for torque, not necessarily high horsepower, high rpm like most hot rodders assume. As mentioned in a previous reply, general aviation pilots are cheap when it comes to maintenance. Longer stroke engines have higher piston speeds, so they do wear a bit faster. All I'm saying is you don't have to wait for a specific time, say , 50hrs to change the oil. If it looks like crap at 30 hours, change it. Oil will always be cheaper than an engine overhaul, and Oil, is, the life blood of an engine, the cleaner it is, the longer the engine will last. It goes without saying, if you run the shit out of it, it will require more oil changes n maintenance, and will not last as long, therefore the maintenance schedule, IMO, is just a that, a schedule. Nothing stops you from changing the oil more often. Look at it, smell it, feel it in your fingers, if it doesn't look, or smell fresh, change it. Let me put it another way, no one likes dirty pussy, clean n fresh is best... I prefer a clean one owner, with low hours on the clock...

@@MattRogersdesigns I think the warm-up is longer. ATIS, set radio / Instruments, Call ground, Taxie, Run-up / Checklist, Check engine gages as one of the items on the checklist - Light Camera Action. I can not do that is five minutes - I takes me about 10 to 15 minutes, depending If I have to wait to take off and or some other delay.

No recalls in aviation really, they become SBs and ADs, and usually only covered my the manufacturer if it’s still under warranty.

Unacceptable if this is a commercial plane.

haha yeah me too, it totally slipped my mind to leave a case bolt or two in. And in regards to the lifter failure, I'm thinking the lifter itself simply fatigued and failed; there were no signs of oil starvation so we ruled systematic failure out.

He's a newbie, it's ok to make mistakes as long as you learn from them that's what training is for and why newbies are closely supervised