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We took Porter Airlines to Halifax, NS, then rented a car and drove to Yarmouth, NS for a week over Christmas. It was great to see my parents and sister again.

Broken Plenum Chamber Mounting Flange EndJust before leaving for Yarmouth, I started the annual inspection on the aircraft, starting ahead of the firewall. I found a cracked flange that supports the plenum chamber top on the right side at the cowl air inlet. The left side had the same failure a couple of years ago. I reinforced that area on the left side when I repaired it, but I didn’t make any changes on the right side, as I couldn’t get good enough access to do the work in situ, and it is a pain to remove the parts. I rolled the dice that the right side would be OK, and I lost that bet.

 


Broken End of Support FlangeThe bit that broke off. 

 


Repaired Flange EndI’ve got the repair mostly done now, but we’re going into a bit of a deep freeze now (a cold front went through today, and the forecast low for Wednesday night is –30°C), so it’ll have to wait until we’ve warmed back up again before I do any more work in the hangar. I’ve worked in the hangar at –17°C - that is just workable, with two electric radiant heaters pointing at me, but I wouldn’t want to go colder than that.

 


Repaired Flange, Seen From Bottom