Cessna 172 Engine Removal & Tear Down

The latest job that I'm working on in the hangar is the removal of an engine to inspect it. The aircraft is a 1961 Cessna 172B that has only 900 hours on it ... which in general aviation is an amazingly low number for an aircraft so old. Below is a video showing us removing the engine so it can be stripped down and inspected.

The engine from the aircraft is a Teledyne Continental o-300D (for those who wish to know). Once the engine is on the stand Andy, Ian and myself could start to strip down all the accessories, electrical cables, ducts, exhausts and baffles.

We then had to remove the cylinders. To do this you have to remove the rocker covers, rockers and push rods. After that the cylinder can be removed, which reveals the cylinder head that can then be removed.

Once all the cylinders have been removed, we had to split the crankcase open. First the accessory case is removed (with a bit of persuasion as you can see below), and the oil sump. Once these have been removed the crankcase can finally be split, the camshaft and crankshaft can be removed along with the tappets.

Now that everything has been disassembled, the parts can be cleaned up and inspected for cracks, abrasions, corrosion and measure all the shafts and bearings to see if they are within operational tolerances.

Once all this has been done, and all the parts that need replacing have been purchased, the reassembly will begin. I'll keep you up to date when this happens.

A Hop, Skip & Jump across the Pond!!

In October we spent roughly three weeks back in the UK, having been in the States for our first year! Our main focus was to renew our US visas and update as many people as we could in a short space of time! It certainly was a crazy whirlwind ... but we had loads of fun in the process!

We travelled via Toronto both ways ... driving the first leg (approx 7 hours!) and then flying direct to London Heathrow! One of Jenny's best friends lives in Toronto with her husband, so it was a great chance to catch up with them at each end of our trip!

As everything was fast and furious while we were home, we weren't as on the ball with our camera as much as we usually are ... so there are many people and places we saw which we don't have any photos of ... huge apologies ... here are a selection of some of the friends and family we managed to catch up with!

We were also able to see Lucy & Andrew Amukowa, who are like family to us, from the RUSH project in Kenya. They were in the UK for Andrew to have some life saving surgery which was more that 100% successful ... for more information about RUSH and Andrews amazing recovery check out www.rushuk.org.uk.

Our visa renewal was really straight forward and we spent the rest of that day in London enjoying the sounds, sights and shops that we'd been missing! While we were home we able to update three of our supporting churches on what we've been doing this last year, Purley Baptist Church (www.purleybaptist.org), Emmanuel Church Weymouth (www.radipoleparish.f2s.com/emmanuel.htm) and Croham Road Baptist Church (www.crohamroadbaptist.co.uk). We also caught up with a couple of groups who regularly get together to pray for us, one near Yeovil where we used to live and another in Orpington. We are aware of other churches and groups that we didn't get to see ... and will make you our priorities next year when we're home.

A personal priority for us as a family while we were in the UK ... was to eat some yummy food that can not be savoured over there in the small town America! Real bacon, sausages, crumpets, Chinese & Indian takeaways ... to name just a few!! We took a couple of photos of some deliciousness we were able to enjoy ... a Cornish Pasty, Cream Tea and Fish & Chips ... YUM!!

We knew that it would be a really busy time for us ... and so carved out a few days in the middle just for us as a family down in Cornwall. Mark's parents have a little cottage down there and it was the perfect getaway for us to recharge ... we did a lot of relaxing but tried to do something fun each day as well. We built and decorated sandcastles on a couple of beaches (a new experience for Abigail which she took very seriously but loved doing), went swimming, shopping and to a huge playzone which Abigail loved to lead her mummy and daddy through, even though we struggled to keep up for the most part and as it was designed for little people!!

We also took a day out down on the beach in Brighton ... a favourite spot for us ... in fact where we went on our first date together ... as you can see from some of the photos below, it was another day of fun and silliness with Mark's sister, Amy, in amongst all the comings and goings of everything else!

It was so lovely to see so many people, get to eat so many things and visit so many places that we love, in such a short space of time. There were elements of UK life that we hadn't realised we missed and didn't know if we would want to leave at the end of our stay ... however arriving back in Ohio on October 31st, we were really glad to be 'home' again!!

The rest of Popeye's visit (back in Sept!!)

OK ... so Auntie Popeye left in the middle of September ... and we've been a little slack at updating this for various reasons ... so here's a snapshot of the rest of her visit!

The photo below shows Abigail's method of getting to bath-time for most of Popeye's visit!! Very amusing for us to watch and great fun for Abigail ... and I think Popeye too!!

We took a day trip to Rolling Ridge Range up in Amish Country ... it's like a drive through open safari type park with loads of great animals ... you can either drive yourself or take a wagon ride (we chose to do the latter) ... and along the way you get to feed the animals too!

We all really enjoyed the ride ... which takes about an hour and half to go round the whole park, stopping every so often to look at the different animals ... Abigail loves animals and loved watching them all over the side!

Here's a couple of photos showing some of the animals there ... including deer, camels, pot-bellied piglets, there were a couple of zedonks (zebra/donkey cross), bison, zebra, llamas, emu ... the list goes on!!!

After the wagon ride there was another area with a chance to see more animals ... monkeys, turtles, crocodiles, ducklings, baby camels, goats, guinea pigs ... etc etc

We also had lots of fun hanging out at home, going to the park and lots of other stuff ... as you can see the Abigail and Popeye were just as cheeky as each other most of the time ... this final picture sums it all up!! ;o)