Hey all,

I'm flying  lot of this aircraft at the moment and I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong. I've read the manual and know the engine limitations, so perhaps this is normal.

The engine has a health metric which is a simplified percentage. I presume this is an aggregated average of various engine components (unlike the 310C readout which is more useful imo).

For every flight I make of around 40 minutes, the engine health drops by a percentage. So after one hundred flights I presume the engine would be utterly ruined. I'm guessing this isn't normal? Yesterday I did an IFR circuit with full approach so maybe 15 minutes in the air, and the engine dropped from 100 percent to 97 percent.

 

The things I'm doing are:

 

Starting the engine, leaning it to avoid fouling (as much as possible before it loses rpm).

Allowing the engine time to warm up before I fly or perform runup.

Keep the aircraft at maximum RPM for minimal time (up til around 500ft or so) before bringing it back to max manifold / 2500 (as per the POH).

Open and close the cowl flaps as per POH (full open for takeoff, full closed in cruise, on approach I leave them around half way). One thing I would say is I'm perhaps a little undisciplined with this than the other things.

On another note, the fact I have what feels like a real engine is so great to me. I love this stuff, and understanding how I'm damaging the engine is very interesting. On this note, aside from the Black Square aircraft, do any other aircraft come close to the same level of engine modelling? GA or Airliner. I've been looking at the BN2 Islander and saw it had a significant update at the end of last year. Is it anything like the Black Square models in depth?

 

Thanks all!

Below is info from the JustFlight forum regards what causes engine degradation. Check these factors. If occurring in-flight, could be prop rpm too high or mixture too lean.

here is a list of all the conditions that can reduce the health of the engine:

(A:ENG MANIFOLD PRESSURE:1, inhg) > 32
(A:PROP RPM:1, rpm) > 2750
(A:RECIP ENG CYLINDER HEAD TEMPERATURE:1, CELSIUS) > 230
(A:ENG EXHAUST GAS TEMPERATURE:1, CELSIUS) > 870
(A:ENG OIL TEMPERATURE:1, CELSIUS) > 110
(L:var_ShockCooling_1, FAHRENHEIT) > 70

Thank you! This is incredibly useful. Do you have any idea what ShockCooling refers to?

good discussion here

Cooling the BS Bonanza - Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020) - The AVSIM Community

 

2 hours ago, hs118 said:

good discussion here

Cooling the BS Bonanza - Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020) - The AVSIM Community

 

Is started that thread since I had similar issues as OP. In that thread I linked to this document which was very enlightening.
In real life, for this type of engine, running at full power is considered better than throttling back since the extra fuel flow will help cool the engine.

In my case the engine remained at 100% health until touchdown, which seems to indicate my issue was mostly shock cooling.

23 hours ago, hs118 said:

good discussion here

Cooling the BS Bonanza - Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020) - The AVSIM Community

 

Thank you! This solved the problems. I was just retarding the throttle with the cowl flaps open and shocking the engine. Now I reduce power much more slowly and keep the cowl flaps closed when doing it. No engine damage. Awesome - learned something new 🙂