Brief Description: Engine start 4th try and Success!
Finally after so many attempts, much trouble-shooting and fiddle farting around, the engine started. And easily too! Fired right up right away on this fourth attempt day. Who knows what the actual fix was, or if it was a combination of many things. For the first few runs the idle speed was way too high, starting out at about 3200 rpm versus the SeaRey preferred 1800 rpm. So we adjusted the carb idle speed screws a half turn at a time until finally we got the engine to start and idle at about 1500 rpm.
After many run-ups the engine was warm enough that it started without using the starting carb and with just a little throttle. After ensuring that I had good oil pressure and engine temp over 120F I ran the engine up to 4000 rpm and did a mag check. With a drop of less than 300 rpm and a difference between right and left modules of less than 150 rpm we declared success and shut down for the day in high spirits.
Next steps include: -adjust idle speed screws to get closer to 1800 rpm idle speed -warm up the engine, shut down and check and fill the oil, and then check the hydraulic valve tappets for correct oil purging -run the engine up to full speed to determine the max static rpm - if greater than 5300 increase prop pitch, if less than 5300 decrease the prop pitch - this will then allow the engine to achieve max 5800 rpm when the plane is moving -now that this rebuilt engine is active, start filling in the engine log book
