So, in sort of an attempt to get some momentum going on this project, I’m pausing on the cowl stuff for a bit, just to get some more fun stuff done. This was somewhat enabled by receiving some parts that I’ve been waiting on for almost a year. Way back when I was trying to get all my accessories mounted before hanging the engine, I discovered that the 90° oil filter interferes with the B&C vacuum pad alternator I’d bought. So at the same time I was ordering a different oil adapter from B&C to work around my engine mount, I also ordered a drive extension kit from them. The extension kit was backordered, but that was OK…I wasn’t in any huge hurry, and worst case the airplane could fly just fine without the standby alt.
Of course, that backorder period was a good bit longer than expected, but it matched up fine with my work ethic (or lack thereof). In any case, last week I got an email from B&C that the parts were finally in, and they showed up here a couple days later. Finally, something relatively simple and fun to do!
The kit consists of a few different parts: first, a longer shear coupling that’s installed on the alternator spline drive, a spacer for the mount pad, and the most fun part: four longer mount studs. So Job #1, after removing the existing blanking plate, was to remove the old studs. In a pattern well-known to any DIY mechanic, the first three studs came off with relative ease, but the last one was a real bear, and required some torching to remove. Really fun trying to heat the stud without scorching anything else nearby…
After that, it went well…new studs went in easily with the provided stud installation tool, then I just had to stack everything together. There’s a gasket, then an adapter with a gear to the accessory drive inside and the splined socket outside, then another gasket, then the spacer, then another gasket, and finally the alternator.
That said, this isn’t 100% done yet. I unwisely used the same mount nuts for the stud removal, and a couple of them got rounded while working on that one stubborn stud. I went ahead and used them to mount the alternator, but I’m going to replace them with new nuts at some point. Oh, and did I mention that I just placed an Aircraft Spruce order today? No matter how hard I try to combine Spruce orders to save on shipping, it seems my efforts are doomed to failure…
Anyway, here’s a shiny new alternator on my shiny new engine:
