Cracked Cylinder

[N1478D]

Cylinder #1 has a crack and is not repairable. TSO is 1350 hours, and the logs don't say exactly what happened at overhaul concerning the cylinders. The remaining 5 cylinders are still in the 72 to 76 range.

What do you think? New cylinder and from whom? Would it be wise to replace more than one? Put a overhauled one on to last till overhaul?

Different thoughts are going thru my mind. While the exhaust and baffeling is off on that side, maybe it would be best to put 3 new ones on and replace intake/exhaust gaskets etc.

It would be tough to financialy swing for 6 new ones at one time.

ECI has steel ones in stock, their nickel plated ones are 60 days out.

Am interested in your thoughts and suggestions.

[jrenwick]

Joe,

Based on my experience, if this were my situation I would take a serviceable used cylinder, let my mechanic hone it and lap the valves, and put it on. He usually has one to sell me, but now I've bought a used engine with a cracked case and I have my own supply.

I did this with two or three cylinders on another 170 I owned in the '90s, and when I talked to its latest owner two years ago, he said the engine was still running fine at well over 2000 hours SMOH.

Sometimes the cheapest approach works out just fine.

Best Regards,

John

[steve grewing]

Joe,

I have a spare engine and the original six cylinders removed from my engine. All the parts are at (LNC) Lancaster, TX. I was going to do just what John suggested and keep one of the later style casting cylinders as a spare and Ebay out the rest. If you want, come on over and take your pick. You can have it for your trouble. The originals are disassembled, were NDT'ed years ago and have been stored since.
PM me if you're interested.

Steve

[blueldr]

Clean up a used cylinder and install it.

[GAHorn]

Except for Steve's extremely generous offer,....I'd consider another way to view the problem of a cylinder failure in a mid-to-high-time engine:
Purchasing a used cylinder exposes you to the risk of yet another failure of a cylinder of relatively unknown quality. (Despite the assurances of inspection, a used cylinder has unknown prior treatment/stresses and can fail in short order...or can last a long time....it is a complete unknown gamble in my opinion. (I've done it on several engines and had a 50% failure rate in short order...the real irritation being the complete waste of labor to remove/re-install a second time.)
On the other hand, a new cylinder comes with a warranty, and known condition. If you intend to keep your engine and eventually overhaul it, your new cylinder will be sufficiently young to retain for use in the overhaul, and you will have complete knowlege of it's history. It can be inspected for continued-time-in-service on the overhauled engine (no real harm to value since you're keeping it) or can be inspected/overhauled and returned to service "zero" SOH in keeping with the rest of the engine should you decide to put it on the market, yet you will still have retained it's relative value. (And you'll have removed most of the risk of having to re-do the R/R labor prematurely.) IMHO

[N1478D]

Joe,

I have a spare engine and the original six cylinders removed from my engine. All the parts are at (LNC) Lancaster, TX. I was going to do just what John suggested and keep one of the later style casting cylinders as a spare and Ebay out the rest. If you want, come on over and take your pick. You can have it for your trouble. The originals are disassembled, were NDT'ed years ago and have been stored since.
PM me if you're interested.

Steve

Anybody that ever gets a chance to meet Steve and see his beautiful 170 should not pass it up. Hope to take my cylinder off in the next couple of days and start the process of looking at the parts and then reassembly.

THANKS Again Steve,

[steve grewing]

Joe,

Thanks for the kind comments. I hope the cylinder works out for you. I enjoyed meeting you guys.

Later,

Steve