Test flew on Saturday after a lot of work rebuilding. I did a top end rebuild on both engines. Also had to rebuild the spar box on the right wing due to the crappy series two gear and my stupidy.
Flew 3 hours yesturday (memorial day). 1.5 hours in the late morning. 1.5 in the evening. Was great to get back up in the air Lazair style again. I've sorely missed Lazair flying. Nothing quite like it. There was a lot of good thermals. I flew chase with a hawk circling in a thermal. He let me follow him pretty close (I could see his individual feathers) for at least two circuits. Too fun.
On the evening flight, I had a great time flying around the valley. Just after sunset, I headed back to the airport. About 3 miles out, the left engine quit. I had just went to idle since I was way high on approach. The engine just simply quit. No bangs or sputters. I tried to restart first without and then with choke. Nothing. Still had a ton of altitude, so I didn't even add power to the running engine. I came in for an unadventful landing.
I pulled the engine off thinking the worst as it was hard to turn the prop over. I found that the flywheel had failed somehow in that the four plates on the magnet part of the flywheel had all come off?!!! All four! Weird. Don't know how/why that happened. I guess I'll have to order a new flywheel. Very strange....
That's it for now. 3.4 hours Lazair time this year so far.
MarkDJ.