Should you trade your aging airplane in anticipation of higher repair costs on your current bird? Mike, Paul, and Colleen have a strong opinion on this. Plus, sticky valves, taking good care of turbos, and engine monitor set-up frustrations.

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Full notes below:

Scott has a Tecnam P2010 with a Lycoming IO-390. He’s had a few instances where cylinders dropped off, the engine ran rough, and then they quickly came back on. It was followed by morning sickness. In essence he had a sticky valve. He found that his CHT temperatures were quite low. At altitude, running the airplane at best cruise power, his CHTs are about 350 degrees. In climb if he leans he can get three cylinders over 350. Mike said he wouldn’t stress about the CHTs, but he would borescope the cylinders to verify that there isn’t too much build-up.

Yuriy has a new-to-him 2010 Cirrus SR22 that’s turbonormalized and he’s looking for some tips on taking care of his turbos. He flies lean of peak at 28 inches. He is limiting turbine inlet temperatures at 1,500 degrees. Mike thinks 1,500 is excessively conservative. The red line is 1,650 degrees, and Mike tries to keep his at or below 1,600 degrees. He also doesn’t subscribe to the one inch per minute reduction of manifold pressure. Lycoming at one time published a document that said not to cool CHT more than 60 degrees a minute. Mike’s engine monitor alarm is at 30 degrees a minute, and he said it doesn’t go off very often. He also doesn’t cool the turbo on the ground before shutting down unless he had high power right before landing for some reason.

Wade has a Cessna 185 with an IO-550. On his last annual he had a few burned exhaust valves. He’s trying to avoid higher maintenance bills in the future. Paul tries to make Wade feel better by telling him that burned valves have nothing to do with how he’s operating the engine and everything to do with the lead in avgas. Going through his operating technique, the only suggestion they have is for Wade to lean much faster, and avoid using the lean find feature. The green arc on his manifold pressure gauge is also wrong. He was worried that he’d have to take off at partial power in order to stay in the green arc on the gauge. The hosts discuss how to reprogram the display.

Matt doesn’t want to throw good money after bad. He’s wondering how long you should hang on to an airplane as it ages. He has a 1977 Cessna T210. Parts are starting to get scarce. It’s hard to find qualified mechanics. He feels like he wants a great airplane that lasts him well into the future. The hosts all agree that it’s better to hold on to the airplane he knows, and not to worry about 210 parts availability, at least when compared to other airplanes.