[hharney]

Well, yesterday was the last flight in my Skymaster with the original front engine from 1968. 47 years ago Continental Motors delivered this engine to Cessna in Wichita. Since then there was one major overhaul in 1980, before I started flying it, that dad had a shop do. We had to change a couple cylinders, a starter or two, throttle body and fuel control but other than that, maybe a vacuum pump or two, it's been amazing power plant. I can't complain as it has 2200 hours on it since the overhaul in 1980. Still operates good, has good compressions but is starting to leak some oil out the cylinder drains as the valve guides are very worn. I have very limited knowledge on the overhaul in 1980 so I am not even sure it has a VAR crankshaft. I am assuming it does but the log entry is lacking in that detail.

I am exchanging it for a FACTORY ZERO time reman from Continental. It is a IO360CB6B which has larger main journals and ups the TBO to 1700 hours from 1500. Continental has been great to work with and has gone out of their way to make this as transparent as possible. My hat is off to them so far, we will see how the rest of the program progresses. I am doing most of the work myself under the direction of my A&P at Griswold Aviation in Marshall, MI. Started today and have about 60% of the dis-assembly complete. Hope to see a new crate show up in 2-3 weeks.

I am having the propeller governor overhauled and the hydraulic pump as I don't think they have been done or at least for a long time. Of course new engine mounts and lots of cleaning, tidy up of wires. Anything else that you can think I should address let me know.

List price for the engine is $50,492.00 and with the core credit of $14,500.00 it makes the bottom line $35,992.00. It's a big hit but I think in my case I am better off with the reman for several reasons, especially not knowing if I have a VAR crank.

I'll post some results as it happens