Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Mule Update

Why do Englishmen drink warm beer? A: Because their refrigerators have Dowty pumps!

The mule has a dual pump made some time in 1979. One imagines that it gave faithful service for many years, but — alas — no more. A cracked housing left us showering in Aeroshell Fluid 4 (aka "good ol' MIL 5606G"). Soviet aircraft use AMG-10, which is so similar to 5606 that the two can be mixed with no ill effects.


When the end casting (which should have been a plate) busted into three pieces, shards of the casting went into the gears and the pump summarily ate itself.


Dowty was bought by Parker some years back and they were able to supply an exact replacement pump. Particularly important was matching the keyed drive shaft and mounting holes.


Parker is shipping us a new pump from South Yorkshire, a transaction greatly simplified by our snazzy new Skype Phone that was bought specifically for locating parts in Europe. The new pump should arrive some time next week.

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