Light weight starters.

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Gary Brink

New member
I noticed in another post that Larry mentioned he has a Skytec starter so I have a question. I was at an FAA Safety meeting a couple of weeks ago and the speaker said that the new light weight starters had a tendency to break if the engine "kicks back" while starting it. Has anyone experienced this? I haven't heard of it before and am just wondering how prevelant it is or if he was just blowing smoke at us.
Gary
 
Don't know. So far, so good. I think I can maintain flight just with the starter...all I need is a large glider in tow to haul the batteries :) !
 
I installed a sky-tec starter at overhaul, only have about 15 hours on it. Performance has been excellent. I've never had the O-470 kick back in the 20+ years I've operated the plane. So I cannot answer your question due to lack of experience. The Bendix mags have been good to me as well. Formerly, a good number of those starts were one compression stroke at a time.
 
More than two years ago I spent some time talking with the folks at Skytek in Texas about building more starters for Franklins. I have a couple of them in service and they have been great. They had enough parts in stock to build up another 30 or so. So, Glenn and Lynn, lamenting the high cost of aviating today, the reason they wouldn't was they were facing the possibility of a lawsuit from a Franklin owner who claimed that when his engine kicked back, the starter broke and he now had metal in his oil. In other words, "I want a free overhaul of my engine," courtesy of the starter builder. The manager at Skytek said they didn't sell enough of these Franklin starters to make it worthwhile. Dan
 
Some models do have that issue. I put a ST5 on my Viking and the ST5 does not have kickback issues. Their site here; http://www.skytecair.com/

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Dan Cullman said:
More than two years ago I spent some time talking with the folks at Skytek in Texas about building more starters for Franklins. I have a couple of them in service and they have been great. They had enough parts in stock to build up another 30 or so. So, Glenn and Lynn, lamenting the high cost of aviating today, the reason they wouldn't was they were facing the possibility of a lawsuit from a Franklin owner who claimed that when his engine kicked back, the starter broke and he now had metal in his oil. In other words, "I want a free overhaul of my engine," courtesy of the starter builder. The manager at Skytek said they didn't sell enough of these Franklin starters to make it worthwhile. Dan
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Same here, my starter was pretty much done last year, contacted Skytek. They mention they would not make them anymore for Franklin so got my original Starter overhaul.

A friend has a Skytek that broke when engine kicked back, but it's a homebuilt, souped up engine with extremely hight compression. when it kick back, the airplane almost flip over...

Alain
 
At least 7 or 8 years ago I seem to recall a Slick representative at OSH saying that there was some kickback issue with the newer hi torque starters, but as I previously said, I haven't had any issues with mine (knock on wood!) I would guess that a combination of our low compression engines and impulse couplers may have something to do with it? I am keeping my old starter in reserve just in case, but I really love my Sky-Tek!
LHL
 
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