| I traded in my Canair 506 on a Canair 512 and it arrived today (3/18/05)!!! The Canair Hovercraft 512 page to the left has considerable additional information on the Canair 512 hovercrafts generally. This page is focused on my particular craft which is serial number QHO20003M99I . Below are some pictures of my craft that I took in Vancouver, Canada when I went up to look at it and when it was delivered by Lew Adkins of Canhover. The side bodies were off of the craft at the time I saw it and were folded up for travel when it was delivered. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| As part of the purchase arrangement, Lew Adkins provided flight training. We went to Lake Somerville and Lane Crampton and his son joined us for the first ride. It handled like a big craft which it is. One aspect of 512 operations which is interesting is that the two engines do not rev at the same limit. The port engine will max out at a considerably higher RPM than the starboard engine. Lew indicated that this is due to the difference in air flow for the two fans. It seems the air flow for the port engine is not as efficient as for the starboard engine. Below are a few pictures of the first flight in Texas. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| A few days after I returned from the training flight, I decided to do some PM on the craft and was changing the oil, filters and spark plugs. The starboard engine appeared to be in fine shape but when I took the spark plugs out of the port engine, there was clearly something wrong with that engine. One spark plug was missing the electrode entirely, one had a big piece of the ceramic insulator missing and the remaining two were clearly run too hot. This was quite a surprise as the engine seemed to run fine. However, we did notice what sounded like a miss from time to time during the training but it was hard to tell. Well, it turned out the engine had the wrong spark plugs installed, had a slightly warped head, a bent valve, a broken ring, a broken piston, a wrong fuel injector and a leaking intake manifold. Someone had obviously worked on this engine before and apparently did more harm than good. As best as could be determined, the number one cylinder was detonating which broke the piston ring and piston. That could have been due to the wrong injector and leaking manifold but who knows for sure. Needless to say I was disappointed but what can you do but get to fixing the machine. Duff at Northbelt Automotive Parts was very helpful in gathering the parts I needed for the engine rebuild and arranged for the head to be rebuilt. Thanks Duff!!! Mike Bice as usual was also extremely helpful in analyzing the problem and helping rebuild the engine. Thanks Mike!!! Lane Crampton helped me take the head off -twice- and put it back on as we sorted through all the problems. Lane is a good guy to have as a friend. The rebuild kind of became a community effort with many others involved from time to time helping with man power or specialized tools. Thanks to all that helped !!!!! I also received great support from Lew Adkins and Bob Masters. Lew even offered to fly down and do the engine work himself but I figured if you can't fix your own hovercraft then maybe hovercrafting is not the hobby for you. Had I known the amount of work required I might have reconsidered the matter .... Below are some pictures of the spark plugs, piston and what remains of one of the rings and the engine being worked on. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| I have also been doing other repairs and modifications. The exhaust system was supported by four (two per exhaust system) plates held up by four well-nuts. Over time they had come loose due to the load and vibration and, in one case, was just barely being held by part of one well-nut. With the help of Mike Bice, I made some new larger mounting plates that support the exhaust system from the top of the ducts and reinforced the composite material. Click Here to see more details of the modifications to the exhaust system. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Some other modifications I have made are to add a rear view camera and display, an electronic compass under the port front seat, an intercom, a GPS system, two fans and a duel battery charger with a plug mounted in the starboard heater duct. I also moved the radar to the console so I could actually see the thing. Below of some picture of these changes. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 5/29/05. The changes to the hovercraft seemed to work pretty well at the Austin-Houston hover-in this weekend. The GPS was great to have and the rear view display was very handy to see approaching small boats and the like. The display was also much appreciated during launching from the boat ramp when I was giving rides to the many guests so I could see that no one was behind the craft. The radar worked ok mostly as it "talks" to the GPS and compass and displays the speed of the craft and direction/location information. However, it did not always detect some of the small fishing boats until they were very close by. The small fiberglass boats just do not reflect enough of the radar energy to be seen on the radar display. The radar is a JRC 1500 and is pretty light weight as radars go. I will likely replace it with either the Garmin 40 series radar or with a Furuno system. The nice feature of the Garmin system is that it is integrated with the GPS system and you can overlay the radar and GPS map display. Garmin also has a satellite weather receiver that will give you real time weather map information on the same display. However, Furuno makes larger and more powerful radar systems that are also integrated with a gps map system but they do not have the satellite weather receiver. Furuno systems also have available navigation maps for the Mississippi River which are not available for the Garmin system. Seeing as I would like to go up the Mississippi River next year, the map system would be nice to have. It would also be helpful to mount the radar antenna somewhat higher than it is now to get better range. I still need to work on the intercom system as there is a lot of noise in the system when the engines are running and I need to filter the 12 power input. I would also like to add a CD/radio system to the craft so there is no end of work left to do.... Below are some pictures of the craft at the Austin-Houston hover-in. Also the first three movies are pretty short but the last four (4-7) are about 30MB each so consider the download time. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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7/16/05. I decided to replace
all the trailer bearings as they were of unknown vintage and I am glad I
did. One of the bearings was bad and had metal shavings in it.
In addition, the brakes had a number of issues. The prior owner
had put new brake pads on and greased the bearings before it was
delivered. However, "stuff" happens and it had one bad bearing and
most of the brakes were not working correctly mostly due to the new pads
needing to be adjusted after the trip from Canada. In one case, the
rear seal was ruptured and grease was all in the brake drum, magnet and
pad so that brake did not work. In all cases the magnet retainer
was missing although that is not a big deal and not uncommon apparently. In short, only
one brake on the left side and 1 and a half brakes on the right were
working correctly. The pictures below show the brakes. I had all
the hubs machined by Northbelt Auto Parts so the new brakes could start
with a good surface. The axles
are Ez-lube axels and actually inject grease to the rear bearing and
then it flows forward. The last two pictures in the row are of one of
the new brake assemblies and the new bearings. I have also
decided to make a new instrument panel as there is just too much to add
for the current panel to accommodate. Also, the current panel
vibrates a lot in choppy water so I would like to redesign it to be
stiffer. I will add pictures as it is being built.
7/6/05. I have started to "mock up" a new instrument panel. I was giving thought to using an LCD display for the engine monitoring but NMEA 2000 sensors do not seem to be very common and it would cost quite a bit to use the panels designed for experimental aircraft. Raymarine has the "E" series of displays which can display NMEA 2000 engine data but that is not an inexpensive display either. At this point I am planning to use the Faria 4-in-1 gauges and the Flow-Scan duel tach and Flow-Scan fuel computer to replace all my current gauges. My mock up also assumes two Garmin 3006C displays but all is subject to change. I am planning to add a stereo, VHF, cell phone interface and Amateur Radio units. I would also like to add indicators for the rudder position as the wiring is already installed and I just need to add the electronic indicators. This is a big job and I am not really looking forward to all the wiring that will be required. Below are a couple of mock ups I have been thinking about. I need to keep the panel as small as possible to help with the mounting and like issues.
7/12/05. I have decided on going with the 3rd design. It uses the Garmin 3010C and 3005C multifunction displays. The smaller display can give the "big" picture while the big display can give the details. Anyway, that is the thought. Now for the hard work! Of course I just found out that the fuel computer I wanted to use won't work as the Canair has an open fuel return to the tank on both engines. So, it looks like I either have to find one from an airplane or use two fuel computers which is not a great solution.
7/25/05 I noticed that the FYL was adding considerable electrical noise so I am adding a noise filter to it. I could hear the noise in the intercom and see it on the lift indicator. With the changes, things are much better. The first picture above is the filter inductor and capacitor I added. The 2nd picture is the trailer with its new feet. Replacing the bearings, brakes and tires was far more time consuming than I expected but at least it is done now. 8/16/05 I have also been installing the Garmin network equipment in the craft. I will have better pictures but the 3rd - 5th pictures show the power distribution system I added to the box next to the port battery box and installed the weather and network box inside. The last picture is a little out of focus but it is had to get the camera in the space to take the shot. 12/3/05 Currently I am working on the long range fuel tanks. The original tanks were 25 Gal. each for a total of 50 Gal. I received the long range tanks from Canhover in Canada and am installing them. The new tanks are 40 Gal each for a total of 80 Gal. This will increase the cruise time considerably. However, like all projects, it has taken far longer to install them than anticipated. I had to make 1" spacers for the front feet so the tanks does not hit the hull bottom where the sections come together toward the rear of the cabin. Then all the plumbing has to change as the inlets and outlets are now in a different place. I am also installing check valves in the vent lines to keep any gas from coming out of the vent and polluting the water during tank filling (of course I normally fill up on land but...). Then of course there is the radar project. I am installing a Garmin GMR 40 which is a 4KW dome radar. This unit will interface with the two Garmin 3010C displays and let me see targets superimposed over the navigation maps. I was using a 3010C along with a smaller 3005C display but I found the small display was too small to see well when underway. I also signed up for the XM marine weather service and can now get real time weather information displayed on the displays along with the navigation maps etc. Garmin makes a pretty well integrated system now. I have the radar mount mocked up and now need to weld and power coat the mount which I hope to do shortly. Lastly (for now), I am adding forward looking cameras one of which works in daylight or low light (distance somewhat limited at night) and a forward looking infrared camera for thermal imaging. I hope to mount the thermal IR camera on the radar mount so that it is fairly high and can scan well in front of the hovercraft. The thermal IR camera needs to have a protective mount made for it but it works pretty well. Ok, why the cameras? Well, the visible light camera is to see objects that might hit the rear ducts like tree branches, bridges and the like. The thermal IR camera is to see at night or in poor visibility such as fog plus it is fun to watch. When I was at Canyon Lake, I was coming into the dock area at night and there were two boats there which caused me to stop. The spray made it hard to see out of the front window even with the window wiper (I did not want to reduce lift given where I was). With this camera setup I should have an easier time as the cameras will cover the same area as I can see through the front window and not be affected by the spray. The images from the cameras will be displayed on the overhead monitors or on the Garmin 3010C displays so it should be pretty easy to use them effectively. Below are some pictures of the fuel tank areas with the covers off with one of the original tanks and cleaned up with the longer long-range tanks. You can also see the space under the engines were one of the bilge pumps is mounted (oh yea, I am replacing the pump with a larger one). The space under the engines is normally filled with big blocks of foam for emergency flotation. There are also three pictures of the platform lifted off the trailer with the jacks. I am going to have the trailer part galvanized for corrosion protection. The last picture shows the forward looking visible low-light camera and part of the new radar mount.
1/17/06 Still working on the mods for the radar and bilge pump (Click Here for the Radar Page). Picture 1 below is the new 2000 gph pump on the right and the old one which was 500 gph on the left. It was not easy to get the new pump mounted as you have to do it through a 8" access hole. The new pump turns on automatically and senses if there is water present. If water is not present, the pump shuts down again and tests again after about 2.5 min. This way you don't need to know if there is water present and don't have to wait until the water is high enough to activate a float switch. With a float switch, the water need to be between 1.5" and 2" to start the pump and that is a lot of water and weight for a hovercraft! Picture 2 shows one of the stators with a missing screw. I noticed it when I removed the splitter wing to repair the coupling. What a pain to fix. I have to pull the stator vane next to it off first then work on fixing the missing screw. It is not a good plan to have loose stators by the fan as if it went into the fan the hovercraft would lose a considerable amount of its enthusiasm. Picture 3 shows where the port exhaust melted a plastic part under the duct. Picture 4 shows what the part should look like. The remaining pictures are of the inside of the bottom of the ducts showing the exhaust and related "stuff". I noticed the port exhaust pipe was contacting the side of the duct and was burning a little. So, something else to fix.... I am not too crazy about how the exhaust is routed so I may look into changing it in due course (See Exhaust Page).
3/6/06 Radar mount pretty much is finished now. Mounted below the radar dome is the thermal infra-red camera (Click Here for the FLIR page). Mounted on the rear of the radar mount support is the rear view camera. Mike Bice did the radar mount work and, as always, it looks great! With the help of a number of friends, I added some spacers under the front engine mount legs to close the gaps at the top of the ducts. We also put in new rubber engine mounts as the old ones were cracked from heat and time. This was a lot of work!
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