Deaks pretty good at dispelling myths and old wives tales. How about one from you?
Well, one is that business of people putting the mixtures in autolean on the ground. When I see that I’m liable to ask, “Why are you doing that?” Usually they’ll say “Well, it keeps it from loading up.” It doesn’t do a thing, absolutely does nothing. If you know how a carburetor works inside, the fuel isn’t going through what you’re controlling with the mixture plates — it’s going through a little idle valve, and it dribbles some idle fuel in, and you can move the mixture control rich and autolean, whatever you want, and the fuel doesn’t even go through it — it goes through something else. But you find all sorts of people, mechanics included, absolutely convinced of it. Is that something that crept over from fuel injection systems or just a bad habit? It’s an old wives’ tale and, like all of them, contains just enough veracity to seem to make sense. Just like the business of reducing manifold pressure on take-off to “baby the engine.” Deakin, who doesn’t swear much, let loose a burst
