1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

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ememic99
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by ememic99 »

They effectively say that engine core worths 0.
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by Boatguy »

Karl wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 5:46 am Most recent customer newsletter regarding engine replacement.
Thanks for the post! And now for some questions:

1) Did you receive this copy from one of the resellers?

2) What is the engine warranty in a new Diamond? Airframe warranty? Avionics warranty?

3) With an 1,800hr TBR, replacement is $29/hr per engine. Add in replacing the HPP and flywheel twice and injectors once and it's probably more like $35/hr.

4) Does the old engine have to be sent to Austria? Why are they making a distinction about the "core" engine?

5) Suggestions for what to do with the old engines?

6) What is the significance of the replacement price being based on tail number?

7) According to GAMA, Austro shipped about 300 engines last year (assuming all DA40's are NGs). Are there really 500 going to TBRs this year?
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by michael.g.miller »

CFIDave wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 12:53 pm You'd think there's somewhere in the world where a 3rd-party engine shop could overhaul Austro Engines for less than the cost of new engines (it only takes 5 days of labor according to Austro's newsletter). Austro should have actively facilitated and encouraged this before discontinuing all overhauls! :x
Does Austro publish the overhaul manual? If so, this could be a blessing in disguise, giving US-based shops a chance to really know the engines. There will be a lot of cores lying around after this change, so significant economic incentive to repair the cores if the manuals are public.

If they don't publish the overhaul manual, this is just a slap in the face to owners, eliminating a huge benefit of the Austro engines over the CD-series engine. Effectively, we pay the weight penalty, with no savings at overhaul.
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by CFIDave »

michael.g.miller wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 10:39 pm
CFIDave wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 12:53 pm You'd think there's somewhere in the world where a 3rd-party engine shop could overhaul Austro Engines for less than the cost of new engines (it only takes 5 days of labor according to Austro's newsletter). Austro should have actively facilitated and encouraged this before discontinuing all overhauls! :x
Does Austro publish the overhaul manual?
No. Their password-protected website includes Maintenance, Operations, and Installation manuals, but no overhaul instructions.
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by photoSteveZ »

Boatguy wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 4:33 pm
Karl wrote: Wed Mar 23, 2022 5:46 am Most recent customer newsletter regarding engine replacement. ;)
.
.
.
4) Does the old engine have to be sent to Austria? Why are they making a distinction about the "core" engine?

5) Suggestions for what to do with the old engines?
.
.
.
The PDF Karl posted states that the core is NOT returned to Austro and remains the property of the customer. Wow, thanks, Austro. Now we can take the money we save in shipping and apply it to disposal. ;)

By the way, I confirmed this week with a Diamond source that Austro has no plans to resume offering overhauled engines in the future.
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by TimS »

neema wrote: Tue Mar 08, 2022 7:20 pm I was lamenting that Austro locked themselves in design with the AE300/330 rather than focusing on bringing in a new Benz iteration every decade or so. They could focus on being conversion specialists, rather than take on manufacturing of a retired engine.

Benz makes millions of engines per year. Leave the manufacturing to them.
The quoted price I have seen in multiple locations was the Dries family spent 67 million Euro on the certification of AE-300. And that did not include any production, that was just the R&D number.
Current regulations, pretty much make that a non-starter from a business perspective with such a small market.

Tim
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by ememic99 »

Reading about mandatory injectors replacement, it seems that CD engines have lower maintenance cost during their lifetime which is TBR 2100 hours (17% longer that AE300 1800 TBR and 77% longer than AE330 1200 TBR). For CD-135/155 AFAIK only HP pump, alternator and v-ribbed bely have to be changed every 600 hours; the rest is just inspections and some smaller parts. If AE300 is 47.500 EUR then it's still cheaper than CD-155 (I think it's around 55.000 EUR - it's not easy to find accurate and current pricing) but I believe this all came as a surprise to aircraft owners.
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by AirWolf »

CFIDave wrote: Mon Oct 19, 2020 3:31 am 1. Austro ran out of genuine Mercedes-produced OM640 core engines and is now assembling its own virtually identical engines.
Curious, did this actually end up happening? When and starting with which serial number? I could only find news references to this on AVweb back in 2019 and no updates since. Are they now producing their own cores as described here? https://www.avweb.com/recent-updates/bu ... re-engine/
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by CFIDave »

Yes, the AvWeb article you mentioned is correct: Austro is now building their own core engines since they used up their supply of Mercedes-Benz OM640 engines upon which the AE300/AE330 engines are based.

Austro was forced to go back and find suppliers who could re-create parts used by older Mercedes OM640 diesel car engines that were produced between 2004-2011 -- and then assemble core engines from these reproduced parts. Austro can't change their aircraft engine design very much without re-certifying the engine with EASA/FAA.

One of Austro's challenges has been controlling the "stack up of tolerances" where individual parts suppliers may produce new engine parts that individually conform to design drawings, but when combined with other engine parts may not fit correctly -- potentially leading to excessive parts wear and/or overheating.

FYI, if you want to see what an Austro engine looks like inside, check out this video of a Mercedes-Benz OM640 engine disassembly:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6RpRsKktRc

The YouTube video is Russian, but you can easily turn on English subtitles. (Many of the accessories removed in the first part of the video aren't used by Austro, but the core engine is the same.)

For comparison, here are some photos taken back in 2016 showing the head being replaced on one of my DA42's Austro engines; you'll see the core engine is the same as what's shown in the Russian OM640 video:
IMG_3312.jpeg
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Re: 1,800 Hr Inspection Costs

Post by AirWolf »

That's awesome - when did they "switch over" approximately? Sometime between 2020 and now?
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