HACman fuel system

Yesterday I received my new "HACman" system that is designed to allow one to lean the fuel supplied to the engine for both economy and power without having to change the jetting. This would allow me to fly both at sea level and 10,000 feet with the engine operating at its peak by just twirling the little knob that you see in the above picture. I didn't get it installed until midday yesterday, and only flew long enough to make sure that it was installed properly. Today was to be the test to see if it indeed did give me better fuel economy and performance. For that I decided to fly to Burns, refuel there and return home. At 88 air miles one way a suitable test.


In the photo above I am at 1000 feet above the ground on take off, with the engine 100 RPM's under maximum. The EIS (engine information system) shows left to right- top left-RPM's, bottom left is Oil temp/oil pressure. Middle top is amount of fuel, bottom middle is an unused aux gauge. Top right is EGT (exhaust gas temps) bottom right is CHT (cylinder head temp)

Maximum rpm's is 6200 for no more than three minutes, max sustained cruise is 5800. Maximum EGT is 1400, max CHT is 338 degree's.


I of course could not resist an early morning shot of the Steen's.

I had decided to climb to 8,000 feet on my trip to Burns, keeping the engine leaned to maximum. I had a bit of headwind, and my speeds were just under 60 MPH in straight and level flight.

This is "Cow Camp" for the ranch next door. A very nice spring with the cabin and corrals.
As is shown in this photo, I am leveling off and just about to throttle back to save as much fuel as possible. It has taken me at least a gallon of fuel to climb to this height, but I have also flown about 24 miles towards my goal.
The surface here is about 6500 MSL. Lots of water, for a change.

More Steen's, Mickey basin is the dirt in the top of the picture.
The picture above is just a bit East of where I flew the other day looking for Elk. I had intended to expand my search to this area, but I wanted to try a bit of 100 LL in the engine, having always burned auto gas. Therefore I decided to go to Burns and refuel there.
Crossing the Mann Lake road, with Mann Lake in the top left of the picture.
Interesting texture to the hill below. I assume Lava flows are responsible. This stuff is all over the hills here and, is red and very brittle. It is almost like Shale. Flat and flaky.
Over the ridges that separate us from Burns, the terrain flattens out and allows more habitation and ranches, and hay production.
This EGT setting seems to be "peak" fuel mixture. Richer and RPM's drop, leaner and they also drop. The Air speed and GPS were reading the same.
Malheur Lake in the distance.
Hay production is much in evidence every where they can provide water to the pivots.


Burns Airport is in the near distance. Interestingly enough my GPS, using the 196 data base was showing the airport several miles to the left.

I landed and refueled at the self serve pump. My tanks are marked in gallons and are in full view. I need 3.5 gallons of fuel to replace what I burned on the way here. I was surprised to find that the pump showed that it delivered 4.1 gallons of gas. At $4.57 they overcharged me $2.87. Glad that I only needed 3.5 gallons.




A trip to the boy's room, and I took off for home. I decided this time that I would only climb high enough to clear the mountains.
This area below me is the rest of the area that I wanted to check for Elk. I saw a bunch of animals that resembled Elk, run out from a pond, Light tan on the back and dark in the front. I thought at the time that they were Elk, but the next bunch I saw were definitely horses, most were colored the same way. Since they were horse's they would have been Real "Wild Horses", the Kiger Mustang. Goggle the breed, very interesting. All of the other ones out there that are black, white and other colors are merely "feral" horses.


Upon landing I found that I had been in the air for 1.5 hours burning a bit over 3 gallons of gas, again traveling at least 88 miles. This betters my "mileage" by 9 miles per gallon. Before installation my best mileage was 20 MPG, this works out to be 29 MPG, and somewhere in the area of 2.3 GPH. I think I will keep it.

One thing I forgot to mention was when I was installing the setup, I folded the wing back to give me room to work on the engine. As is normal, when I took off the lift strut, I drop it onto my foot and then the rest of the way to the floor. It only falls about a foot, but it does fall. After tripping over it a couple of times I decided to take it off. When I picked it up a bat flew out of the end of the strut where there is a bit of room in the plastic fairing. I guess he went for the ride over the Steen's the other day. I have been seeing ?mouse? crap on the floor. Apparently I don't know mouse crap from Guano. Must have been quite a ride.