Piper PA-28-161, G-BGPJ, 17 August 2006
Piper PA-28-161, G-BGPJ
Summary:
During the landing roll following an uneventful local flight the engine stopped. The pilot restarted the engine and taxied the aircraft to the hanger and on closing the throttle the engine stopped again. He tried to restart the engine but with no success and decided to shut down the aircraft. The pilot was discussing the possible causes of the engine failures with his passenger when his attention was caught by a passer-by. On opening the cockpit door he was informed that there were flames around the nose landing gear leg. The pilot and his passenger rapidly evacuated the aircraft and the fire was quickly extinguished using a foam fire extinguisher. Examination revealed that one of the two hollow arms of the horse-shoe shaped float in the carburettor contained a substantial amount of fuel which resulted in the needle valve not fully closing allowing excess fuel to flow through the carburettor’s jets giving a rich mixture and, at low power, fuel poured out of the carburettor into the air box and the engine suffered a rich fuel mixture cut.
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