This Forum is a place for Piper Comanche pilots to communicate and discuss technical issues
If you join or reset a password, please check your Spam Email box for emails from Admin at ComancheTechTalk.com
Please put your questions on the forum as well so everyone can read and respond. Someone else might be having similar questions.
All questions or topics on the Forums automatically get sent to the Tech team as well.
S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
Recently, whether in heading or nav mode it seems to track like a drunken sailor. It will start to bank but then seems to forget what it is doing until it is 15-20 degrees from its original heading then it meanders back only to fly past the desired heading/track on the opposite side. It does not seem
As it is flying way off course if I apply a little pressure to the yoke it seems to wake up and realize it has gone to far and stops the turn. I thought maybe the AP wasn't engaging at all but there is force on the yoke.
It goes through the motions of intercept, CAP SOFT, SOFT but no matter what mode it wanders though I believe the bank angles are proportionately smaller based on the mode.
It still holds altitude beautifully but you can't use altitude hold unless you have Nav or Hdg engaged.
I suspect this is an expensive trip to the avionics shop but wanted to see if anyone knows of a simple fix first.
Richard Lanning- Posts: 65
- Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:08 pm
- Location: South Florida
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
I brought it to a good avionics shop and they did some good old fashioned troubleshooting. There were a couple loose ground connections. There were a couple bad pins in connectors. They hooked it up to the STEC "break out box" to check signals and things were good. The servo was requiring more voltage than it should so they made some adjustments there and fixed it. Overall, I spent another AMU with the shop and the 60-2 is working perfectly.
I have no idea if my problem will have any similarity to yours since yours is roll mode, but there are a lot of connections and pieces to the 60-2 and I would find a shop that can do some good diagnostic troubleshooting before you start replacing boxes.
Matt Bogard- Posts: 110
- Joined: Fri Jun 17, 2011 1:47 pm
- Location: Omaha, NE
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
If you ever send you HSI back to the factory make sure you tell them ahead of time NO NEW KNOBS. Seems that every HSI has to have the little knobs replaced at $60 apiece! My old knobs were perfectly fine.
Richard Lanning- Posts: 65
- Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:08 pm
- Location: South Florida
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
Regards
jvb
- VANBLADEREN
- ICS BOD member
- Posts: 203
- Joined: Fri Jun 01, 2001 8:55 pm
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
Matt Bogard- Posts: 110
- Joined: Fri Jun 17, 2011 1:47 pm
- Location: Omaha, NE
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
- George Kretschmann
- Posts: 148
- Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2012 12:27 am
- Location: Central Alabama
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
When it starts to wander I apply a little pressure and it stops and then goes back the other way to get back on course. Unfortunately, it sort of just keeps going the other way. It is oscillating about 20-30 degrees each side of the desired course. Seems to be a static oscillation.
Richard Lanning- Posts: 65
- Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 11:08 pm
- Location: South Florida
Re: S-Tec 60-2 Wandering
William Hughes- Posts: 97
- Joined: Mon Apr 21, 2014 9:23 pm
- Location: Saskatoon, SK