The Extra 200 that didn’t want to fly.

The Extra 200 that did not want to start its engine!First flying lesson done and with my externals lesson on the horizon, this weekend it was all lined up to be a “fun flight” in an Extra 200 – somewhere between clocking up a bit more time in the air and just having fun doing some aerobatics.

Upon arrival to the airport I’d watched the Extra 200 land, blue skies and good visibility – the gods were seemingly being kind to us today.

Pre-flight briefings done, flight suit on, headset plugged in and canopy closed we were ready to go…….

That is we were ready to go, in the 20 minutes since it had landed the Extra had decided it was less happy about going back up.   The “Oh…” from the instructor in the back seat was a give away sound of ‘Hmmm the engine hasn’t started and this is not looking promising.’

While my instructor assured me the battery was not flat, as far as the Extra was concerned it was flat – perhaps a stuck solenoid was the running theory.  My instructor made calls to various people and tried a few things to bring it back to life, but there’s a limit to what you can do before you start needing CAA aviation mechanic approvals and we were reaching that point quickly.

So sadly, it was so close but not to be (at least not today).

Re-booked and my instructor pointed out that the silver lining to this story is that in a few weeks I’ll have had more lessons under my belt, some if not all of them with him, so when I next get to try the Extra I should be in a better place and be trusted to do a bit more with it!

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