Pilot of a prescott pusher homebuilt makes an emergency landing when the engine fails subsequent to ...

Narrative:

I planned to do some test flying of my plane. I received a briefing through duats on-line; drove to the airport and performed a thorough preflight because neither I nor the plane had been up in several months. Everything looked normal. I departed and headed south to the area where I would perform some of the routine test flying. I was flying for just under 1 hour when I decided to perform some slow flight. I slowed down to under 120 mph and extended the gear; but only got 1 green light (the left main). I cycled the gear a few times with the same results. At this time I headed the plane back to ZZZ and performed a couple turns and slips that managed to get the right main gear down and locked. I advised the tower of my situation and requested a fly-by for a visual inspection. I made my pass about tower height at around 120 mph and the tower reported that the nose gear appeared to be extended; but they also said that something fell off the plane. I decided I needed to get the plane on the ground despite the nose gear issue; hoping the gear would lock down as I reduced speed for landing. I was in a right downwind as instructed by the tower when the engine started to run rough and lose some power. I advised the tower I was having trouble and turned a short base. At that point the engine quit completely and I noticed some smoke coming into the cabin (the plane is a prescott pusher so you do not have a view of the engine from the cockpit). I advised the tower that I had lost my engine and had a fire and declared an emergency. I turned off all fuel feeds and power. I was approximately 700 ft AGL and still carrying 120 mph. I was able to make it to the runway and made a dead stick landing. When the nose touched; the gear folded so I elected to turn the plane into the grass to minimize damage to the nose. Once the plane stopped; I evacuated the aircraft and surveyed the situation. The engine compartment had a couple of fires burning. I managed to put one out with some rags I had in the cabin and then pulled the passenger side engine cover to work with the other fire; but found it had burned itself out. At this point everything was safe and settled. I surveyed the damage and found that the piece that had fallen off the aircraft was part of the exhaust system on the pilot's side of the engine. This allowed the hot exhaust to blow directly on the hoses and wires at the firewall; igniting them. There is no obvious reason for the loss of the exhaust pipe since this system had less than 5 hours flying time since installation. I will be investigating the causes of both of these failures. The gear had been rewired; the oil flushed and everything thoroughly tested with no sign of any problems. The exhaust pipe had been wrapped with heat shield tape so the crack was not visible during any of the inspections.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Pilot of a Prescott Pusher homebuilt makes an emergency landing when the engine fails subsequent to a fly-by to ascertain the condition of the nose gear which did not indicate down and locked.

Narrative: I planned to do some test flying of my plane. I received a briefing through DUATS on-line; drove to the airport and performed a thorough preflight because neither I nor the plane had been up in several months. Everything looked normal. I departed and headed south to the area where I would perform some of the routine test flying. I was flying for just under 1 hour when I decided to perform some slow flight. I slowed down to under 120 MPH and extended the gear; but only got 1 green light (the left main). I cycled the gear a few times with the same results. At this time I headed the plane back to ZZZ and performed a couple turns and slips that managed to get the right main gear down and locked. I advised the Tower of my situation and requested a fly-by for a visual inspection. I made my pass about Tower height at around 120 MPH and the Tower reported that the nose gear appeared to be extended; but they also said that something fell off the plane. I decided I needed to get the plane on the ground despite the nose gear issue; hoping the gear would lock down as I reduced speed for landing. I was in a right downwind as instructed by the Tower when the engine started to run rough and lose some power. I advised the Tower I was having trouble and turned a short base. At that point the engine quit completely and I noticed some smoke coming into the cabin (the plane is a Prescott Pusher so you do not have a view of the engine from the cockpit). I advised the Tower that I had lost my engine and had a fire and declared an emergency. I turned off all fuel feeds and power. I was approximately 700 FT AGL and still carrying 120 MPH. I was able to make it to the runway and made a dead stick landing. When the nose touched; the gear folded so I elected to turn the plane into the grass to minimize damage to the nose. Once the plane stopped; I evacuated the aircraft and surveyed the situation. The engine compartment had a couple of fires burning. I managed to put one out with some rags I had in the cabin and then pulled the passenger side engine cover to work with the other fire; but found it had burned itself out. At this point everything was safe and settled. I surveyed the damage and found that the piece that had fallen off the aircraft was part of the exhaust system on the pilot's side of the engine. This allowed the hot exhaust to blow directly on the hoses and wires at the firewall; igniting them. There is no obvious reason for the loss of the exhaust pipe since this system had less than 5 hours flying time since installation. I will be investigating the causes of both of these failures. The gear had been rewired; the oil flushed and everything thoroughly tested with no sign of any problems. The exhaust pipe had been wrapped with heat shield tape so the crack was not visible during any of the inspections.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	833213
Time
Date	200904
Local Time Of Day	1201-1800
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Experimental
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Initial Approach
Route In Use	Other Traffic Pattern
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	Engine
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 1 Flight Crew Total 1000 Flight Crew Type 10
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Smoke / Fire / Fumes / Odor Ground Excursion Runway Other Airframe part Ejected

Pilot of a prescott pusher homebuilt makes an emergency landing when the engine fails subsequent to a fly-by to ascertain the condition of the nose gear which did not indicate down and locked.