Vince Endter's '76 Turbo RG

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I had a chance to visit Vince Endter in his hanger in the San Francisco Bay area and take a few pictures of his well cared-for Cardinal RG.

Vince himself is an A&P and a very involved owner, fond of accurate facts and data, and has a good sense of humor. I hope he still does after he sees this shot!

Actualy this started out as a picture of the lead sheet that Vince uses to do performance testing at different CGs. He says that a rearward CG is good for up to 4 knots, so when he's light on load he might just toss in a couple sheets of this lead to get that extra bit of true airspeed.

Let's start inside the airplane, with one of the first things most of us take a look at: the panel.

As you can see, Vince is partial to King Silver Crown, as are most people who can manage to get their hands on some. He also has a few extra toys that we'll take a closer look at below.

The first thing that caught my eye was the tach, an electronic thing that provides rather more features than that standard tachometer.

The second unusual item is the egt, a multi-gauge analog system that must provide excelent comparison and a fast read of the temps.

Looking elsewhere in the interior, we see a nice set of seats with an excellent upholstry job.

I admired the headrests and learned that they were built up from a loop of stainless steel tubing and a piece of fiberboard. The upholsterer added padding and a cover and the result is this nice looking headrest.

The seat belts are BAS seatbelts, check out this page for details on that system.

Vince also clued us in to the high-tech custom shoulder harness covers that had come from the local discount auto parts store. I've seen this approach on several Cardinals.. it really helps the comfort of the shoulder harnesses.

Looking overhead, the sun is controlled by visors installed on non- moving solid rods installed where the old visors tubes used to be inserted. Vince says these were far less expensive that the Rosen visors, and did not require the extensive mounting work either. Check out this page for more on the Rosen system to see what he means.

Perhaps most interesting is that for a turbocharged airplane, the panel had almost no additional gadgets or accessories related to operation of the engine. The only special items were the EGT and a vernier throttle with an easily adjustable lock. Vince explained that a high altitude a little throttle movement can mean a big change in manifold pressure.

Vince did have some interesting periphial equipment mounted in and on his console. The pictures below show his intercom system, installed in the area where the courtesy light used to live.

The console also contained a panel in place of the ash tray which contains an avionics master and navigation switches. This panel had a couple of interesting things on it.

First was a circuit breaker labeled 'Avionics Master Bypass". This breaker is hooked in parallel across the avionics switch, so that if the switch stops working you have an alternative path, but that path is still protected from short circuits. Pretty clever.

We'll have to get Vince to fill us in on the two small audio-type jacks, they look like 1/8 inch phono plugs. Audio in or out? Place your bets here and we'll find out what they are.

The switch below the panel is labeled 'Pulselight', a good accessory for the busy San Francisco bay area.

Moving outside the airplane, one is initially struck with the large number of hoses and extra parts on the Turbocharged engine. I will not go into detail about that installation, but if you are interested you can see pictures of Vince's turbo or take a virtual tour through his system, the same pictures with explainations of what you are looking at.

I noticed an interesting approach to the connection of the baffle seal the the cowling baffle. Vince used a large number of .41 safety wire twists to hold the seal on. This is similar, better really, than the staples that Cessna® used to hold it on origionally.

I was interested in seeing Vince's windshield installation, since he had just explained to the digest how he had to increase the width of the joggle. When asked, he explained that the joggle was a small strip of metal along the top of the windshield that holds the Plexiglass from pushing back along the top.

These bolts show where he removed and reinstalled that strip of metal. Vince says the windshield reduced the wind noise substantially and gives him some additional piece of mind during the bird migration season.

Finally, Vince showed us a modification to his aircraft that has been a source of discussion on several occasions.

Most of us have problems with our manifold pressure indicator being slow to respond to changes in throttle. This makes power setting difficult.

Those who have looked into this say the cause is fuel and oil in the MP pressure line. I've heard various theories about how the liquid gets into the usual capillary tube, and I can't really accept any of them, but somehow the oil does end up in this line.

You can blow the line out every few weeks or replace that capillary tube with a new one from Cessna, which Vince has and can be seen in this picture.

The new line is about 1/4 OD and is solid, mounted to clamps on the engine baffle. The loop near the bottom is called the drip loop, and it has a small hole in it's bottom. Vince is holding a .040 drill in the drain hole to show where it is.

Vince says this has resolved his manifold 'laziness' and has no other effect on his turbocharged engine.

Vince also has a few speed mods, including an exhaust stack fairing (see more at this page and a tailcone modification.

But perhaps most unique is his installation of Rob Sobchuk's new wingtips. You can read the data Vince gathered from the installation of these tips on this page.

What doesn't show on that page, however, is the row of tennis balls that Vince uses to back his airplane careful into the hanger. It's almost an ILS, or Rabbits at least!

And that's where I will end this tour of Vince's airplane. I noticed a number of other items, from the built up door seal to the careful curve of the new injector lines, but those items will fit nicely in the maintenance section of this web page.

Thanks for Vince for the tour. Please let me know if this is of interest and use, we can do a lot more of this if it helps to see what's unique about some of these airplanes.

Whether interested or bored, please send your opinion and any ideas you may have for this section to the Webmaster.