Savvy Cylinder Borescope Inspection

Savvy Aviation Founder and CEO Mike Busch, Savvy Borescope Guru Dave Pasquale, and Savvy Aviation Director of Analysis Joe Godfrey take you through the history and importance of borescoping aircraft engine cylinders, then how to shoot the 11 pictures in the Savvy protocol, then how to upload and store them using Savvy's new borescope image interface.

[tortureborn]

Well this has been fantastic. General aviation is such a rewarding interest. Great info, great products, great explanation.

[loupitoufl]

Thank you so much for posting this video. Can't wait to inspect our cylinders in our upcoming annual.

[bobremedi]

Great video Mike, Dave, and Joe. Standardizing the picture series sequence is more thoughtful way to maintain an awareness of engine health. I always felt the same as you all about compression tests. Well done.

[juliencooper]

That is a cool high-tech gadget I never had. I used a special flashlight with a light wand attached so to awkwardly peer down beside that and of course I always did the compression test when / as required. But if not retired now, I'd not give up the old compression tests for cylinders, I'd use both methods. And I'd put the flashlight and wand to their other small area uses where a simple visual look inwards and around is all that's needed, that was always handy when looking for dropped tools and hardware between engine parts. How technology can grow, it's amazing. 😊

[tcutter]

Sensational stuff Mike, love your work !

[verbonloucks]

Bore scope is king but with leak check combined is king AND Queen for safety!

[bobremedi]

Prepping for the inspection is also important. Disconnect the aircraft battery, removing the spark plugs, and having new washers and torque wrench available for spark plug reinstall.

[scottbrooksby]

I just finished doing the borescope inspection on my Cessna 310R. While I understand the importance of checking all of these items to be thorough, I believe that if I had really good compressions, I would take a picture of the top of the valves in each cylinder, but would go no further. If I did find low compressions I would check more thoroughly, but I would not check every cylinder every time with all of these pictures. It takes me almost 2 hours to do the pictures on these two engines. It took longer until I got better at taking the pictures, but it still is not easy to look inside of each valve. Paying a mechanic for an extra 2 hours without bang for the buck does not make sense.

[TruthLiberty]

Getting ready to work on an old Ford v8 truck that has no compression on one cylinder.
Thinking maybe a hardened valve seat may have come loose.
Rocker arm and valve/spring movement seem normal but can't tell if the valve is fully seating without looking inside.
Got a cheap $30 boroscope so not sure if it will work as well as the one in your video but I hope so. Mine does nto have option for takling pictures, but is a handheld battery powered unit so I can carry it anywhere.

[ronpearson]

Would love to see a video using the borescope through the oil fill line to see the cam lobes

[stanleymickett]

I will be performing a boresope inspection soon on an aircraft that has sat for years in a salt environment. Do you have a defect chart to assist in identifying discrepancies? I own the same Ablescope. I performed and inspection on a suspected cracked cylinder once and i was unable to find a crack or source of the oil leak that slowly covered the windscreen. (Turbo Arrow). thanks.

[nucciocaristia]

Do you have ever borescoped a Rotax 912 cylinder? There is not to much room to move the probe. Any suggestion?

[donnorris]

Thank you for this video and protocol. It will help me document our engines.

Now a question - are the red and green colors still valid for engines that mostly run unleaded auto gas?

[bka]

is there another B-scope video showing the examination of the CAM thru the case after a cylinder has been removed?

[soaresviana]

Wouldn't collecting material inside the cylinder be good for cylinder corrosion analysis?

[benjeboy]

I noticed that the image on Dave’s computer when he’s doing the bore scope inspection has a definite blue tinge to it, but the images shown afterwards as photos are a normal “real life” tinge. Why is this? All images I take with my Vividia borescope keep the blue tinge…

[b.ellison]

Thank you Mike, Dave, and Joe! Your borescope initiative is commendable. Quick question though. I first bought the Vividia VA-400 in 2019 on your recommendation. I've not been able to capture the complete crown of a piston on a Lyc IO-360 even when the camera is completely pulled back to the spark plug hole with the piston at BTC. Am I doing something wrong?

[robertfederhofer]

What photo app is Dave Pasquale using. It is not the one from Vividia scope for Windows OS

[mrwonk]

Good news is; if you get a big enough dataset along with human analysis, you can train an AI model to help make quick work of analyzing future armature images.

[gibcardwell]

Can bore scoop inspections be done instead of compression check on a Jabiru 6 cylinder engine? Does that meet FAA and Jabiru's annual inspection requirements?