I am concerned about the number of correspondents referring to PVC sight
tubes - PVC hardens and becomes brittle over time! In the UK there was an
incident or accident some time ago due to a massive fuel leak in flight
through a cracked PVC fuel tube - not something any of us would want to
repeat!
For this reason, the factory changed to polyurethane tubing - which,
although it discolours over time, is still readable after 5 years and can be
replaced at the same time as the rubber fuel pipes.
For what it's worth, the original Europa routing isn't as bad as it's made
out to be - I find that on the ground it's perfectly accurate and repeatable
as long as you calibrate it properly. Although it's useless in level flight
at 120kts, by slowing down to 80kts and aligning (by sight) the passenger
front and rear door surrounds with the horizon, I get a reading
approximately the same as the static reading, as long as there's not too
much turbulence. (I wouldn't rely on it for critical remaining range
decisions - but you might have the same problem with a between the seats
routing due to parallax).
Regards
Roger Mills
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