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We all burp the oil daily and then take our oil dipstick reading per the POH. I’m curious if the burping has any other function besides getting an accurate oil level reading. Does it play a role in the proper operation of the engine in any way?

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I am guessing NOT-AT-ALL. Brett will surely chime in. Since the engine is using a dry sump, I believe this is to restore the "Nominal" volume in the oil tank.

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I have read on other forums that this burping is essential because it also helps to move the oil about in the gearbox before the actual start.

But come on - it's just fun to hear it burp and know it wasn't me for once that did it. Now if I can just get it to make a farting sound ...

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One of the mechanics at N57 came back from Rotax training and told me that Rotax was OK with not burping if the oil checked OK on the dipstick. As I understand it the primary reason for burping is to get most of the oil in the reservoir and that level is what needs to be checked. I find burping takes the oil level from around the bottom of the OK region on the dipstick to 1/2 way between marks.

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One of the mechanics at N57 came back from Rotax training and told me that Rotax was OK with not burping if the oil checked OK on the dipstick. As I understand it the primary reason for burping is to get most of the oil in the reservoir and that level is what needs to be checked. I find burping takes the oil level from around the bottom of the OK region on the dipstick to 1/2 way between marks.

Interesting info! Now we need Icon to amend the POH.

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The primary purpose of burping is to scavenge the oil that is in the crank case back into the oil tank. Post shut down the oil thats up in the journals and other places drains down into the bottom of the crank case. If the engine isn't running it doesn't make it back in to the tank. If you check the oil and its below the minimum and don't scavenge all the oil you can from the crank case you run the risk of engine drawing in air from the oil tank and ingesting it into the engine which is really really bad for the valve hydraulic lifters among other things. So my advice is burp the engine at least every cold start then check the oil level. These engines typically don't consume much oil, but its always good to check.

There have been a few instances where a owner didn't burp the engine, added oil to the top of the dipstick mark then came back with a bit of oil out the breather because they didn't burp the engine first. The oil that was in the crank case along with the added oil brought it above the maximum oil level and the rest went out the breather. It will be a pretty sizable mess if you do this. Also zero g push overs cause a very bad mess. I always apologized to the mechanics before I had to go do tests with 0g cause oil would be all over the engine bay and the tail.

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Bret, can you explain this. I have twice had my oil serviced all the way up to the full mark on annuals. The first time I ended up with oil being blown into the engine bay until the level came down to about 3/4 of the way to the full mark on the stick (after burping). The last time it was serviced to the full level I actually ended up with oil pressure during flight in the yellow range and I made a precautionary landing (no warning light though). I searched some forums concerning rotax and one guy stated he had this happen and he used an oil pump & vacuumed out some oil to reduce it from the completely full mark - then everything was fine. So I tried that myself - it worked. Can't figure out why it would work though.

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My guess is that when the service center brings the aircraft in and changes the oil they don't scavenge the oil out of the crankcase back into the tank where it is then drained. Its quite literally the first step in the line service manual for the oil change. So they service the tank and bring it up to full the left over oil in the system over fills the tank.

Oil pressure ending up in the yellow range- Hum... yellow high or yellow low? The only oil pressure light you will get is if you are below 12PSI and in the red zone you'll get an LED within the oil pressure indicator that turns on. So not sure why your oil pressure went low or high.

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yellow low - and it stayed in the yellow regardless of throttle position

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Hi, being a new Icon owner (S/N 163), I decided to take the Rotax maintenance courses which I completed a few weeks ago at Lockwood Aviation. I'm not an A&P and certainly no expert (which is why I took the courses) but reading through the last couple of entries on this post, I have to ask Mike Himes if anyone has checked the oil pressure regulator on that aircraft. To me that would be a reasonable place to start absent any other inputs. Of course, the other possibility is the oil pressure sensor. You might try reaching out to Dean Vogel at Lockwood Aviation with an email including a picture of the instrument cluster showing the low oil pressure condition.

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Michael, I appreciate your input but I didn't take the time to take a picture of the instrument cluster as I was trying to get the aircraft on the ground quickly. I have lost two engines due to low oil pressure and/or quantity in my life - didn't want to make it three. That being said, I never got into the low pressure red band and I never got the low pressure light on - although that sucker is dim and hard to see in bright sunlight. I will probably look at the issue again after my failed NLG actuator issue is resolved - but that looks like it may take months for Icon to get the new design actuator released.

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I wanted to update my particular oil situation that I have previously posted about above. Just got my A5 out of its annual today. It took three months to get it done with the NLG and MLG switch retrofits. Anyway, I was doing the engine run for them before they put the top cowling on and the oil pressure wouldn't go above the yellow range after start. There WAS an oil pressure rise - but only into the yellow range. I decided to tap the gauge to see if it was stuck. When I did the clear round plastic gauge front (lens?) actually moved. It became immediately apparent that the clear plastic disk was impeding the movement of the needle in the oil pressure gauge. We shut down, took some super-sticky tape to pull the disk to the front of the gauge and then used Super Glue to cement it back into its proper position. Problem solved