Originally Posted by
scifi
. So can we blame our IMC Pilots for this? , as prolonged cloud flying is the only way water could have got into the engine.
As mentioned, water vapor is a by-product of the combustion process and a portion of that blows by the piston rings into the crankcase. However, the only ones you can blame, are those that perform excessive ground runs or only short flights that prevents the engine oil temps from obtaining a value to "remove" that water vapor. And since it is an intermittent issue, if you were to track the max engine oil temps with the current OAT/DWPT by flight or ground run, you can probably narrow down who is the biggest offender. I believe TCM and Lycoming both offer guidance that addresses this topic.