God, settle Princesses.... it's a PT-6!!!
It's near bullet-proof, within limits. I don't have personal experience of the -42, but usually have 2-6hrs daily of a -114A or a -140 strapped to my arse. Dare I say it, probably in far more "challenging" situations than implied by the OP. I work in Papua.
There's a thing or 2 strike me straight off the top... 14-ish% Ng is fairly light to be biffing the fuel in. In the -140, I motor to whatever the damn thing will give me, within starter battery/external limits. That's usually in the region of 17+-ish %. I also motor (again within starter limits) to an ITT... on the -140, around 180ºC, the -114A, around 150ºC before adding fuel. Temps during start Very rarely exceed 780ºC.
White smoke during the start speaks to me of excess fuel -as others have said, probably due the lack of a dry motoring run between aborted start and "in anger" start.
ANY compressor bleeds engaged during start -even an open bypass- WILL result in higher-than-normall start ITT's. Not necessarily an issue -and NOT an exceedance until in excess of 1065ºC on my engines.
A weak battery most certainly will result in higher than "usual" ITT's... trend-monitoring -and an aware driver- certainly Do have an impact on overall engine health. Batteries generally speaking, do have a very Finite service life, which Will be influenced equally by how often and How the engine is started/run. Your MRO should have a handle on that. Importantly, LISTEN to how your engine starts. Headset off, be aware of how the engine is/is not accelerating, is it reaching a peak then decaying, LOOK at your battery voltage during the start... these are all V important indicators of if/when you should chuck the fuel in. Unfortunately, Voltage is the only battery health indicator we have available... but we rely on AMPS to actually turn the fecking engine. But we don't know that until we ARE turning the engine.
Overall, a PT6 will not **** on you. You really have to work at abusing it before it'll throw its toys out of the cot. Relax. Q's are good -but don't let the OWT's get in your head.
Last edited by RadioSaigon; 1st Apr 2017 at 06:55.