B767-300 flight crew arrives at their aircraft for a morning departure to find the windscreen damp with condensation on the inside. It is dried with paper towels and the flight departs. Out of 4;000 FT the Captain's Electronic Flight Instruments begin to flash and eventually fail. Crew elects to continue to destination in day VMC.
Synopsis
B767-300 flight crew arrives at their aircraft for a morning departure to find the windscreen damp with condensation on the inside. It is dried with paper towels and the flight departs. Out of 4;000 FT the Captain's Electronic Flight Instruments begin to flash and eventually fail. Crew elects to continue to destination in day VMC.
Narrative
Upon entering the aircraft the packs were on set to the mid position doors closed. Water was present above the windscreen which I cleaned off with a paper towel. All aircraft systems were operating normally. After takeoff at about 4;000 FT the Captains EHSI began blinking then went off. I transferred control of the aircraft to the First Officer and took over radio communications as were in a very busy environment at the time. At about 6;000 FT the Captains EADI began to blink. I did switch to alternate EFI with the same results. Both EADI and EHSI then came back on and appeared normal. At FL230 it sounded as if the Captain EHSI shorted out with an electrical smell that lasted about ten seconds no smoke was present. There were never any EICAS messages present. The Circuit Breaker (CB) popped on the EHSI at this time. The Captains EADI then began to blink again so I pulled the CB as a precautionary measure. I then ran the Fumes Removal Checklist also as a precaution even though the fumes were only temporary and had cleared on their own the check list ends with continue at the Captain discretion. We then consulted Dispatch and Maintenance Control. The decision was made that since the First Officer's instruments never once had any failure indication and we were in daytime VMC and would remain VMC for the entire flight were would continue to destination [< 1 hour].
Second reporter narrative
We got into the airplane with the APU running and both packs were on in the mid position. We both wiped off the windscreen with paper towels because it had a lot of moisture on it. We were climbing out and the Captain's EHSI started to flash off and on. He pressed the alt EFI switch but nothing worked. His EADI also started to flash off and on. They both came back for a little while and we were given FL230. At FL230; I heard a pop and the EHSI was blank. It sounded like the screen had shorted out. I also think the EHSI breaker popped at this point. There was an electrical smell for a very short time and it quickly went away. We never had any EICAS messages of smoke or equipment overheat either. The Captain ran the Smoke/Fumes Removal checklist and we had isolated the problem; the Captain's EHSI. He also pulled the breaker for the EADI because it was also starting to flash. The checklist ends with the option to continue at Captain's discretion. The Captain contacted Dispatch and Maintenance about the problem while I flew the airplane. We also talked about returning but since we had isolated the problem; had no more problems; and were in daytime VMC for the entire flight we decided to continue. My EHSI and EADI did not flash the entire flight. The rest of the flight was just fine.
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Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.