Reply #180: Exactly, their claims were nothing more than ignorance and/or obfuscation

[MajorChode]

Even assuming a flight was aborted due to engine issues it wouldn't be that unusual. It's quite common for spark plugs to foul (which is checked during the engine run up). Sometimes you can clear the foul by running the engine at high rpm for a couple of minutes with a lean mixture and sometimes you can't. There's also dozens of other things that can cause a pilot to abort due to "engine problems".