February 2007 - American Bonanza Society

COMMENTARYMAJOR CONCERNSABOUT OUR INDUSTRYBY NEIL POBANZThe incompetence of airline upper management,having been self-evident inrecent days, makes me fear for our air traffic control systemif they have their way in taking over ATe. Examples:• Some reservation numbers had a recording on December21 that phones would not be answered until after Christmasdue to overload of the system.• One of our members got on a flight and as the captainboarded, the cockpit security door fell into the aisle. With noone capable of repair. the flight had to cancel.• On another occasion, a member reponed he had to resonto bribery to get a seat. Sounds like a Third World operation,which is, of course, where the aircraft maintenance is beingdone.Landing gear accidentsWe are losing three to four airplanes (of all makes andmodels) a day in US. We are having as many as four to sixlanding gear mishaps a week in Beech piston aircraft.This is unacceptable! There won't be any aircraft left butnew ones at some point. The industry can't exist with only newaircraft. There won't be enough airplanes to suppon businessesand infrastructure needed to keep these new airplanes inoperation.Some of the gear mishaps result from pilots who do notunderstand the gear. Some mechanics do not understand thegear system. Some Beech shops don't have tools, manuals orexperienced piston-airplane mechanics. Some folks try to takecare of their own system without tools, manuals or experience.This lack of knowledge of a system is not restricted to thegear. I believe (not official ABS opinion) that the highly toutedglass cockpits (whichever brand of airplane they are in) canbe a risk multiplier. If operators, to include the CFls, don't getcompletely checked out on the glass, it can cause spatial confusionas has been noted in several high-profile accidents.It seems to me there is more emphasis on marketing thantraining. And it is hyped as though glass cockpits will solve allweather issues. This encourages people to exceed their limits,especially if tbey have a panial failure. A black panel is probablyeasy to detect, but failure of individual pans of the displaymay be hard to work around.Engine life and TBOWe've only been making internal combustion engines forabout 100 years. I've been around maintenance of such devicesfor well over 50 years. Now we have crankshaft failures fromfaulty manufacturing. Lycoming uses a contractor that may bethe only US source. John Deere combines are experiencingsimilar problems. TCM resoned to analysis and tracking ofeach crank. We've had popular cylinders crack, aftermarketrings and connecting rods fail. This is unacceptable!Much ado has been made lately about running past TBO.One issue that might surprise people is that some insurancecompanies have reservations about going past a TBO hour orcalendar limit. Insurance company interest (or disinterest) inairplanes exceeding manufacturer's recommended TBO comesand goes, so you won 't know until renewal time whether youcan get insurance with an over-TBO engine.This could have significant effect on operating cost, as wecurrently tend to disregard any life limits that are not ADNotes, or listed in the type cenificate data sheet or approvedPOH limitations. Most shop manuals are not FAA-approveddocuments on small aircraft.One problem that encourages people to disregard TBOs isthat manufacturers tend to arrive at hour or calendar lim its inan arbitrary manner.For instance, there is the Beech 10,000-hour airframe limiton some models while we have limitation extensions on KingAirs to 20,000 hours, and 22,000-hour Bonanzas still flying finewith no life limits.On the other hand, failure history has led us to recommend500-hour specialty shop overhaul of alternators, as frequencyof failures is high between 500 and 700 hours.New prop life limits have been the result of extensiveengineering tests. One problem on engines is the condition ofaccessories, while another is that the wear incurred in longerengine runs can cause more pans to be throwaways. A pan thatis within new service limits might be suitable for reuse, whilethe higher wear rate, after going through the hardness level,ensures that it would be unsuitable for rework. Operators withmechanical aptitude and experience might be safe operatingequipment until it stans to let you know it's tired.I have run some engines past the recommended TBO andbeen able to tell when a valve lifter was weak or a valve springbroke or found the early signs of a cam follower staning to failby hearing it. I don't believe the average pilot is that in tunewith his aircraft or flies often enough to notice. Noise-cancelingheadsets don't help with this.So through history- like the alternators, tear-down analysisand actual engineering data~ngine manufacturers arriveat recommended overhaul periods. Some have to be a guess,such as calendar limits, which presumes a certain corrosionrate and condition. The owner in Arizona, if the airplane wasalways there, will have significantly less corrosion problemthan one in Florida-even if it's only occasionally in Florida.The way we operate and care for our engines can varywidely, and therefore so can the results. The manufacturerscannot anticipate fully what's going to be done with its engine.@ABS February 2007 www.bononza.org Page 10060