Death of an Airplane

A plane died today. It was given its last rights and deemed unfit for further life as it was designed. This story has a moral, a lesson, and a challenge. Meet Xray, a 1962 Cessna model 172 small aircraft.

Aircraft have been mass produced since the early 20th century. The 1950's brought an explosion of economical, safe, dependable personal aircraft for the masses. These aircraft were designed and built with a 10 to 15 year life span in mind. Today there are tens of thousands of these fifty, sixty and seventy year old airplanes still flying. The reason so many of them are flying is due to the federally mandated annual inspections and stringent repair processes they go through. Every once in a while, one slips through the cracks. This is one of those sad stories with a happy ending.

I know very little of the history of this aircraft, only that over the last two years, according to the maintenance records, the only repair that was done during the annual inspections was to install a new set of spark plug wires (high tension leads).

This aircraft was purchased sight unseen, through an Internet auction house for $18,000. The engine has had a recent top half overhaul (pistons and cylinders). The aircraft has flown weekly for a few months and came into our shop for some repairs to the instrument panel. What transpired over the next three days has resulted in the death of this airplane.

The mechanic working on the panel issue noticed the windshield was cracked and working its way out of its lower cradle. The windshield had moved up far enough that daylight could be seen underneath the bottom. A new window was ordered. Work continued to the next day when a couple more serious discrepancies were found that required repair. At that point the owner decided to have us perform a full annual inspection on the aircraft.

The inspection commenced. The next two days brought scratched heads, bugged out eyes, disappointment, and utter disgust for the disregard for human life, regulations and federal laws that apply to aircraft safety.

The certified mechanics that had been taking care of this aircraft before it got to us had performed a lack of maintenance, in my mind, bordering on criminal. The following is a short summation of a list of over 40 items that require maintenance before this aircraft should be returned to service:

• ·      Windshield cracked
• ·      Windshield improperly installed
• ·      Aft rudder and elevator bulkhead mount broken (cast piece)
• ·      Left wing is 5 inches higher than the right when aircraft is level
• ·      Fuel Selector Valve leaks in the Off position
• ·      Elevator up and down stop bolts set to maximum deflection, travel is way out  of limits per maintenance manual
• ·      All control surface cables rusted
• ·      All elevator and rudder hinge bolts rusted
• ·      All elevator and rudder hinge bushings frozen
• ·      Elevator trim eyebolt frozen
• ·      Rudder and Elevator mount bolts severely corroded
• ·      Elevator trim cable installed with two twists between pulleys
• ·      Elevator cable pulley nut held on my one thread
• ·      Flap cable pulleys under floor miss aligned and rubbing outside on rib
• ·      Engine Mount bolts installed backwards
• ·      Oil filter adapter hand tight, safety wire holding it in place
• ·      Number six intake leaking at gasket
• ·      Number six intake has hole chaffed in it from exhaust clamp
• ·      Baffling not installed correctly between #3 and #5 cylinders
• ·      Intake pipe seal clamps on #3 cylinder loose, slid down
• ·      Engine cowl has severe exfoliating corrosion, quarter inch hole in side 
• ·      Eight Axle/Brake Caliper mounting bolts severely corroded
• ·      All eight flap roller bearings worn and grooved
• ·      Both brake master cylinders leaking profusely
• ·      Clock electrical wire chaffing on the battery box
• ·      Unfilled holes in the firewall
• ·      Vacuum filters with no clamps and unsecured
• ·      Oil hose permeating oil through the sides of itself
• ·      Yoke bushings allow six inches of play in the yoke at full aft position
• ·      Second oil temperature instrument inoperative, not labeled as such
• ·      Wing and tail navigation lights, only one good bulb.
• ·      Landing and taxi lights inoperative
• ·      Old birds next inside the elevator and bottom of tail pod
• ·      Battery tested out at 38% capacity
• ·      One main tire has six inch crack in sidewall

  

A few items on this list do not require repair to deem this aircraft airworthy. Due diligence with periodic maintenance would have caught many of these items before they became unserviceable. 

The moral, lesson, and challenge is this; do not buy an aircraft sight unseen. The lesson is, do your own due diligence and if it doesn’t look right, do something about it. The challenge is, and its is a hard one, being an aircraft mechanic in the field we are often asked to look the other way by pilots, owners and those looking out for them. Your certificate is worth more than any job on the planet; do not sell your signature for a few extra dollars so someone can shortcut maintenance.

This is a sever case of short cutting maintenance. Pilots, it is ok to question the maintenance practices. The happy ending?  No human lost their life this time.