I always thought it was bad hoses or seals causing most of the leaks I dealt with. Read a report from the FAA safety team last week and it said 7 out of 10 hydraulic failures trace back to fitting issues. Now I double check every torque and fitting before touching the lines. Anyone else change how they inspect after seeing a stat like that?
Last month I spotted the same crack using a borescope and it took me 20 minutes to find it, so has anyone else noticed the old timers just have better instinct for finding stuff that's hiding in plain sight?
I was grabbing parts in the hangar last Thursday and heard a 20-year guy tell a new hire not to bother with the torque wrench on a main wheel nut. Said he could 'feel' when it was tight enough. That nut spec is 160 ft-lbs on a 737, and I've seen cracked wheels from overtightening. Has anyone else run into this attitude and actually reported it without getting frozen out?
I was working a flap track job on a 757 in Atlanta 3 years back, and the lead mechanic chewed me out for skipping torque seal on a bolt that looked tight. He made me redo it and said that seal is the only way to catch a fastener backing off after a few cycles. Since then I've caught two loose bolts on walkarounds that would have been invisible without it. Anyone else have a senior guy drill a habit like that into you?
I needed a 1/4 inch drive for some panel fasteners and my Snap-on was in the shop. Picked up the $20 Pittsburgh one just to get through the shift. Checked it against a calibrated tester in the hangar after and it was only 3 ft-lbs off at 50. Honestly I'm not gonna throw my Snap-on away but for basic stuff? It worked fine. Has anyone else had good luck with those budget wrenches for non-critical work?
Borrowed a 3/8 snap-on from the new guy to finish a job on a Cessna landing gear and put a 3-foot pipe on it thinking I knew better. Snapped the head clean off inside the bolt hole and had to drill it out for 2 hours in the rain. Has anyone else had a senior mechanic's rule come back to bite you after ignoring it?
Everyone swears by Snap-On but my 3/8 drive ratchet lost its pawl after 90 days of heavy use on 737s. Anyone else thought about just grabbing a $40 GearWrench instead?
I had a lead mechanic pull me aside last month after watching me zip out access panel screws with a speed handle. He said I was stretching the threads on the nutplates and it would cause issues down the line. Switched to a standard ratchet with light torque and I've noticed the screws come out way smoother now. Has anyone else had a senior guy change how they do a basic task?
Took me about 3 stripped lug nuts on a 737 main gear last month to learn he was right. My $200 Snap-on clicked fine on the test stand but was off by 15 ft-lbs after a 2 foot fall onto concrete. Anyone else have a tool fail after a simple drop?
Hit my 200th annual on a 172 last Tuesday (a 1978 model, faded blue, hangared in Bakersfield). Everyone always says these things are boring tanks, easy money, nothing special. But that one had a cracked engine mount that was hidden under 40 years of grime and bad paperwork. Took me 3 extra hours to find it with a borescope. Now I don't trust the 'they're all the same' crowd anymore. Has anyone else found something wild on a plane everyone said was bulletproof?
I had to pick between sending my torque wrenches out every 30 days for calibration (costs about $40 each) or just trusting the factory sticker and hoping for the best. I went with the 30 day route after a buddy found a 20 ft-lb error on a 100 ft-lb setting last year. What do you guys do for critical safety jobs like engine mounts?
We had a main gear tire pop during a pushback at PDX last Tuesday, loud bang and everything, but when we pulled it the rim looked totally fine no cracks or anything. I thought for sure the impact would have damaged the wheel half, but the service manual said just replace the tire and send it. Has anyone else seen a tire blowout where the rim survived clean like that?
I keep seeing guys at our FBO cranking down spark plugs on those O-360 engines like they're trying to seat a lug nut. You only need 12-15 ft-lbs on most of them, not 30. I had an engine come through last month that had a cracked ceramic insulator from being too tight, and the pilot reported a rough run-up. Check your torque wrench calibration if you haven't in a while, mine was off by 4 ft-lbs. Has anyone else seen cracked plugs from overtorque or am I the only one?
Everyone at my last job swore by Avionics Plus down in Orlando for their Garmin installs. I spent three days there last month watching them rush a 430W harness and left with a bad feeling. Has anyone else had a messy job come out of there, or was I just unlucky?
I crossed 10,000 logged hours on Saturday and honestly I felt nothing until my lead mentioned my torque wrench calibration was 3 months overdue. That woke me up. Has anyone else had a milestone moment make you realize you've been slacking on something basic?
I used a $90 ultrasonic cleaner off Amazon for about 6 months on fuel nozzles and small parts. After a coworker showed me his $600 industrial unit from Grainger, the difference was night and day. My cheap one at home was barely vibrating and left gunk in the corners, while his cleaned a gummed-up injector in 8 minutes flat. Anyone else find that the cheaper units just don't have the power for heavy aircraft parts?
Was doing a routine inspection on a Cessna 172 last Wednesday. Everything checked out fine until I noticed the oil temp gauge acting weird. Spent 2 hours tracing wires, checking connectors, even pulled the panel. Turns out it was a single loose ground screw behind the gauge. Hand tightened it in 10 seconds. Coworker walked by and said "nice job on the 3 hour oil change." Has anyone else spent way too long on something that dumb?
Last month I picked up a cheap borescope after finding a weird vibration in a Cessna 172 engine. I used it to peek inside the cylinder walls without pulling the head, and spotted a scored cylinder that would have cost me hours of disassembly to find otherwise. The second time it saved me was tracing a wiring chafe behind the firewall on a Piper that I couldn't reach with my fingers. For fifty bucks, it's honestly one of the best tool purchases I've made. Anyone else have a cheap tool that ended up being a lifesaver on a job?
Guy I work with, retired Delta mechanic, told me to stop using the click torque wrench for final steps on landing gear. Said use a beam type instead. I ignored him for two weeks. Snapped a bolt on a 737 nose gear. Cost the shop 4 hours of downtime. Switched to the beam wrench and haven't had a single issue since. Anyone else get burned by ignoring a veteran's tip?
I had a Cessna 172 come in with a weeping fuel line fitting near the strainer. Figured it would be a quick 30 minute job, maybe an hour with cleanup. But the fitting was seized on there good, and when I finally got it off the replacement part had a different thread pitch than the original. Took me two full days tracking down the right adapter from a supplier in Oklahoma City. Has anyone else run into parts that just don't match up the way they should?
I was doing a run-up on a Cessna 172 last Thursday and noticed the oil pressure was sitting at the low end of the green. It hit me that I had been using the wrong viscosity oil since I started at this shop because nobody ever told me we switched suppliers six months ago. Has anyone else had that gut-drop feeling when you realize you missed a simple spec change?
I've been working on a 1998 Cessna 172 for the past few months and kept seeing the oil come out looking like sludge at every change. Switched over to a synthetic blend around April and this week's change looked almost clean. Still some color but nothing like before. Is this a common thing with older engines or did I just get lucky with this batch? Anyone else see big changes after switching oil types?
Noticed they were using zip ties on every single wire bundle in a Cessna 172. Has anyone else seen shops move away from lacing cord like that?
Had this APU on a 737 that kept leaking fuel from somewhere near the drain mast and nobody could find it. Senior guys looked at it, I looked at it, we ran it up maybe 5 times. Finally on day 3 I noticed a tiny wet spot on the bottom of a fuel line clamp that you could only see with a mirror on a stick. Turns out the rubber inside the clamp had split and let the line vibrate just enough to wear a pinhole. Replaced the clamp and the O rings on both ends and it passed the leak check first try. Felt good to solve something that stumped the whole shift. Anyone else had a gremlin like that where the fix was way simpler than you thought?
Guy with 30 years on the line watched me wrestling a nut strip. Said "you're the mechanic, not the bolt". I slackened off the wrench and it came right out. Anybody else had a hard time learning when to ease up?