Funny, scary, or just plain odd things found during Maint.

[phil65]

I was flying a Birddog on a wildlife survey flight and on pre-flight banged by hand as usual under the bottom of the fuselage to see if I could hear any FOD bouncing around. There was a dull thud a couple feet in front of the tail wheel. I grabbed the closest A&P and we poked around, only to find a 5 lb hammer and an 8" cold chisel on the bottom of the rear fuselagel!

The worst I ever heard was from a friend who did a pre-buy on a (homebuilt) Pitts S-1S. They found the fuel tank had been mounted to some 2x4s that were DUCT-TAPED to the longerons!!!

Come-on dude, I put that hammer & chisel in there for ballast
Now it will never fly straight

Phil

[Matt Gunsch]

lets see, I have found 1 lb bag of rivits, bucking bars, screwdrivers, wrenches, reading glasses under the floor boards of a cessna, spark plug socket complete with a 1/2 drive ratchet, what made that so good it was from a mechanic that thought he walked on water.
The worst was a T-6G that I was installing high rate ailerons on. Who ever had been doing rigging in the past did not know what he was doing and it was flying right wing heavy. The owner had enough and stuck a duffle bag full of sand in the left wingtip. It did fly straight, but there was about 50lbs in that tip.

[Curtis Block]

Recently we had a very nice Cessna 421 come over to our shop after dropping off some passengers at another FBO on the field. He taxied up on one engine and pulled right up to the hangar doors. Immediately I could see why he was there. The right nacelle was coated in oil. He told us he had just picked up the aircraft form another shop after major work on that engine. We popped the cowling, and after hosing down the engine multiple times with copious amounts of 100LL (everything was coated in oil) we proceeded to try and find the problem. It didn't take long. It turned out that almost every oil line was barely finger tight.

[phil65]

copious amounts of 100LL

Thats a no-no

I think the owner or you should have brought the plane back to the first guys to let them see their handly work and they may have learned a thing or two and it might have been cheaper for the owner.

Phil

[Curtis Block]

I wouldn't have tried the flight back. He was lucky enough to get back on the ground without having to shut the engine down on the first flight. Why risk a second. I'm sure the first shop heard about it, and probibly got the bill.

[phil65]

Sorry Curtis, I thought the other guys were on the same field as you.

Phil

[Canso42]

Trae, what did they do with the air varmint? It should have been mounted on a plaque in the shop.
Doug.

[Curtis Block]

Had a V-tail come in this last year for an annual inspection. We pulled it into the hangar, but didn't get to work on it right away. When we were pulling out the seats there was a really rank smell inside. Once we got the floor up we found where it was coming from. A dead rat was lodged in one of the lightening holes in a cross member under the floor. This hole was also one that many control cables passed through. It was no small rat ether. I'd say it was easily the size of a small rabbit. It easily filled the circumfrance of the hole. Judging by the smell it had been in there for some time as well. We got one of the poor line guys to pry it out of there. It lived in a box for a short time after that, because one of the mechs' insisted that the owner of the aircraft see it. I kicked around for a day or two before I took it out to the dumpster. It just smelled to bad.

[Old SAR pilot]

Nothing

Last edited by Old SAR pilot on Tue Jan 22, 2008 6:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Curtis Block]

Fellow mech, (Les). This is what too much hard work will get you.



During an inspection on a Beech 1900, today.

[51fixer]

Fellow mech, (Les). This is what too much hard work will get you.



During an inspection on a Beech 1900, today.

Since it's a Beech, he should have a 5 lb hammer in his raised hand.
Rich

[krlang]

You know the story,

The one about finding a part in the oil screen with a part number on it. BTDT! I found a chunk of Piston ring in a screen on a Malibu with three digits of the PN showing.

The funniest bit of stupidity was the guy who screwed the carpets down in his Seneca with dry wall screws, right through the floor. I hit my head on one when I was going after the fuel strainer access panel .


Another good one, I was amazed by this one.

I pulled out a drain plug in a Cessna 421, it had a magnetic drain plug. Sitting on it was a starter drive roller bearing, the one that the AD had you replace with a bushing if it was still there. When we called the owner, he said the AD was just done and they lost a roller into the engine. So they installed the Magnetic plug to catch the roller later.


And my favorite line ever.....

"Ive only had three crankshafts ever break in my career, two of them after prop strikes!"

[warbirdcrew]

First one sort of maintenance related:

Aircraft cleaning crew was tasked with cleaning and detailing a certain HU-16, and upon returning to the aircraft the following day it was discovered they had used steel-wire brushes on the brand-new paint job. Resulted in a repaint on one side of the airplane.

Second:

A friend's Harvard was returned to the home airport following an annual inspection. It was discovered after the flight home that the cowling pins were missing and nothing was securing the cowlings to the airplane.

[Jeff Nelson]

I'll add to the list... I normally do custom wiring on warbirds. Because of that, a friend asked my to take a quick look at the electrical stuff on his newly purchased Cub. It was a fairly nice airplane untill we looked under the panel. Someone had made a buss connecting the circuit breaker hot sides. The "mechanic" built one out of one half of a clothes dryer electrical cable. A slit was made to expose the wire every inch to correspond with the center-to-center breaker distance. Then a coat hanger was cut to size, neatly twisted to form a loop to attach to the breaker screw, soldered around the exposed wire in the slits, and wrapped with tape. When you think about the time it took to make it, one could have spent less time making a proper buss. The Cub had been through multiple annuals... And yes, I still have the buss as an example of what not to do.

[Erik H]

A colleague of mine used to collect insects and other creatures he might find during inspections. Here is a couple: