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Thread: Need help dealing with local A&P

  1. #11

    Join Date
    May 2019
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    2
    I guess from a personal standpoint I'm starting to see why he might be offended. But from a business standpoint it makes less sense to me. I've already given his shop my business previously, I have several bigger projects and upgrades I plan to do with the plane (that he knows about) and there are plenty more annuals left. There's a lot of business to be had from me. As for the smaller fixes it isn't like I've asked for favors. I've paid for everything, and as far as I know he gets paid a salary, not a commission (he isn't the owner), so that doesn't change whether he has to do 10 annuals a month or 50. Besides that, I was previously on friendly terms with him and understand that he's stressed, overworked, and doesn't have enough mechanics in the shop for his current workload. He's also complained about how difficult my plane is to work on. So maybe you can see why I thought I was doing him a favor by taking this off his plate. I've even flown with stuff broken because I was really reluctant to ask for him to fix anything. Again, as a flight instructor once my schedule is saturated I turn people down. I can only handle so much. So I applied my own situation to his. The whole industry seems to have plenty of work and not enough people to go around.

    Well I appreciate your different perspectives but I'm still at a loss as for what to do about it now. My first apology didn't take. I guess I'll try one more time and if he still doesn't want my business I'll be looking for a new shop.

  2. #12
    DaleB's Avatar
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    Sep 2015
    Location
    KMLE
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    654
    Quote Originally Posted by Roca View Post
    he's stressed, overworked, and doesn't have enough mechanics in the shop for his current workload. He's also complained about how difficult my plane is to work on. So maybe you can see why I thought I was doing him a favor by taking this off his plate. I've even flown with stuff broken because I was really reluctant to ask for him to fix anything.
    I would continue to do him that same favor.Do you really want to continue deferring maintenance items until the the guy who's overworked, overstressed, understaffed, and apparently doesn't even want to work on your plane, can work on your plane?

    Quote Originally Posted by Roca View Post
    My first apology didn't take.
    I'd take that as a strong indicator of what the future holds.
    Measure twice, cut once...
    scratch head, shrug, shim to fit.

    Flying an RV-12. I am building a Fisher Celebrity, slowly.

  3. #13

    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Posts
    184
    Can you deal exclusively with your friend the shop owner?

  4. #14

    Join Date
    Nov 2016
    Posts
    12
    Aviatrexx, in post #8 you said, "While all work done on your aircraft must be logged, I know of no regulation that requires an inspection to be recorded. Ask that the expert's inspection to be done for your eyes only and "off-book". That way your mechanic won't see it later."

    That's a textbook description of undocumented maintenance. I doubt a true expert would be willing to throw away his or her integrity or reputation that way, and potentially throw another aviation professional under the bus like that. To do a thorough inspection, access panels and other parts may need to be removed and re-installed. Despite our best efforts, all people in aviation occasionally make mistakes. If the expert happened to leave a tool inside the airplane during an "off-book" inspection that led to an accident, the last mechanic or inspector documented to have been in that area will take all the blame for leaving something behind, or not finding something that someone else left behind. A true professional does not do that to someone else.

    We've heard it said that aviation accidents are usually a series of smaller events. My husband worked at a major US airline years ago. He once told me about an undocumented maintenance event that was just one event away from a major accident. Because the airplane did not crash, the event never made the evening news. Mechanics and inspectors had completed documented work and inspections somewhere inside the tail of a Boeing 727. When the maintenance visit was over, a test flight was required to check something that could not be replicated on the ground. After the throttles were advanced for takeoff, multiple warning lights and alarms started coming on in the cockpit, while other systems were dropping off line, so the crew aborted the takeoff and returned to the hangar. All of the affected systems were related to each other through a particular wire bundle in the tail. When the area was opened, they found a clamp blown off the coupling of an adjacent high-temperature pneumatic bleed duct fed by the #2 engine in the tail. The wire bundle was nearly melted in half by the blast of hot air.

    During the resulting investigation, the mechanic and inspector who were documented to have been in that area swore up and down they had done everything right. Only after word got around that "Joe" and "Steve" were getting raked over the coals about the event did another mechanic come forward and explain what happened. After the area had been closed up, he thought he might have forgotten to do something in that same area, so rather than generate a lot of new paperwork to document that he was re-opening the area, he thought he could just go in, inspect his work, then close everything back up. What he needed to inspect was located behind the pneumatic duct, and the only way to access it was to remove a section of the duct. When he re-installed the duct, he forgot to tighten one of the clamps. Since the work was not documented, it was also not inspected by a second set of eyes. The clamp stayed in place long enough to get through a few high-power engine run cycles in an engine run area, but failed early in the first takeoff roll. Had the clamp failed after the flight crew was past the point where they could no longer abort the take-off, the plane might have crashed somewhere past the end of the runway.

    The reason aviation has gotten so safe is that professionals remember the mistakes they've made and intentionally make changes to not let them happen again. Cutting corners gets people killed.
    Last edited by JenniferCL; 06-23-2019 at 03:00 AM.

  5. #15

    Join Date
    Aug 2011
    Location
    Fort Vermilion Alberta
    Posts
    196
    Sell that airplane and buy a homebuilt.

  6. #16

    Join Date
    Oct 2019
    Location
    South Flatistan KPMP
    Posts
    4
    Quote Originally Posted by Kyle Boatright View Post
    I'd speak with the shop owner and go from there based on what he says and does.

    That said, I'd have a hard time going back to a mechanic who went off the deep end on me.
    Had a similar issue. Fantastic A&P at my prev. home airport, now moved to another airport close by. Good A&P at new airport but I want to continue doing my annuals with the 1st guy. I don’t ask for favors and expect to pay for any and all services the new airport A&P provides. But I have excellent rapport and friendship with a fellow who has done my annuals for the last six years and I intend to stay with him indefinitely. If someone has heartburn with that tough s—t.
    Ed Ferrer

    If Emmanuel Kant, can Genghis Khan?
    Timing is crucial to the outcome of the rain dance.

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