Unfortunately a fatal crash near Maitland Airport 17/5/20

[turboplanner]

I tend to read Nine News online and find it frustrating how many spelling mistakes/typo's you get every single day.

Not only is the journalism poor in many cases, but proof-reading if it still exists, seems non-existent,

The general population has virtually stopped buying newspapers and stopped advertising in them.

Where in the past a sub-editor would pick those mistakes up and present a polished stories, in most cases the Sub-Editors have gone and the world is the poorer for it.

Now is the new normal; spelling mistakes are accepted on forums like this and social media, and that's where the public have gone for their news, so newspapers have to accept that.

It's a bit like people complaining about the quality of Chinese products, or loss of Australian jobs - the general population went elsewhere.

[kgwilson]

According to the ABC news last night the aircraft was on a test flight after maintenance and there were engine problems after 15 minutes of flight so it was attempting to return to the airfield. If it was still in phase 1 testing which I presume is the first 25 hours, the maintenance is likely to be adjustments/modifications to improve performance or even just idle speed etc. I know from personal experience that the first flight after maintenance is fraught with possible problems.

[Old Koreelah]

One aspect of this tragedy often missed is the impact on first responders and investigators. They are people like us and have families of their own. Some even have fathers who fly little wooden aeroplanes around the district in question, so you may only imagine their stress levels.

They have to do a professional job in challenging circumstances. Giving dignity to the deceased is high on their agenda, but made very difficult by the intrusion of news camera crews and spectators.

 

Pilots of light aircraft flying close overhead for a look-see just adds to their problems.

[Flightrite]

One aspect of this tragedy often missed is the impact on first responders and investigators. They are people like us and have families of their own. Some even have fathers who fly little wooden aeroplanes around the district in question, so you may only imagine their stress levels.

They have to do a professional job in challenging circumstances. Giving dignity to the deceased is high on their agenda, but made very difficult by the intrusion of news camera crews and spectators.

 

Pilots of light aircraft flying close overhead for a look-see just adds to their problems.

 

That's very true. I was involved in the EMS field for 10 years. It's ugly and depressing at times!?

[Flightrite]

Good to see the driver of the latest plane crash survived, nice days means higher activity especially of late, stay safe??

[Methusala]

A Canberra times front page article I saw last Thursday was headed "Contract Tracing..." This on a front page FGS! I used to be a proofreader on this paper decades ago but saw the demise of proof reading as electronic typesetting took over. How could such an obvious error get through to the front page. Years ago, the head reader had to sign off on the front page.

(Sorry to be off topic here. Don)

[Jase T]

know from personal experience that the first flight after maintenance is fraught with possible problems.

I will second that! As a former Unit Maintenance Test Pilot, post-maintenance flights were always the best briefed, best researched, and the ones that had the most thorough preflights, from a special purpose designed checklist. Whilst they had the greatest chance of things going wrong (the only time I ever experienced a compressor stall for example) they were also the flight where you had planned for things to go wrong and had planned and briefed your "What if's". The 8P's was the key to doing it properly! But there was still a good chance for things to go wrong if you let good old fashioned complacency sneak in! I recall one flight (was in fact on my UMTP course) we attended a 3rd party maintenance facility where deeper level maintenance was done. In this case an R4 (the most comprehensive almost a full strip and rebuild of the entire aircraft). My self and the instructor drove down to pick up the aircraft and sign the acceptance paperwork we briefed the hell out of the sortie in the car on the way. We walked out to do the acceptance test flight with checklists in hand, we climbed up to start the preflight from the roof of the aircraft (in this case a UH-1H), we looked at the rotor head (had seen them thousands of times before) and I said to the instructor "I Can't put my finger on it but it just doesn't look right". He said "Well let's make sure we get the checklists out and do a good job of it" was the reply. About the 3rd item on the checklist referred to inspecting a certain piece of lock wire. It wasn't there "BIG red flag", neither was the next one, then it dawned on us that MOST of the pieces that had to be Lockwired had not been... Now the maintainers amongst you will say "that can't happen it must have been checked by at least 5 people before it got to you". Yes, it had been checked and signed off by more than 3 people. BUT WORSE it had flown 3 times by the company test pilot like that (accep[tance and vibe test runs) before they deemed it serviceable to hand to us for acceptance back to the unit. We called the company test pilot to come over and have a look at something we wanted to show him... The look on his face was rather white and concerned when he realized he had flown that aircraft without most of the important bits lockwired on!! Lets say it failed the acceptance flight, there was 2 mountains of paperwork, and it was a LONG time before it was presented as ready again while they checked everything that had been signed off!! So yes maintenance test flying can be risky, but you have to plan and prep and brief... and then something unexpected is bound to happen!

[planedriver]

Well Done!

[Butch]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

[jackc]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

 

Well, I have done just that, right now a LAME is bringing everything up to date and it will be flown and tested and then I will go over it with a fine tooth comb before taking possession.

At the end of the day, the buck will stop with me.......

[Jerry_Atrick]

@willedoo - I take your point on the resources of journalism being stretched due to the advent of the wild-west that social media is. And you beat me to the roles of sub-editors and editors. Be that as it may, often stories like these are syndicated from a feed and as I understand, even the likes of Fairfax et al syndicate more content than they did.. Sharing resources should still allow some copy editing or review before publish.. Although, it may be me and others being over-sensitive to the use of home-built implying a negative connotation.

 

Re test flights - In our syndicate, we are lucky in that the LAME is a syndicate member and active flyer, so he is likely to have that bit more tenacity to his approach. However, I make it a point not to be the first to fly after a 100 hourly or annual. It's nota guarantee as that un-locked bolt may take time to work its way off, but at least more fundamental things may come a cropper beforehad..

 

Having said that, it has been too many hours and months since the last annual and I still haven't flown :-(

[facthunter]

When a plane goes in for the Full treatment (vitually stripped down to bare frame, crack tested and rebuilt) it becomes a source of bits for the rest of the fleet to pirate sometimes and it may be worked on for periods of about 6+ months, just sitting in the same place in the hangar with bits everywhere. I recall one such occasion crewing for a test. The first item was to feather and unfeather each engine(4 off) in flight. Not all together by the way.

It would not unfeather so doing any more was not on. Back to Essendon and asked for the ACTUAL wind on final and tower just referred me to the ATIS. Fairly ordinary service, I thought at the time.

Yes to the "back on line" condition. Plenty of times many things were far from right, but TEST flights were not done in later years. The line flight was revenue and test flight at the same time, so ALL must be better if test fights are not needed. Nev

[Butch]

Well, I have done just that, right now a LAME is bringing everything up to date and it will be flown and tested and then I will go over it with a fine tooth comb before taking possession.

At the end of the day, the buck will stop with me.......

If you are comfortable with that it's ok.

 

After following Kyle with his Savannah rebuild where he has almost rebuilt the whole aircraft ( praise to him ) because it was so badly built, it has made me aware that not all builders know what they are doing or care when they sell! ( or crash )

Edited May 18, 2020 by Butch

[M61A1]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

Every factory built aircraft is built by the lowest paid workers They can get with the least amount of training necessary.

with a kit plane often a quick look will tell you about the builder and quality of work

I bought a fixer upper. You could see the original build quality was very good, but a large repair was very dodgy. I replaced the whole repair section and proof loaded it anyway.

[facthunter]

They might genuinely believe they have done a great job, just out of ignorance. If you end up with someone else's horrendous effort the "where does one stop?" becomes the issue. If you think it may be a suss thing, don't go near it. I've tended to think that" I CAN fix it" if I have to BUT THAT position means you may have something that just isn't worth doing even if you got it for nothing.. Nev

[Butch]

Every factory built aircraft is built by the lowest paid workers They can get with the least amount of training necessary.

with a kit plane often a quick look will tell you about the builder and quality of work

I bought a fixer upper. You could see the original build quality was very good, but a large repair was very dodgy. I replaced the whole repair section and proof loaded it anyway.

The factory workers maybe low paid workers but the quality control are the ones that I worry about.

 

No aircraft manufacturer will take the risk of selling an unairworthy aircraft, it would wreck the reputation of their aircraft.

[tillmanr]

Maybe you should speak to Boeing.

[facthunter]

But, even with the BIG stuff it's usual (or was) for a reputable airline to send reps to the factory during the build and also for the extensive acceptance testing.The serial # TYPE was often designated for one airline in particular at the time of placing the order. Factories often built "white Tails" Not ordered or supervised by any prospective purchaser and were considered unloved and inferior. They also had wide variations in equipment specifications making it harder to incorporate them in otherwise standardised fleets and extra workload for pilots and maybe less safety if differences not handled carefully. Nev

[jackc]

If you are comfortable with that it's ok.

 

After following Kyle with his Savannah rebuild where he has almost rebuilt the whole aircraft ( praise to him ) because it was so badly built, it has made me aware that not all builders know what they are doing or care when they sell! ( or crash )

 

Lucky for me, it’s the Aeropup Australian Agent who is doing all the work, he also produces the kits and factory built aircraft. So the work will be top notch, as good as I can get anyway.

[Flightrite]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

 

I've been driving two home builts ( not done by me) for some time, I'm still here?

[Flightrite]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

Every A/C you step into comes under that category, the hand of man built every plane ever designed/built!

[KRviator]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

The good thing with the RV line is it's hard to find a single point of failure, with the exception of the fuel system. I would rather build and maintain my own plane as then it's a known quantity. Sure you pay a LAME to "do this, fix that" and give you an airworthy aircraft at the end of it, but it isn't their life on the line if they've forgotten to tighten the fuel servo B-Nuts.

 

I've flown Victor 1 several miles offshore with my 5 year old in a plane I built in my back shed, and felt completely comfortable doing so just like I've flown from Sydney to Caloundra over a layer of stratus where you couldn't see the end of it, or what was underneath it - and truthfully I feel more comfortable doing both of those than flying an aero clubs 60-year-old C150 for a BFR...

[ClintonB]

I would find it nearly impossible to buy used kit plane assembled by someone else.

 

One wrong bolt, missing rivet or lock wire missing could take your life.

 

Wish I had the patience to build my own!

Mine was the perfect example. 264hrs TT, should be good I thought. We made 15.5hrs home with only minor problems. Training in it had the nose wheel leg mounts crack out. Whilst rectifying this found more and more bushes flogged out, and with all the bolts being cbc 8.8 grade I started replacing them with aircraft bolts in imperial size with new bushes. Also found all pivot bolt points on undercarriage and elevators out of alignment drastically. With lots of time working most have been sorted. Then one day i moved the ailerons and realised there was 1/8” play in the bushes. These are built in to a fibreglass flaperon. I have made bushes and sourced a new torque tube in 4130 as the alloy one is almost cut through from flogging. Still have to disassemble the other side and do yet. All this extra has made it a labour intensive project which has stalled. I know I need to finish and enjoy it just to get my financial input alone. I suppose I should make a list and just do one thing at a time until back together( if I don’t spot anything else).

[Blueadventures]

What breed? PM if you want. Cheers

[M61A1]

The factory workers maybe low paid workers but the quality control are the ones that I worry about.

 

No aircraft manufacturer will take the risk of selling an unairworthy aircraft, it would wreck the reputation of their aircraft.

The point being that often homebuilt aircraft get more attention to detail than factory built ones. Factory built get the bare minimum required to meet spec and get them out the door.

The low paid workers often get trained on one job without really understanding it's importance. I would like to think that homebuilders generally understand the importance of every bit they assemble or manufacture. I have seen exceptions to this, but it is usually quite clear with a brief inspection.