Probably just dumb.

I only have 20 years of experience.

But Bruce, he’s really dumb… he’s pushing 40 years of experience.

We will shut up now and try to learn from the experts.

How many years of experience with how many service centers did you say you have?

While we wait on a response from the experts, here’s my humble opinion.

There use to be good shops and bad shops, as long as one knew who to avoid, you were ok.

That is no longer the case, we now have good visits and bad visits.

All of the shops we use are good at finding new ways to piss me off.

Do I believe any shop, including a Textron service center is capable of screwing up?

Oh absolutely, I have photos of my own, lots of them. I have had battles with Textron.

The difference? I can prove they did wrong or missed what I said they missed, and I brought it to their attention when it happened. If you don’t do that, you are just blindly accusing someone of something. He has no idea if someone else worked on that plane.

Mike doesn’t know who rtv’d that fitting, that makes accusing Textron of doing it an unfounded accusation. I am not defending Textron, I am defending what is fair and unfair.

As far as the environmental duct, I bet they did miss that, I know because I have checked it and pointed it out to shops myself. Why didn’t you check it when you bought the airplane Mike? I check every one, I have V/Ultra clients on here, ask them if I check it and have told them it’s one of the most common things we find.

I have found questionable repairs and practices in my airplane. Photo evidence provided.

The plane was maintained by Textron since new until I bought it. You can come read the logs if you like.

The issues existed at least during the phase 1-5 inspection by Textron at SWF in 2019, so things like that damaged and sloppily repaired fresh air duct were signed off as passing inspection.

You are free to draw your own conclusions from the above evidence, but fair folks will conclude my plane did not always get the best care from Textron from the above.

Mike C.

As in which individual person did it? No I don't outside of who signed off each MTR, and they didn't necessarily touch the airplane itself.

As to which shop did it? Yes, I do. Textron.

Beyond any reasonable doubt, the fresh air duct and the RTV fitting were in the plane when Textron signed off its last major inspection. So even in the unlikely case Textron didn't do the work, they signed it off as being airworthy after having seen it.


I bought a plane with the highest pedigree you can get. Factory maintained since new. Only two owners since new. Can there be any higher pedigree than that? This is exactly the sort of thing Chip might put extra value on.


If someone else besides me had reported the exact same facts, would you have responded with the same statement above?

I kind of doubt it. So why is this personal for you?

Mike C.

I am sympathetic to Mike's objective data, but I also have a hard time believing that shoddy work was done by Textron. I think somebody else had their hands in that plane. Even my lowly Piper, none of the mechanics will go an inch out of their way to McGiver a repair. Sometimes might be nice, but it is always replace new and send the big bill. They have no incentive to take risk and work on the cheap.

It does seem odd to me, too. None the less, the physical evidence is there.


Even if that was true, Textron did sign off the condition during inspection. There is no way all the bad stuff happened in the 1 year between that inspection and my ownership. That fresh air duct didn't get that way that fast.

A possible explanation is that there were part supply problems that motivated Textron to "fix it" poorly. For example, the fresh air duct is a 6 inch CEET duct and that is not commonly stocked. So instead of delaying the delivery of the airplane to the customer, they gooped it up and delivered it that way to meet the delivery promise. That might have occurred for the fitting as well.

Obviously, I don't know the circumstances that caused this behavior, all I can report is what I found. You are free to draw your own conclusions.


This is what makes me think this is more about schedule and part lead times than trying to be cheap.

There are times when a field repair can be the right choice, but that fresh air duct is clearly not one of them. Total repair cost was about $1000 due to the labor of taking apart a lot of stuff to get it in, like the baggage compartment walls. I bought the double wall version, which was about $300 just for that, IIRC. Looks nice now!

Mike C.

We live in a day where more aviation maintenance needs to be performed than there are those “artists” to perform it professionally.

Both things can be true at the same time. Mike’s point is that just because you pay a premium at the premium shops that does not mean you get premium work done. That for sure is true.

The RTV example is a tough one. Just because one shop did an inspection does not mean they are responsible for the repair. Lots of ways that repair could have been done by someone after it left the Service center. I have personally had repairs that were questionable to get my plane home. Sometimes you have to do field repairs. The person that did that RTV repair may have had good intentions and solved the immediate problem then it got forgot about.

But the fact is larger more expensive shops can do crap work. Anyone that says they can’t is lying or not paying attention.

My plane was just in a “small” reasonable shop and they found things a big MRO shop did wrong on recent repairs. Repairs that I paid unbelievable prices for.

Mike

Mike is trusting that all work done to his plane was properly logged. Personally, I think you have to be incredibly naive to believe that the person who was willing to use RTV wouldn’t also be willing to skip logging it.

He may have a point that it was missed or allowed on an inspection, assuming the RTV can be positively aged to be older than the inspection date.

Otherwise, we don’t know who did it and when, just that it was done.

It is not believable that the duct was in great shape at the inspection and then within one year, an unknown person did a hack job on and it aged so much to be what it was when I bought the airplane.

Both previous owners of my plane were the "take it to the service center" types.

Mike C.

It is not believable that the duct was in great shape at the inspection and then within one year, an unknown person did a hack job on and it aged so much to be what it was when I bought the airplane.

Both previous owners of my plane were the "take it to the service center" types.

Mike C.

You and others have failed to provide an alternate explanation that makes any sense.

Airplane advertised as "100% service center maintained since new" and had a phase 1-5 at SWF FSC a year before I bought it. The duct had damage and "repairs" that were years in the making when discovered.


No prepurchase inspection was done. Most of it is not visible on a pre flight inspection (in the tail).

The FSC either did the "repairs" on the ducting or they passed them as airworthy multiple times, I let you deicide which is worse.

Meanwhile my little local shop said "no good" and I agreed, so I bought new double walled version which is holding up nicely.

Mike C.

Well, isn't that a bit ironic......

Not at all, it was a calculated risk.

In late 2020, there simply wasn't any option to get PPIs done. No shop had time, it was a feeding frenzy in the market.

Very few of the faults in the airplane I have discovered would have been found in a PPI. This duct might be one of them, but also might not have been since you need to basically take apart the rear baggage to see the major areas of deterioration, but on the scale of things, not a big deal, buy a new one and replace it, about $1K total labor and parts.

Mike C.

Might be reading into it too much, but the Aircraft for Sale forum here on BT seems unusually high on price drops vs solds. Maybe this is just a typical period for the end of summer, not sure. But several appear to be very nice airplanes.

Is the wind being knocked off the sails?