Use this forum to flag up examples of red tape and gold plate
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By Paul_Sengupta
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1221056
Why do I need to overhaul or renew all my ancillaries at engine overhaul time?

I had magnetos overhauled 40 hours before my engine overhaul, yet I had to do them again, at a cost of about £1000. I put a replacement starter motor on last year but I had to have a replacement or overhaul. I've just bought a new alternator where there was nothing wrong with the old one, and they are easy to change on my particular aircraft.

Why do some maintenance organisations insist that it's CAA/EASA rules that seatbelts on Cessnas must be replaced every 10 years? A friend of mine had his seatbelts replaced under this rule, than 10 years later had to have them done again...all of them...despite having never carried anyone in the back of his aeroplane. He had to throw out and replace the brand new unused seatbelts.

Why the insistence of having magnetos overhauled every four years, or vacuum pumps and so on?

Why do these and other things have calendar lives independent of how many hours they have been used for?
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By Genghis the Engineer
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1221079
Because they polymer materials that degrade whether used or not. But, it would be a doddle to extend the life of such items by test or inspection a year at a time.

G
By johnm
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1221139
There is a general issue on calendar lifted items which should be subject to engineer discretion. I believe that the rules have in effect been changed for the better but haven't been enacted because they are sitting in a paperwork queue for formal endorsement. Could be enacted pending formalities and should be.
By David Roberts
#1221149
johnm wrote:There is a general issue on calendar lifted items which should be subject to engineer discretion. I believe that the rules have in effect been changed for the better but haven't been enacted because they are sitting in a paperwork queue for formal endorsement. Could be enacted pending formalities and should be.


Think you may be referring to the EASA CRD 2011-15 (TBO limits) published 20 September, which obviously affects only aircraft within the scope of EU regulation & rules. There is some concern about this on several points, not least the applicability to aircraft used for 'ab initio' training (without a definition of 'ab initio' which appears to be for pre-licence pilots flying solo). But this decision, with its flaws unfortunately, is one of the things we had been pressing EASA for through the Part M Task Group set up in late 2011 and which EASA promised would deliver key outputs 'within a year'. But Cologne time is at least x 2 the rest of the world. Suggest those interested in the TBO subject read the CRD on the EASA website first, to see what is in the pipeline in terms of alleviations.

Generally on Part M stuff, there is CRD 2012-17 published 9 October, the result of Part I of the Task Force work. Read that before commenting on things for which there are going to be alleviations in process for maintenance re EASA aircraft. Part II work is scheduled to start early 2014 - and the agenda is still open, so suggestions please, as we on the group are in a position to propose changing things in EASA rules.

DGR / Europe Air Sports and member of EASA Part M Task Force