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Strangest/oddest finds at inspection time???

oldbaldguy said:
Noted several times during preflights that the belly seams of my C-model 182 were wet. It was parked outside and I thought maybe rain water was getting in, so I took my dad's old hirdy girdy drill and drilled a small hole in at the lowest point. Several gallons of water drained out all over the ramp. Seemed like it took forever. No telling how long it had been trapped in there.
Click to expand...

My 150 leaks somewhere and after a rain I have to push the tail down and wait a couple minutes as all the drains at each bulkhead run for a couple minutes. A 150's performance is anemic enough as is, without an extra 50 lbs of water in her belly.

Scariest thing ever found at annual was a badly corroded spar slice angle. The rivet tails popped off when the mechanic brushed them with his fingers. :eek: See pictures here: http://www.mosquitonet.com/~wanderer/Aircraft/corrosion.htm

Both wings have been completely rebuilt and epoxy coated inside now.

Phil
 
Some years back, after having my 12 pre-buyed by a mechanic not as good as the one I have now, and after having that same mechanic do the next annual due, I took the 12 to Dan's for a tail section beef-up....

......the guy at Dan's asked me to lift the tail and hold it up so he could easily point out what they would do for the beefup. Thought it was a strange request, but I was younger then, so I bent over, twisted a bit, grabbed hold of the tailwheel spring and began to lift.....

....before even getting the tail off the ground, the bolt holding the assembly to the fuselage broke. Turns out it had been nearly twist/sheared apart and there was about a 16th of an inch holding the bolt together.

Thank goodness I didn't have just one more hard landing.
 
Re: strange finds

nanook said:
n........ caribou hair in the leading edge at the tip of a c-207 wing after the pilot reported a "bird strike".......
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must been a loaded raven or eagle huh? ;-)
well Santa had flying reindeer, so sorta a bird........
.
.

:D
 
AntiCub said:
oldbaldguy said:
Scariest thing ever found at annual was a badly corroded spar slice angle. The rivet tails popped off when the mechanic brushed them with his fingers. :eek: See pictures here: http://www.mosquitonet.com/~wanderer/Aircraft/corrosion.htm
Phil
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those broken rivets look like the ones holding the weights to cessna ailerons, first guy I worked with would always use his hand and a screw driver and bump the heads on the rivets holding weights on,

quite a few were nothing but rivet shaped corrosion...under nice paint!!
.
:(
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I was stationed in the Navy on a fast frigate with a small helicopter aboard HS22. As part of my MM auxiliary men duties I maintained the JP-5 pump station and hoses up on deck near the helo hangar. The check called for a valve dis assembly and I forgot the 9/16th wrench needed. The Helo mechanics were right in the middle of completing an engine swap and were buttoning up the last of the cowlings so I borrowed one of their wrenches. I guess I should have told them cause in short time frame I was called away for a few hours for some emergency elsewhere on the ship.
Yeah you might of guessed it when I returned it took me about 10 minutes to finish my check and when I looked over that engine was half way back out of the helo. Still being fat dumb and happy I walked over laid down the wrench on the nice canvas wrench pack they had and thanked them all very nicely for the loan of said wrench. Now these boys were 12 feet in the air on top of the helo but it only took them about 3 seconds to come off that helicopter and chase my dumb ass the length of that ship. I was smart enough to know what murder in someones eyes looks like though and kept far ahead until I got behind locked doors.
From there on all the aviation contingents tools were painted God awful fluorescent colors and we were bound by death threats never to touch them :agrue:
 
At least the heaviest...

About 15 feet of 3/8 chain wrapped around a Baron motor, cowling still fit nicely. The chain now resides here as a tractor accessory.
 
Re: At least the heaviest...

Ballast said:
About 15 feet of 3/8 chain wrapped around a Baron motor, cowling still fit nicely. The chain now resides here as a tractor accessory.
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someone doing a W&B adjustments? musta been hauling telephone poles sticking out the back eh? :)
 
How about a J-3 that was covered in blue tarps instead of aircraft fabric? :eek: They'd even made 2" tapes out of blue tarp. It was painted with buty and from a distance just looked like an average older cover job.... and it got more interesting from that point on......needless to say, it hasn't flown since... :drinking:
JH
 
Found an aluminum fuel line in a PA-18 with a patch made out of electrical tape to fix a pinhole. That same one had house wiring, no bushing on one wing attach fitting, and some other things I can't think of right now.


Some guy was working on my Dad's 182 and put an 8 or 10-32 rivet nut in the wing root and then proceeded to screw a pk screw into it when he put it back together.
 
Back in the 80's a friend of mine had been hauling fish from camps on the Yukon River and flying them to Fairbanks.
After the season, he got to digging around behind the back seat and found
a big ol' King Salmon that had been back there for some time... he said when he grabbed the tail to pull it out, it came apart, maggots all over.... and STINK.....

He and his wife stopped by one day while he was hauling fish, and you could hardly see his wife in the back seat for all the fish slime on the windows.... ah the good ol days......
 
Ruffair said:
Back in the 80's a friend of mine had been hauling fish from camps on the Yukon River and flying them to Fairbanks.
After the season, he got to digging around behind the back seat and found
a big ol' King Salmon that had been back there for some time... he said when he grabbed the tail to pull it out, it came apart, maggots all over.... and STINK.....

He and his wife stopped by one day while he was hauling fish, and you could hardly see his wife in the back seat for all the fish slime on the windows.... ah the good ol days......
Click to expand...

and after you clean the slime and it still stinks bad...... wash with vanilla extract in water.... thats what we did with the 185's.....
 
mike mcs repair said:
AntiCub said:
oldbaldguy said:
Scariest thing ever found at annual was a badly corroded spar slice angle. The rivet tails popped off when the mechanic brushed them with his fingers. :eek: See pictures here: http://www.mosquitonet.com/~wanderer/Aircraft/corrosion.htm
Phil
Click to expand...

those broken rivets look like the ones holding the weights to cessna ailerons, first guy I worked with would always use his hand and a screw driver and bump the heads on the rivets holding weights on,

quite a few were nothing but rivet shaped corrosion...under nice paint!!
.
:(
Click to expand...

Yeah, we've replaced a couple of those too. :)

Phil
Click to expand...
 
My friend Gary had an old PA-12 (they called it "rag bag"). 17 years ago he took his gold ring off to prop the thing at the lake. Well, needless to say the ring disappeared. Last May he got a call from some guys recovering the airplane in Montana. "did you loose a gold ring with a K on it?" It was in the belly the whole time. They sent it back and he gave it to one of his sons.
 
yikes

purchased a champ that was just rebuilt and on floats for about 20hrs well I was taking lessons in it so the guy I got it from and I went to put it on wheels I guess the shop he had put the floats on didnt think it needed nuts on the rear upper float strut bolts.. :crazyeyes: :crazyeyes:
 
Newest findings.

Cessna C-180. Fuel smell from the passenger side. Upon investigating, found a piece of clear nylon tube cut length wise, wrapped around the fuel line, and clamped on with two worm clamps within the rear door post. The tubing was blue in this area. After draining the fuel and removing the clear tube, found a perfect 3/32 hole in the fuel line which coincidentally matched perfectly with a screw holding the interior door seal on. You could even see where the drill bit started to cut on the back wall of the fuel line. I have that chunk of line to show people what not to do when installing interior panels and seals.

Cessna C-180. Right Rudder cable to tail wheel steering bracket broken and only about 3 or 4 rivets holding it in place. The bracket moved a good 1/2 inch when operating the right rudder. Repaired the system and the owner remarked that the aircraft handled much better on the ground.

M5-210C Maule. Found a 1/2 inch wrench laying on the top of the belly fabric directly under the flap handle and trim system. Probably would not have done anything, but a good hard bump may have lodged it into the flap mechanism.

Brian.
 
A bit off topic but I did see a couple of guys painting a cub on a cold(40s), windy fall day with foam brushes and latex house paint. It looked about what you might expect when done.
pete
 
In the late 60's, my father bought a surplus 182 from the Border Patrol. I was instructed to pull all of the interior, as he had ordered a full Airtex interior. In the belly, I found about half a box of loose, unspent .357 mag rounds. Can't imagine what would have happened if something had hit one hard on the primer.

The airplane also had a patch on the left wing, about 1" outboard of the fuel tank. A wetback on a horse had shot at the airplane with a Marlin 30/30. The Border Patrol Agent got his though, when he flew the airplane into the wetback, killing him and his horse. You really didn't want to mess with those guys back then. And to think...... Ramos and Campos went to prison for inflicting a flesh wound on a fleeing drug runner!
 
Reviving an oldie. Found this Friday. Flaps seemed to operate just fine. :lol:
flap cable.jpg

flap cable 2.jpg
 

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Steve, that's one way to take the slack out of a cable :roll:. Looks like a factory single crimp on the sleeve.

Thanks. cubscout
 
Cubus Maximus said:
My friend Gary had an old PA-12 (they called it "rag bag"). 17 years ago he took his gold ring off to prop the thing at the lake. Well, needless to say the ring disappeared. Last May he got a call from some guys recovering the airplane in Montana. "did you loose a gold ring with a K on it?" It was in the belly the whole time. They sent it back and he gave it to one of his sons.
Click to expand...

That was me, after the mess of a plane Gary sold me I'm surprised I actually sent that ring back. The bird was basically condemned at its first annual. I found the ring as I was doing a total rebuild on it.
 
Otter
During conversion to civilian status, firewall template called out replacing some rivets, but specifically exempting one. Mechanics drilled it out anyway and went right through one of the control cables on the cabin side.

Cub
Did an annual about a year after a rebuild on a green cub. Found green paint on un-nutted gear bolts (plural). Friend called it structural paint.
 
I once flew a pressurized Cessna 337 (hated that airplane) that my company purchased new from Cessna. Occasionally would have trouble opening the entrance door. After several embarrassing instances where I couldn't open the door to let my passengers out I had our mechanic take the door apart. He found a 6 inch long screwdriver that had obviously been left in the door at the factory.
 
20191109_170050.jpg

Local avionics shop has been hacking up airplanes. Look closely at the screw with a black nut on it.
 

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Found behind the panel on co-pilot side.


17F1CB9D-7CCC-4EEB-8641-B044866E3E42.jpeg
 

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Might have posted this before. On the rebuild we found a lost screwdriver bit .......


G-BTBU_Piston 001.jpg
 

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