"C-175 SoCal Beware" Original Poster Replies

(Bill Berle)
shared these priceless pearls of wisdom:

-
-I guess I have a few more folks who dislike me than I had initially
-counted. In my life, I have INDEED been at various times a horse's
-ass, a buyer of un-airworthy airplanes, and a seller of unairworthy
-planes. I've been a womanizer, a liar, a spoiled brat, a whining brat,
-and an angry bitter jackass. I've had money to burn and I've clipped
-coupons and I've spent money and I've lost money.

I don't dislike you. Hell, I've never MET you. My comment was that you were
beating some ******* up that may or may not have deserved it, but not from any
hard data that you posted. You may not have liked what you saw, but nowhere did
you say what measured outside of limits or what lie (prevarication, untruth,
etc.) you were told by the owner.

Did the ad say N/MDH (no/minor damage history)? If so, you were within your
rights to flail the owner publicly. Did you ask directly about major damage
history and be told that there was none? Again, you can rip the owner a public
new asshole for lying. But NOWHERE in your rambling post did you assert any
such behavior.

And yes, at some point in our checkered careers, most of us have been somewhere
in that litany of bad actors that you listed.


-
-But one thing that I have NEVER done, is to turn my back on aviation
-or my fellow pilots and owners. I have NEVER kept silent about
-something important where my voice (even the voice of a spoiled brat)
-could have made a difference. Some people can sit back and say that
-it's all on the buyer, and that the seller has every right to just
-keep quiet and let the buyer figure out everything for himself, and
-screw the buyer if he gets taken. That is a very common mentality in
-certain cultures outside of America and well outside of aviation.

The seller has the obligation to point out to you anything that (s)he knows to
be unairworthy. The seller has the obligation to answer any questions to the
best of their ability. The seller does NOT have the obligation to point out to
you every item on the aircraft that may or may not need future maintenance. You
**have** heard of a prepurchase inspection, have you not? If you felt the IA/AP
that did the recent work might have let some stuff slip, you **do** have a
mechanic that you know and trust, do you not ... after owning all of your
airplanes you MUST have run across at least one trustworthy wrench.



-
-For those of you who think that I was wrong, or whining, or crying or
-whatever when I posted a warning, I have a couple of questions:
-
-Do any of you understand that the existence of private aviation in
-America in 2004 is put at real risk by every private airplane crash
-that gets reported on the news? In an election year? That YOUR ability
-to go flying on a nice day could easily be destroyed by one Cessna
-crashing into a house on the other side of the country from you?

Of course. That's why some of us take a cut in pay to spend a few years in
elected office, just to keep what we can in aviation going.


-
-Do any of you understand that an average brand new private pilot with
-150 hours would have every reason to believe that if he buys an
-airplane with a current annual inspection signoff he has every reason
-to think it is safe and airworthy? REGARDLESS OF THE ****ING DOLLAR
-PRICE HE PAID???

If the average brand new private pilot believes this, then his instructor was
sadly deficient in conveying 91.3 and 91.7. Why not attack the problem at the
root...instructors that don't drill it deep about the responsibility of PIC?


-
-Do any of you know the difference between a quickie 'pencil whip'
-annual inspection on an airplane that there isn't anything seriously
-wrong with, and a quickie 'pencil whip' annual on an airplane with
-significant mechanical safety issues that need to be addressed before
-the next flight?

I've never met an IA that pencil-whips annuals. Evidently you have. Perhaps
that is why you distrust the lot of us so.


-
-For the record, there is a reason I said that I am not an IA or
-A&P...because I am not one. However, I am fairly educated and have
-been around long enough to know a little more than the average owner.
-My reason for stating all that originally (and now) is that I
-admitted that I did not have the measuring equipment or the license to
-determine the exact state of legal airworthiness on that 175. That
-being said, I saw several things on a CURSORY inspection that were of
-serious concern to me, and that convinced me the airplane was less
-than safe. All of the folks who posted negative comments about me or
-my post ALSO did not address what I said in any real-world manner.

Excuse me? Seems to me I posted the entire list of airframe ADs on a 175 and
asked you to find the "flap track AD" that you referred to on that list. If you
are referring to the 72-03-03R3 jackscrew AD, the 175 is not listed as
applicable. If that isn't real-world, how do you better define it?


-
-Even though I did not have the measuring tools or the license to use
-them, I said that I knew damn well that Cessna did not build seat
-rails with oval shaped holes. NOBODY said anything like "well, I think
-Bill Berle is a jackass for XYZ reason, but yes, oval shaped seat rail
-holes have KILLED more than one Cessna owner and that is certainly a
-big tip-off that the plane might be less than safe."

So Berle knows better than the Cessna engineers that wrote the seat rail AD?
And the FAA folks that approved it, with three revisions, each one more
restrictive than the prior version? Most Cessna drivers that are "fairly
educated and have been around long enough to know a little more than the average
owner" would have spent the buck or so on a T drill and a Z drill. If the T
drill doesn't show space around it, the airplane is good to the next annual. If
the T drill has an air gap, then it gets inspected every 100 hours until the Z
drill shows an air gap and then the rail is replaced. That's the engineering
way of doing it.

The airplane didn't meet YOUR standards, Berle. That may or may not be the
airworthy standards. But YOU don't get to set the standards for airworthiness
until you start punching the FAA timecard.



-
-When an IA mechanic inspector signs off an annual, that means the
-airplane is presumed airworthy and within safe limits, even if the
-owner wants to sell the plane for 50% of it's retail value a week
-later. The IA does NOT have the right to say to the buyer "well, tough
-****, you get what you pay for, anyone who thought that $25K would buy
-you a really airworthy 175 is an idiot...caveat emptor and all that...
-and my signature doesn't count unless you paid $50K for it anyway".

The IA has no relationship to the buyer. The IA put his signature (and
reputation) on the dotted line for the current owner. If the buyer looks up the
IA and asks a question, the IA is perfectly within his rights not to answer.
The IA has the right to refuse to reinspect the aircraft for the buyer.

Having said all that, if the signator IA was evasive, I'd have every reason to
suspect that something was wrong with the deal. At that point, I'd either back
away or have my trustworthy wrench give the airplane a **thorough** inspection.



-
-What seems to have been lost in all these intellectual giants' flaming
-replies is that there was an airplane presented and advertised as
-being flyable, safe, and in-annual. The airplane was at the very least
-suspicious because of the results of a very informal cursory
-inspection. Since I am NOT a licensed IA, I am NOT in a position to
-numerically quantify the wear limits on seat rails, flap tracks,
-control yoke play, and aileron circuit friction. However I am well
-within my rights and ability to call it into question for IA's, FAA
-inspectors, and other potential fraud victims to talk about. I even
-told the guy that if the measurements showed it to be within limits I
-would publish an apology. Nobody wanted to give me credit for that, I
-guess.

You've got it dead wrong, Berle, dead FRIKKIN wrong. You are very much in a
position to numerically quantify wear limits wherever you please. You can
measure, tap, jiggle, and satisfy yourself that every part on the airplane is
within specifications. You can disassemble the engine and measure parts to a
tenth of a thousandth if you wish, and you can reassemble that same engine. The
only thing you CAN'T do is sign your own work off after you are done.

If it was a 175 you were lusting after, did you ask your trustworthy mechanic to
give you an AD checksheet printout on the airplane? Most all of us who play the
game for real spend a grand or so a year for software that keeps us on the
straight and narrow regarding maintenance. Most of us will print out a
checklist for a client in the hopes of keeping the client happy. Most of us
will also let the client pore over the maintenance manual and copy down
pertinent sections and wear limits. My suspicion is that you did neither.

In short, Bill, you are very like one of my students who doesn't do the weekly
assignments and then tells me what a lousy teacher I am when they fail the
midterm. You -- didn't -- do -- your -- homework.

So, in the interests of education, here is a quick and dirty first-cut way to do
Airworthiness Directive 87-20-03R2 on a private (not for hire) airplane. You
might want to cut this out and use it on your next "inspection":

A. The AD covers everything from the first 150 to the last 337 that
Cessna ever made, and everything in between that uses seat rails.

B. The airplane has to have more than a thousand hours total time.

C. Look for cracks in the rail. If there is a crack ACROSS a hole, it
is permitted so long as there is no other crack within an inch of this crack OR
less than 5 cracks of this nature on the rail. If the crack is from hole to
hole, replace the rail. If there are cracks in the rest of the rail below the
top part of the rail, replace the rail. (You really need the drawing to
visualize this last sentence.)

D. Buy a #24, T, and Z drill bit. On the T and Z bits, scribe a line
0.020" down from the end of the bit. Poke the T bit into each hole in the rail.
If you can see an air gap above the 0.020" line, you have to remeasure the rail
every 100 hours. If you can see an air gap above the 0.020" line on the Z bit,
replace the rail.

E. Place the seat onto the rail and engage the locking pin. Pull up on
the forward edge of the seat and mark a line where the locking pin and top edge
of the rail meet. If the locking pin does not go at least 0.15" (a #24 drill
bit) into the hole, replace whatever is necessary to achieve this 0.15" depth of
engagement.

F. The roller housing (the part of the seat that the rollers are bolted
onto) is a U-shape. The top of the U is welded/bolted onto the seat. The sides
of the U bear on the sides of the rail, and the bottom of the U wraps around the
rail itself. Measure the thickness of the side of the U. If the bottom of the
U measures less than half this thickness, replace the roller housing.

Now again, I said this was a Q&D first cut, but it will at LEAST give you
something on which to base a claim other than an eyeball measurement.



-
-Out of a personal dislike for me, my detractors seem to be overlooking
-the most universally basic service that pilots and aviation people do
-for each other... they look out for each other and always go over and
-above what is minimally required, to help prevent an accident. Well,
-MOST of us go over and above, Jim.

I am not given the choice of going over and above. If the wear limit is 0.36
and the part measures 0.359, it is airworthy and I do not have the right to
claim otherwise. I am within my rights to terminate the inspection and return
the aircraft to the owner to take elsewhere if I choose, but I do not have the
right to reject the aircraft as unairworthy. That's just the obligation you
take on in this profession. Sorry if you want more. I don't inspect to YOUR
standards, I inspect to the manufacturer's standards.

Now, if you say you want a new limits overhaul, I'm happy to do it -- it is your
nickel. I just can't reject a part as unairworthy if it meets service limits.



-
-I have every legal right to stand by and watch some other pilot take
-off with a control lock still installed. In my best "caveat emptor"
-voice, I could tell the NTSB investigators that the pilot got what he
-deserved, because he didn't follow the checklist and didn't do a
-proper pre-flight, and that I haven't a care about his widowed wife
-and kids. And that the pilot can further burn in hell because I don't
-like him, and worse yet I found his tone of voice a little too
-'whining' when he was talking about the preflight in the first place.
-It appears that THIS is the same kind of logic some of the posters in
-this thread would apply. None of you who hide behind that type of
-logic are friends of aviation.

Oh, come on. Nobody I saw posting said anything of the kind. What we all said
was that you didn't do your homework, you took a road trip and saw a beater
airplane, and that you were ****ed that the owner didn't tell you that it was a
beater before you got there. NO body said that if the airplane measured
unairworthy that you should buy it and fly it. That is stupid. What we said is
that IN YOUR OPINION, WITHOUT SO MUCH AS A TAPE MEASURE RULER, you determined
that the airplane was likely unairworthy. Get over it. You wasted a tank of
gas.


-
-My intent was to make people aware of a
-potentially...POTENTIALLY...unsafe airplane and a DEFINITELY sleazy
-seller. I had to tone down and soften several things to protect myself
-from a lawsuit. For the same reason, I had to remind everyone that I
-am not legally licensed to say whether this airplane was airworthy,
-which one poster took to mean I didn't know much about airplanes. I
-know more about airplanes (and I honor our un-written agreement to
-help each other) than some of the fish in these waters do.

NO body said you didn't know much about airplanes, at least not this body. What
we said was that there was no hard data in your rant.

Now, let's do something positive. Explain, and bowlderize to you heart's
content, exactly what this seller did that was sleazy. He may have shown up in
rags, smoking a foul cigar, smelling of cheap wine and garlic, but what did he
do about selling the airplane that was so sleazy?



-
-I feel that I have done the right thing by calling people's attention
-to this matter. I will do it again tomorrow or the next day. I am
-disgusted that it appears some of you wouldn't do it, just because you
-didn't have to.

If I chose to do so, I'd sure as hell have some basis on which to make my
assertions other than the Clem Kaddiddlehopper line about "It just don't look
right, it just DON'T look right".


-
-As for the personal attacks or disparaging comments toward me, I can
-live with that far better than I could live with myself if I just sat
-back and said "caveat emptor" and allowed this type of behavior to go
-un-addressed.

And again I ask you for your points and authority to back up your assertions.


-
-And as for Mr. Weir, I have no idea what I have ever done to earn his
-disrespect. He read my original post, looked past all of the substance
-and reasoning behind it, and then proclaimed that "all he saw" was a
-spoiled brat or an amateur IA wannabee, or whatever. My question, Sir,
-is how could you see anything if your view was blocked by the inner
-lining of your colon?

That was pretty snotty, wasn't it. Get it all out of your system, Bill? Good.
I knew you could.

Now, I'll make the point once again and stop. There WAS NO SUBSTANCE to your
reasoning. None whatsoever other than an opinion not substantiated with data.



-
-Bill Berle
-Los Angeles


Jim
Grass Valley


Jim Weir (A&P/IA, CFI, & other good alphabet soup)
VP Eng RST Pres. Cyberchapter EAA Tech. Counselor
http://www.rst-engr.com

What is the big deal about worn seat tracks?
They're all worn, unless the airplane has less
than 2000 TT or unless they've been replaced.

New tracks are (relatively) inexpensive, and, to
anyone who is half-way competent with a rivet gun/
bucking bar, they're no big deal to replace.

They'll take 10 minutes a piece to drill off, and 10 minutes
a piece to rivet new ones back on.

As I understand it, the AD is based upon a very
few cases where the tracks were so bad, the seat(s)
slid back upon takeoff and a stall/spin crash ensued.

I have cheap ($25 or so dollar) "auxiliary" seat stops
installed on my (currently airworthy) seat tracks which
are a backup/fail-safe measure in the event the tracks
fail me when I shove in all 145hp for takeoff.

Bela P. Havasreti