Annual Off to a Good Start

Although I am starting to resent the whole annual inspection process.
More on that in a minute.

All compressions on our O-540 are 78 or better out of 80, so that's
always a relief. The oil filter was clean (as always), and the exhaust
system is sound. Those are three big-ticket items off the list --
always a relief.

As always, however, the inspection process itself has created some
problems. The stupid tail cone must be removed to inspect the
stabilator hinges and trim jack screw, which means torquing on
nutplates attached to plastic. (Whoever approved THAT **** on a
certified plane?)

Of course at least one of the nutplates has to twist off the old,
brittle plastic, resulting in a repair bill where none was necessary.
Same goes for removing the umpteen screws on the access panels. Does
a 4" by 6" inspection panel REALLY need 9 easily strippable screws to
hold it on? Wouldn't TWO (or 3?) done the job? Stupid.

My A&P could only smile and commiserate with me. He says that there
is a move afoot to make the "annual" inspection an every-other-year
affair, which makes good sense to me. It therefore has no hope of
approval.

More good news: I unscrewed the 6.3 million stainless steel structural
screws to remove the starboard main fuel tank, to search for our fuel
leak. (Classified as a "stain" -- not a "seep" -- by my A&P) My
forearms are still burning, because I didn't want to risk stripping
any of my expensive stainless screws, so I did 'em all by hand.

We found a problem right away -- a seeping rivet -- and were able to
fix it without resorting to sending the tank out for a complete
teardown and overhaul.

He used his rivet gun (while I bucked the rivets) to tighten down the
whole row of rivets around the offending rivet, and then applied fuel
tank sealant to the INSIDE of the tank on that rivet row. In an
amazing stroke of luck, that leaking rivet was accessible by reaching
through the fuel tank filler -- a one in a hundred chance.

Then we found another seeping rivet from under the sealant around the
fuel gauge sending unit. That simply required another dab of fuel
tank sealant, and (hopefully!) my leaky tank is now history.

Tomorrow we start on the interior, which means removing all the seats,
and the floor under the back seats. My A&P is eager to get back to
working on his P6 Hawk biplane, which is almost ready for its first
flight -- so we should be done with my annual in record time!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"