Fuselage strut fitting - FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet (merged)

[Forrest Barber]

FAA engineer Andrew McAnaul has asked that I get this out to our members ASAP. Here it is for you to return comments. The NTSB is still investigating there is a lot of information and we need more. Comment on this thread is good too! I think I did it... Rob & Robert would be proud of me.
Off for a Flight Review.

Service Letter102 (Taylorcraft factory)

[cpirrmann]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

FAA engineer Andrew McAnaul has asked that I get this out to our members ASAP. Here it is for you to return comments. The NTSB is still investigating there is a lot of information and we need more. Comment on this thread is good too! I think I did it... Rob & Robert would be proud of me.
Off for a Flight Review.

Good job! This is more like what we should be seeing. Thanks

[astjp2]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

Was it the strut that failed or the Fuselage? Tim

[Robert Lees]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

Well done, Forrest. You're a Star!

Good job! This is more like what we should be seeing

To be fair, there was an FAA Airworthiness Concern notice went out on struts before the Strut Ad was formally issued.

[Forrest Barber]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

I don't need praise just patience....... THE DAMN fuselage fitting pulled off the fuselage, IT WAS a RUSTY PIECE OF CRAP.
I will try for the photos tomorrow. We have a two fold thing here, inspect the struts , inspect the attach fitting area. One is now an AD , the other will likely be a SB IMHO.
As to the notifications , YES the FAA sends AD's to owners by regular mail, sometimes they get it before the IA's do. In my case I got it by my AD service within hrs of the issuance. I use ATP-NAV.
The FAA engineer felt this discussion group was the quickest way to get it to owners, I explained to him that only 30% of the registered owners belong to the Type Club or Foundation.
It has always been a problem. faa.gov gets me a lot of info...

[VictorBravo]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

This morning I posted a suggestion on another thread that may well help address this new Airworthiness Concern in the future. Perhaps Forrest can promote this idea to the FAA engineer if he deems it a good idea:

A relatively simple part, combination of access plate and protective fairing, could make it a lot easier to inspect for existing corrosion and help prevent corrosion in the future.

In addition to allowing full 360 degree inspection access, it would also serve to not trap water next to the fitting, and (if properly sealed to the rabric and struts) it would help prevent water/mud splashing o nto the lower strut attach area.

I'll let Rob determine whether to merge that thread into this one... "mergers and acquisitions" seem to be in fashion nowdays

[VictorBravo]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

Forrest, do you have any knowledge or recollection of the number of Taylorcrafts that suffered strut or strut attch failures? Is the Wiley crash the first one ever, or the fifth???

[Ragwing nut]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

IMHO, this should only affect seaplanes. The fitting on a seaplane becomes the lowest point where moisture runs to. I have never seen this as a problem on non float equipped aircraft. They will rot at the tail. I have fixed my fair share of fuselages of all makes and models. The only time I have ever ran into the issue of rot arounf that area was on a Tri-Pacer. The carry thru tube betwwen the attachpoints had rot and had to be repalced.

Mike

[Dano"T"]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

A Taylorcraft on floats sits quite tail low compared to many other floatplanes.....The tail is still the low point on my plane.....(which obviously is on floats)

[Buell Powell]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

I have noticed on some planes the fittings were pretty much covered over with fabric and the metal parts that were exposed were just sprayed with the dope-silver-and paint with the fabric. The dope doesnt stick to the metal parts very long and becomes loose-cracks and can be fkaked off with a pocket knife and sometimes there is rust there. The way I prevent this is to scuff the epoxy primer and paint the fittings,lift handles, step supports, etc. with Aerothane(I use Poly Fiber) before I cover the fuselage,When covering I glue the fabric around the outside the of the fittings making sure that it is completly glued down flat. Then mask off the fittings etc. when I start applying the fabric dope. This way the paint wont peel off and leaves a nice clean surface.Ifaplanewas covered and they had used the fabric materials over the fittings you could just remove the gunk on the fittings-trim the fabric around the fitting and check and clean the fitting and re-prime@ paint the fittings-make a patch as per the covering manuel-mask off the fittings and blend in the patch.By the way Aerothane is an excellent Urethane paint for this-very similar to emron..itis very durable and almost no chemicals will soften it. I clean it sometimes with paint thinner and it doesnt hurt it. Hope this helps
Buell

[Richard Boyer]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

Forest,

I appreciate the posting of this and that Mr. McAnaul is interested in getting the info out to us. The problem is that the write up is inconsistent with the actual AD.......

The facts are that a strut didn't fail but that is what this very costly AD is saying it addresses.

There should be a one time check of the wing strut attach fitting. Maybe once every 5 to 10 years after that, but the majority of us check that sucker EVERY ANNUAL.

But, I'm preaching to the Choir here........

[dewhitaker]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

I want to make some comments about the timely dissemination of information. First of all, Thank You Forrest for passing this on to the tribe, well done!

However, that being said, here is what I find very offensive: The Airworthiness Concern Sheet that was published for the struts has a date on it of 4/12/2007. Why did most of us not find out anything about this until August when the AD came out?

Look closely at the bottom of the page at the routing of notification. It would seem that the AOPA was the only group officially notified of this. Why did they not pass this information on? As a dues paying member, I will be asking them that question.

The boxes for the EAA and type clubs are not checked. Why were they left out? They could have been very helpful in getting the word out.

The last sentence of the ACS states: "The FAA endorses dissemination of this technical information to all owners / operators and requests association and type club comments." Well, Andrew McAnaul, the FAA has all of our contact information as registered owners. Why were we not notified in April when the strut ACS was published? The FAA certainly has the ability to notify owners if they should choose to.

I urge all in the tribe to make your voice heard to the FAA on these two issues.

[Buell Powell]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

Bill,
I think your idea of a clear fairing would be one good way if someone has reason to suspect the fittings would be corroded due to excessive moisture such as the one that failed. However making it an AD for all T/crafts regardless of the conditions would not be necessary as Mike has stated.I don't want to contradict anyone but the thought having to install clear plastic fairings on my little original 41 Deluxe gives me the shudders. Really- nearly all of the fittings can be seen and checked from insides the fuselage and with a little extra care when painting and covering almost all of the outside can be inspected. I do think an SB is very important because I dont think most pull the seat to check the rear fittings or cable covers to check the front from the inside and see if debris or moisture has collected there and check the outsides.

[cpirrmann]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

I'll kind of repeat myself. This is good information that should be put into a comprehensive inspection manual for us and our IA's to use. The more recent maintenance manuals have step by step , piece by piece instructions for doing just about anything. We can have that too.

[Forrest Barber]

Re: FAA Airworthiness Concern Sheet

David, the AWCS was posted on OUR website before any body else got it....It was discussed at the Fly-in ..... I asked all to comment.