A reminder to double check your work

[BrendAn]

an extra few minutesay have saved this person's life. No excuse to not bolt a strut on correctly 

[BrendAn]

this page should have been at the top

[facthunter]

Murphy's Law. IF It Is possible to do it Wrong, it will Be.. In this case, before the Bolt was tightened it should have been ascertained the Bolt was through the eye by Moving The Wing up and down and checking it's movement was Limited both ways, by a positive and definite stop.. That would be a Normal procedure and there's NO Backup.  Flight is unforgiving of errors and Mistakes. Nev

[Thruster88]

This was the accident that claimed the life of the Dragonfly designer Bobby Bailey. He was test flying the aircraft that someone had built. 

 

 

[BrendAn]

3 hours ago, Thruster88 said:

This was the accident that claimed the life of the Dragonfly designer Bobby Bailey. He was test flying the aircraft that someone had built. 

 

 

I didn't realise it was that crash, I read about that at the time.

Even more important to do a thorough pre flight when it's someone else's aircraft.

[Thruster88]

6 hours ago, BrendAn said:

I didn't realise it was that crash, I read about that at the time.

Even more important to do a thorough pre flight when it's someone else's aircraft.

 

[Siso]

Amazing aircraft! 

[Garfly]

There's a lovely (912) Dragonfly based at Taree.

 

 

Edited May 5 by Garfly

[onetrack]

Well, you just got to wonder about some peoples attention to personal safety. 

 

QUOTE:

"Inspection of the hangar where the airplane was assembled revealed that no assembly checklist or assembly manual was present in the work area.

The airplane did not have a data plate installed and had not been inspected by a Designated Airworthiness Representative (DAR) or an FAA Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) inspector.

No airworthiness certificate or operating limitations had been issued for the airplane."

 

And there was no way a pre-flight inspection could have picked up the assemblers failure to ensure the bolt was inserted into wing strut support block. This was multiple failures in assembly procedures and checks.

 

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/Aviation/ReportMain/GenerateNewestReport/194119/pdf

 

 

 

 

 

[onetrack]

Here's another, almost identical crash caused by an almost identical problem. Could YOU have picked up the assembly fault in the wing strut here? (see photos, page 7 of the NTSB report).

 

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/Aviation/ReportMain/GenerateFactualReport/99569/pdf

 

 

Edited May 5 by onetrack

[BrendAn]

8 hours ago, onetrack said:

Here's another, almost identical crash caused by an almost identical problem. Could YOU have picked up the assembly fault in the wing strut here? (see photos, page 7 of the NTSB report).

 

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/Aviation/ReportMain/GenerateFactualReport/99569/pdf

 

 

i will tell you being a rag and tube flyer both those problems would have been picked up with a preflight inspection.

i  always check every attachment even the spar bolts just in case one has broken or worked loose.

and i also push the wingtip up to check the struts as well. thats all on xairs but i am sure its the same on any other .

[danny_galaga]

Good heads up, but this is not a few minutes extra work. When I finished building my plane, I turned to page 1 of the manual and then went through every page of it. I checked every single bolt, nut split pin etc that I had placed, page by page. After each page, I dated it so that there could be no doubt in my mind that I had checked it. It actually took me weeks to do this. 

 

In the end, I found one split pin that hadn't been bent, on an aileron. I always bend them a tad, just enough for it to stay in place, if it's a part that needs adjusting. So on a first flight I'm confident it probably would have stayed, but clearly I screwed up. I was both happy there was only one thing I left unfinished, but dismayed I left ANYTHING unfinished.

 

So yes, it only took a minute to rectify the problem. But it took weeks to find.