Dafydd Llewellyn

Well that does amaze me! I mean I don't know about GA but I know in gliding just the incipient spin is not only encouraged but mandatory practice! it shocks me to think that it is not allowed in RA. a developed spin certainly not! but letting the nose drop off, opposite rudder and central stick. hardly rocket science and could very well save your life one day. How many people are killed world wide by aircraft spinning in! I'm remembering back but I could have sworn I did it as part of my training.

GFA policy has always been that ALL 2-seat training gliders in Australia MUST be certificated for full spinning. Ever wonder why there are no Wassmer Bijave 2-seaters in Australia? Because they were not certificated for full spinning.

Certification standards usually divide fixed- wing aircraft into two categories : "Normal" and "acrobatic" (some have a half-way house called "Utility") When a fixed-wing acrobatic aircraft aircraft is certificated, it must be shown to be capable of recovery from a spin of at least six full turns. Some authorities do not consider that sufficient; they want six turns AFTER the spin has stabilized. Recovery must be possible even if the controls are applied incorrectly at first - so one must test for aileron into the spin, aileron neutral, aileron out of the spin, up to the point where recovery is initiated; and one must test for the extremes of CG position, and for all flap and undercarriage possibilities. The aircraft must recover by the standard technique within one and a half additional turns

 

For a "Normal" category aeroplane, which will be placarded to the effect that intentional spins are prohibited, (and that includes incipient spins), it must be demonstrated that the aircraft is incapable of entering an unrecoverable situation after one full turn, again for all permissible CG positions, all flap and undercarriage positions, and with ailerons with the spin, neutral, or against the spin, up to the point where recovery is initiated; it must recover within one additional turn.

 

The test sequence for a normal category aircraft with a fixed undercarriage and three flap positions thus usually has 128 test cases. This testing requires the fitment of a spin recovery parachute.

 

So if you want to learn how to recover from a spin, contact your local gliding club; and likewise if you want to brush up your spin recovery. It's an entirely normal manoeuvre in any two-seat training glider in Australia - and all gliding instructors are competent in teaching it. But do NOT do it in a Drifter; they were never tested or cleared, for even the one-turn cases, because CAO 101.55 (and the first edition of BCAR S) omitted spin testing from their requirements. Jabiru and Skyfox both did it voluntarily. However any ultralight aircraft is in danger of exceeding its flight envelope during the recovery, even if it happens to have benign spin characteristics.

 

Also, unless your VG kit has a supplementary type certificate (STC) for your aircraft, and is installed strictly IAW the STC, it most likely was never properly spin -tested. VG kits can, if they are properly designed, make the aircraft very resistant to entering a spin; however if it does enter, they can also make it unrecoverable. Approach with care.

 

The last truly spinnable trainers in Australia were the DH Chipmunk, the Fuji, and the Avions Pierre Robin. Neither the Cessna 150 aerobat nor the Victa Airtourer were capable of performing true spins; they were emasculated so they did a half-hearted one.

 

The reason there are no spinnable recreational trainers is, I would suggest, because the very tight weight limits preclude the additional structural strength necessary for the increased flight envelope speeds required by acrobatic category; in any case the airworthiness standards for these aircraft do not allow for aerobatics. Any form of spin - even an incipient spin - is an aerobatic manoeuvre.

 

 

M61A1 Window dressing is alive and well. SMS's anyone? They could be good but I often feel they are a way of covering the @r$e of those at the top.. Rules are written for the lowest common denominator. ( the fool who should not even be there). nev

Regardless of rules, precautions, etc, the fact remains that stupidity is punishable, in nature, by death. There is no substitute for competence and vigilance.

 

 

I think this is a very unfortunate outcome and rather typical of the know-all attitude of certain people here.I've known Duncan for a good while now and I'm sorry to say that some of you have assumed a bit too much and probably solely based on Duncan's rather poorly worded original question. Let me assure you that Duncan is no fool, and whilst not being an engineer he does have a remarkably good understanding of the engineering requirements for designing and building his plane, and the math knowledge and skills to conduct the calcs for any part of his structure.

 

Duncan is a very active member of another site which is more oriented to homebuilding and amateur design than RecFlying is, but I asked him to come and post here so that the Aussies could all enjoy his build experiences as others elsewhere have been doing.

 

For the benefit of those of you who don't know as much as some here obviously do, the calcs associated with composite structures are very complex and the results of the calcs are very rarely realised in real-life, especially where amateur construction in uncontrolled environments is concerned - that was admitted by Rutan as being the major weakness with his line of kits and plans, and hence all Rutan designs are way heavier than need to be if the construction of them could be guaranteed to be consistent from one builder to another. With that in mind Duncan has, over some years now, conducted representative experiment with a large number of lay-up possibilities and tests those pieces to destruction to further his knowledge and product development based on real componentry rather than theoreticals, with a view to improving on the dumbed-down product.

 

Quite unlike Daffydd's examples of Scott Winton, Charles Ligetti and Gordon Bedson, all of whom I knew very well, Duncan is one who is always willing to listen to informed opinion, and is also one to experiment to advantage.

 

All Duncan wanted to know was the thickness of the foam used in the sandwich on the Jabiru fuselage and he thought someone might be kind enough to measure theirs. 32 posts, two weeks and a vault of unsolicited advice and criticism has been forthcoming but not one person out of the dozens who own a Jabiru, has actually been kind enough to offer whether theirs has foam in the region of 10mm thick or 3mm thick. For the benefit of those who don't profess to be experts, and who might have had an interest in what Duncan was sharing with the forum, below are pictures of an uncoated Jab fuse showing the (white) regions where foam is used to stiffen the structure.

 

Duncan emailed me last evening and mentioned that he does not at this stage intend to return to the site which is a shame, his build story has been fascinating and there aren't many committed amateur experimenter/designers in Australia any more, in the 1970s/1980s we led the world and now we've been left way behind, in part, IMHO, due to the knocker mentality of some.

 

[ATTACH]23517[/ATTACH] [ATTACH]23518[/ATTACH]

Well, that's a relief to know. Duncan's original question was pretty much identical to some I've had asked of me in the past, and several of those askers ended up dead. The people who responded were, as far as I could see, concerned that this was another tradgedy in the making, as was I.

I hope his investigations have taken into account stress diffusion aspects at concentrated load points; carbon fibre is not forgiving of local stress concentrations. Coupon testing won't answer those issues. The photos you supplied of the early Jabiru proof testing are most apposite; that's the sort of thing that is involved in proving a composite structure - but that's just the test for point A on the manoeuvre envelope, for the wings and the primary lift truss. A typical basic loads report for a simple aeroplane will contain around 64 cases for the manoeuvre encelope and 32 or so for the gust envelope, from which one selects four or five of the most critical combinations of wing and tail load. In the process, one must verify that the controls do not lock up due to the structural deflections at limit load. Then there are a whole raft of control system load tests; and the undercarriage drop tests.

 

It is prudent to use a relevant design standard as a guide, even if you have no intention whatever to proceed to certification. Those standards are written in blood, and it's just plain dumb to ignore them.

 

 

I agree most emphatically that accurate and complete data on accident causes is needed. Unfortunately it is more difficult to achieve this than one might expect. Different people tend to analyse causes differently. So any form of tabulated analytical data MUST be done in accordance with a well-defined (and public) set of criteria.

 

I'll give you an example: A little old lady trips over a loose carpet strip, and falls, breaking her hip. She pick up a viral infection in hospital, is given an antibiotic to which she has a violent allergic reaction, and dies. What was the cause of death?

 

Answer (as from a Coroner): She tripped over a carpet strip. Because without that, none of the rest would have happened.

 

This sort of thinking was applied by the WA Coroner in relation to an accident involving a seized fuel injection pump shaft in a Cessna, which stopped an engine at low altitude after takeoff. The pilot chose to turn against the dead engine because of some powerlines that ran diagonally across his path a couple of Km from the airport, lost control, and crashed. He had not turned on the electric fuel pump. The Coroner's finding was that the cause of the crash was an incorrect choice of bushing material in a modification to the fuel pump, about 1100 hours TIS previously.

 

There was no consideration that a pilot is supposed to be able to fly a twin-engine aircraft after an engine failure (that's why people make twin engine aircraft); or of the fact that the electric fuel pump is there to deal with that situation, or the fact that the fuel system of the engine concerned is designed in such a way that one cannot take-off with the electric pump running, or of the fact that the pilot turned against the dead engine when perhaps he did not need to.

 

So unless the individual compiling the data has a considerable depth of expert knowledge, there is a good chance that the statistics may still be misleading. It's no easy matter to get this right, and almost no national air safety bodies in the world do so all the time. The American NTSB is probably as good as any of them, and the FAA often disagrees with its findings.

 

So yes, it's a good idea and very much needed; but how do you get it right?

 

 

Good grief. What a self-rightous bunch you are turning out to be. For goodness' sake - chill guys... This finger pointing and tut-tutting is unnecessary.Duncan

FFS, at least get yourself Bill Whitney's CD on how to work out the loads and proof test your aircraft.

 

 

Yeah, that's one method of design

Y'know, people don't try to be surgeons or dentists without proper training; beats me why some of them think they can be engineers without it. Yes, it's fun to create your own design; but a composite aircraft structure, without some knowledge of the fundamentals? I assume our friend is in that situation, because he would surely not ask that question otherwise. Look at Scott Winton . . . or Charles Ligetti . . . or Gordon Bedson . . . Lots of luck, Pal, I suspect you're going to need it.

 

 

Pal, I asked a simple question. Do you know the answer or not? I didn't expect (or deserve) a talking to about doing my homework. Sheesh.Duncan

Which model Jabiru? Where on the airframe? Actually, your question is meaningless; some Jabiru wings are completely foam-filled, and have a single-thickness skin. Others are not foam-filled, and have sandwich skins, the make up of which varies according to the local loads. Some of their skin is glass over 3mm coremat - but they adapt according to the need as shown in structural testing.

 

 

(so is lead pencil)... er graphite?

Yes. Never use one on aircraft-grade aluminium alloy.

 

 

If my basic chemistry is still OK....Aluminium and carbon = electrolysis (a battery of sorts, differing electronegativities)

 

Steel and carbon is OK as normal steel contains an amount of carbon anyway (far less electrolysis, Fe + C + Ni + Mg + others)

Yes, carbon fibre is bad news in contact with aluminium (so is lead pencil).

The point about all this is that, in building a composite structure, you are creating the material; so the choice of face layup, core thickness & material, resin, layup and cure process etc will all affect the end result. That is the reason why composite aircraft structures MUST be justified by test, and the test specimens MUST be built exactly the same way as the actual aircraft structures. There are enormous differences in detail design from one aircraft manufacturer to another, and also enormous differences in layup technique, etc, so it is not a practical possibility to reverse-engineer a structure, because you will never know all the factors involved. When you add fatigue-resistance to the equation, it becomes very complex indeed. It's a minefield for the amateur.

 

 

Hi guys,Does anyone know how thick the composite skin of the Jabiru is? For that matter, does anyone know how thick composite skins usually are? I have received advice that a fuselage skin thickness (sandwich) of 3mm is more than enough, and other sources insist on 12mm. Are either of these in the ballpark of what would be considered "normal"?

Regards,

 

Duncan

Pal, you do NOT build an aeroplane by comparison with other aircraft if you want to stay alive. The Jabiru structure is extremely carefully worked out, and it's exactly as strong and rigid as it needs to be, (taking into account crashworthiness as well as flight and ground loads), there's no margin. Also, composite aircraft are often designed by stiffness, rather than strength.

If you have sufficient understanding of how to calculate the loads on the aircraft structure, you could perhaps make some test specimens using whatever materials you want to use, and test them. To do that you also need to know how to perform meaningful structural tests.

 

If you do not have that level of knowledge, then either stick to a kit that somebody else has tested - or build yourself a structural test specimen of an entire wing, an entire fuselage, etc, and static load test them. You may need to pay an engineer to work out the number of sandbags and where to place them.

 

If you choose to do that, then support whatever it is you're testing with a few hydraulic jacks whilst you're putting the sandbags on; then let the jack down a little bit at a time. That way, when something cracks, you won't destroy the whole test specimen by having it fall on the floor with a ton or so of sandbags on it; so you'll be able to beef it up and try again.

 

Bear in mind that a composite structure normally needs to be able to carry around 225% of its design limit loads, in order to have the required safety factor (150%) at the temperature of a white aeroplane standing in the sun.

 

Also bear in mind that the structure needs to be tested for the worst possible combinations of manoeuvre and gust loads, for all points on the flight envelope. See FAR 23 subpart C (Structures).

 

 

I don't know Dafydd. It was totally rebuilt in 1993 and I was told of the problem and kept an eye on it for movement. My plane had a wooden spar 7ECA so I couldn't lift or jack it easily. I was the only person who flew it ever ( when I had it)The guy who built it did all the annuals. He is a a bloke who tackles any thing fabric wood sheet wing, fuselage reskinning engine shop Got jigs for most work. The Cessna wing skins look better than from the factory. STOL kits etc.The plane unfortunately got written off after I sold it. but the same guy bought the wreck and is rebuilding it. It will be as good as new I am sure. nev.

Well, if you didn't have main U/C U-bolt problems, it almost certainly had the CAR 35 mod. that I designed in the late 1970s. The original factory installation used a U-bolt, which pulled closely down onto the underside of the leg. In glider towing usage, these failed within a couple of hundred hours. The reason was that as the leg deflected on touchdown, it pivoted about the corner of the (square) lower longeron, and exerted a "prying" effect on the bolt. The head-breakage on Partenavia undercarriage legs would be from a similar cause. The cure was rather subtle; when the leg is bent during manufacture, it take on a curvature across its width ("anticlastic curvature" - which has the result that it rests on the lower longeron at its edges, and is very slightly convex on its underside. If one replaces the U-bolt with a sufficiently rigid saddle piece, there will be air between the ends of the saddle and the underside of the main leg, at the edges of the leg. When the leg bends under the landing impact, the transverse curvature reduces a bit - and this can provide sufficient movement to compensate for the prying effect. It takes careful design to balance the two effects, but if you get it right, bingo - no more bolt problems.

The Tecnam leg attachment had a similar problem. This sort of thing is not likely to be picked-up in the initial design & certification of the aircraft; it's the sort of thing that shows up in service. The CAR 35 system existed to fix those sorts of problems. There's hardly an aircraft on the Australian civil register that does not have some sort of CAR 35 fix for some chronic issue. This is simply the reality of the game; aircraft production numbers are never sufficient for these sorts of subtle things to be caught before the aircraft get out into the field. I wrote over 3000 Engineering Orders for issues of this nature, between 1975 and 2011 (including several for Tecnams, under No Technical Objection notes from the manufacturers). This is the real world; it's unrealistic to expect anything else.

 

 

I had a Citabria. There is a lot of leverage on the bolts and mine were not a problem but used in training I am sure they could be. A fibreglass plane like a 230 compared with the 162 Cessna would always be a lot cheaper to produce. They are cheaper to repair too. You are not actually comparing apples with apples ,though but the Jabiru is a value plane and you can easily fly one across Australia, so they play a role for sure. Nev

Can you tell me whether your Citabria had the original U bolt undercarriage attachment (which broke) or the CAR 35 approved replacement using a saddle plate and two ordinary bolts?

 

 

I don't know what a Technam is , but I have flown various Tecnam's and the airfield is a bit rough at Boonah. But I haven't seen any U/c problems.

I have. And none of you have answered Oscar's question, which was whether or not Tecnam paid the cost associated with AN RA-Aus AN150911-1.

 

 

I would also point out that since CASA has not seen fit to issue an AD in regard to the Jabiru through-bolts, it follows that CASA does not consider them a threat to safety.

 

 

Jabiru should NOT fold or have any problems provided they has intiated the correct business management practices as other people here have described in earlier threads, for God sake it is their product and if the engine or any other part of the aircraft prove to have a major fault safety in the engine or airframe it is their responsibilty to repair it and make it good at NO cost to the consumer, provided that the owner of the aircraft has followed correct proceedures set out by the factory since he bought it, these aircraft are not $200 items, they are expensive items that people have paid their hard earned for and they should expect a warranty and expect that their aircraft be fixed by the manufacturer at Jab's cost, how can this be any other way...

What warranty does Jabiru offer? I'm sure it's not open-ended. For that matter, all the "UL" models of Rotax are labelled to indicate that they may stop at any time.

 

 

Isn't that law part of the trade's practices act of 1974....I wonder how this is going to affect the resale of Jabirus now?

The recall provisions were not, to my knowledge, in the 1988 version of the TPA, at least in the manner described by Dr. Zoos. Strict liability for defects was introduced then, but it related to injury or death.

The issue in regard to strict liability lay in the definition of a defect: "A product has a defect if its safety is not such as persons generally are entitled to expect" (or words to that effect). The Motor Vehicles Standards Act made compliance with the ADRs a defence against this. Aircraft (and aircraft engines) have to comply with far more stringent standards that that, to gain a Type Certificate, but the holding of a TC has not been made an automatic defence; the manufacturer would have the cost of arguing this in the courts.

 

The holder of a Type Certificate has a strict liability under CASR Part 21.003, to report defects to CASA. This is normally done by way of a Service Bulletin or similar.

 

The resale value of Jabirus is now, it would appear, more precarious than that of any of the imports, because of this recall legislation. In the case of the imports, the Australian legislation affects only the importer. Some of these are already "men of straw". So the effect is to destroy the indigenous manufacturer who was so misguided as to make his product available in Australia; and to guarantee that no redress will be forthcoming from an importer. To my way of thinking, this is totally counter-productive.

 

A 10-year limit is not "friendlier" - the correct description is, "only 2/3 as destructive".

 

 

Going by the serial numbers there is 3000 engines affected.Under ACL in Australia there is a 10 year limit. So its actually friendlier for Aussie manufacturers. Every retailer, every distributor and every manufacturer in Australia knows they can be sued for a faulty or unsafe product, and relied upon to replace faulty products under warranty, under recalls or for a variety of other reasons. We are a tiny business compared to Jab, but we carry 10M product liability and $1M recall insurance. We factor that into our costs, plus we operate with a 3% refund budget. Jab would be similar. They are crazy and reckless if they are in the game they are in and not insured for product liability or recall. Because even if they could walk away financially as a pty ltd co, from a major recall, they wont escape their duty of care for safety to consumers as company directors. These guys would have a serious insurance consult every year in the game they are in and they undoubtedly would be insured for this.

 

Its standard practice already. Im not sure why your thinking this is unique to Jabiru or tough on Jabiru. All Aussie manufacturers retailers, distributors, representatives, sales people, service agents and a host of others already face this and deal with this every working month. This is not a unique problem to Jabiru, its not unique to the aviation industry. It happens all the time. There are literally hundreds of product recalls every month and unfortunately they are very expensive, but that is why you have insurance for it.

 

We faced a recall last year on one of our biggest selling lines. It cost us 3 months worth gross sales revenue, or over 12 months profit margin. Its just an unavoidable consequence of running a business. We made a claim and it was paid after a LOT of time and paper work. Our current premium is higher as a result. but our premium is not ridiculously higher, because the whole concept of risk management by insurers is to spread the cost of the probability across many insured parties, not lump it on one party, otherwise insurance wouldn't be viable.

 

It will be similar for Jab, they will bury their heads and hope this blows over, but it wont. They have a legal and moral obligation to fix what is undoubtably a safety fault in their product. Every consumer buys their product assuming they are buying a safe and reliable product. And they are entitled to some protection. Jabiru dont tell you when you purchase from them that they are selling a discount product that is unsafe or unreliable and thus discounted, or a product that has no warranty.

 

Where as when you buy a motocross motorcylce they fully inform you that you are buying an offroad motorcycle that due to its tough operating conditions is only required to provide a 3 month warranty. And every consumer knows that up front, and its a large part of the reason why its $3000 or so cheaper then the same bike that is registrable.

 

If you bought a TV hoping to get 3-5 years out of it, and after 13 months they said, this TV is unsafe and your house is likely to burn down if you dont have a major component replaced. The TV is not to be used until the part is replaced. Oh and we the company are not paying. It will cost you 1/4 the cost of the TV price to have it repaired. I bet it would hit the national news and every current affair program. Yet this happens all the time, we dont hear about it because these manufacturers dont shirk their responsibilities. They just go about fixing it.

And when did that come in? Long after Jabiru started, I suspect. OK, now for some maths - 3000 engines x (perhaps, on average) $3000 per engine = $9 million. How many owners do you think will get redress before Jabiru folds? And what support for the product do the owners have after that? If the TC holder folds, and nobody picks up the TC (and who would, with that sort of liability attached?) then will CASA cancel the Type Certificate? If so, all Jabirus will be grounded. Think it through . . .

 

 

Thats easy to say if you have deep pockets or are unaffected.Manufacturers know they have these obligations and if they are smart they price it in. I run my own business and we know exactly our refund rates and budgets, its priced into every transaction we make. Its not about crippling jab, its about jab knowing this was always a likely possibility and they would have both insurance and past profits to accommodate this..

 

If they dont they are very foolish. Its called product liability and recall insurance.

Have you ever tried to obtain this sort of cover for an aeronautical product? The Americans at least have a statute of limitations of 15 years on the manufacturer's liability - so the cost of 15 years' cover has to be added to the price of each item. Australia has no such limit, so the potential liability is open-ended. How do you build that sort of cost into the selling price?

The end result of this sort of legislation is inevitably that no Australian manufacturer will market his product - if it's in the consumer product category - in Australia - at anything like its real cost. Nor will anybody take on a franchise to import a product in this class; what you will end up with is "facilitators" who "help" purchasers to purchase directly from the overseas manufacturer, and the manufacturers will set up in countries whose legislation is more favourable - why do you think Cessna are now manufacturing the 162 in China?

 

This sort of legislation is of no real benefit to anybody but the lawyers, in the long run. It's actually self-defeating - but the consumer pays for it.

 

 

Under ACL they have certain obligations. These are private aircraft for consumers. Thus for any private owner there is a possible case under acl.http://www.productsafety.gov.au/content/item.phtml?itemId=983801&nodeId=34452c5e015282c3651c4e076ab001f2&fn=Product Safety - a guide for businesses and legal practitioners.pdf

Summary

 

A recall can be initiated by a supplier or ordered by a minister. Most Australian recalls are initiated by suppliers.

 

Suppliers should recall consumer goods as soon as they realise the goods:

 

• > may cause injury
   
   
   
   
  
• > do not comply with a safety standard, or
   
   
   
   
  
• > are banned.
   
  When a supplier initiates a recall, they must notify the Commonwealth minister within 48 hours of recalling the consumer goods. Failing to do so is unlawful.
   
  A minister can order a recall when the product poses a safety risk and the supplier is not prepared to recall the goods voluntarily.
   
  ACL reference: sections 128 and 201 (supplier-initiated recall); 122-127 (minister-ordered recall)
   
  When can a consumer seek compensation?
   
  A consumer can seek compensation from a manufacturer who has supplied defective goods, if the goods caused loss or damage.
   
  A manufacturer is a person or business that:
   
  > makes or puts goods together
   
   
   
   
  
• > has their name on the goods, or
   
   
   
   
  
• > imports the goods, if the maker of the goods does not have an office in Australia.
   
  ’Loss’ and ‘damage’ can include:
   
   
  

 

 

 

 

• > injuries to the person making the claim, or to another individual
   
   
   
   
  
• > economic loss caused by damage to, or destruction of another good, land, a building or a fixture.
   
   
  

 

 

The court will consider the safety of the goods by looking at all relevant circumstances, including:

 

• > marketing of the goods
   
   
   
   
  
• > packaging of the goods
   
   
   
   
  
• > the warnings and instructions for use
   
   
   
   
  
• > what may reasonably be expected to be done with the goods.
   
  If a person takes a manufacturer to court and wins, the court decides how much compensation is due.
   
  A consumer must take action within three years of becoming aware, or from when they should have become aware, of the alleged:
   
  > loss or damage
   
   
   
   
  
• > safety defect of the goods, or
   
   
   
   
  
• > identity of the person who manufactured the goods.
   
  They must also claim within 10 years of when the goods were originally supplied.
   
   
  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From

 

http://www.claytonutz.com.au/docs/ACL Guide manufacturers supplier_nov_2012.pdf

 

Under the ACL “goods” are defined to include:

 

• ships, aircraft and other vehicles;
   
   
  

 

 

The term “consumer goods” means goods that are intended to be used,

 

or are of a kind likely to be used, for personal, domestic, or household use or consumption, and (in circumstances where a recall action has occurred) includes any such goods that have become fixtures since the time

 

they were supplied. Unlike the term “consumer”, there is no upper monetary limit in the definitionof “consumer goods”.

Yes, let's destroy Australian industry. Then we can all go back to watching the footy.

 

 

An AD is issued by CASA under CASR Part 39; I suggest people look it up. It was inaccurate to title this thread "new through-bolt AD . . " because, as yet, it isn't an AD; it's a service bulletin. I do not know whether a Service Bulletin issued by an LSA manufacturer and graded by him as "Mandatory" has a similar legal weight for that manufacturer's LSA products, as one that is mandated by CASA for Type Certificated products, tho I'd not be surprised if that were the case.

 

None of this says anything about the wisdom of complying with it; one should normally think twice about ignoring a manufacturer's "mandatory" SB - tho I have to say that changing the nuts without doing anything else, sounds like re-arranging the deck chairs. What Oscar says is correct; there are many possible factors that can affect TB breakage, and all of them are aggravated by running at high manifold pressure.

 

The reason I asked whether it was really an AD, is because if it is, then the mechanism of an AMOC can come into play. Now go look that up on the CASA website.

 

 

As I understand there is no AD for LSA only service bulletins, as the manufacturer certifies the aircraft not Casa.

The Jabiru 2200J and 2200C are type-certificated engines, NOT LSA. So the SB is not mandated by an AD for those engines. I'm not sure of the legal position for the other series mentioned in the SB.

 

 

Is this an AD - i.e. has it been issued by CASA under CASR Part 39? - or is it simply a Service Bull Tin that Jabiru have classified as mandatory? Because if the latter, it's not mandatory under CASR Part 39.

 

 

To understand point 4, go look at CAR 262AN, and see how it translates if you substitute "Recreational aircraft" for "Limited aircraft" . The basis for CAO 95.55 is CAR 308 (it says so in the heading of CAO 95.55) - i.e. it's an exemption basis. If the basis changes to something like CAR 262AN, the basis is no longer exemption, but compliance - i.e. the whole movement moves much closer to the mainstream of aviation. And no, it's not clear, because the details will be in the procedures manuals that are required by the regulation. However, if there are to be no exemptions under CAR 308 or whatever, then the only way is to comply with the regulations, i.e. you move into the mainstream.

 

The document is a discussion paper, which means it is an advance warning of the way CASA is thinking. Jonathan Alec is the CASA Deputy Director (he was previously CASA chief counsel); he walks softly, but carries a very big stick. He may well be the next CASA Director, after the elections. RAA ignores it at its utmost peril.

 

Also, I suggest you look at points 11 and 12 in the paper - and read them in the converse. In fact, wherever the paper suggests what might happen, provided, you should read it as what will happen, unless . . .

 

The paper has a lot of politikspeak, and is very subtle in the way it says things, but if you read it as I suggest, you will start to see what it really means.

 

 

Try this:

 

1. RAAus must properly discharge its responsibilities under the regulations;

 

2. No privately-owned organisation acting in a public role should have a monopoly;

 

3. RAAus's subsidy is under review and will likely be dropped unless some other government agency is prepared to step in;

 

4. The exemption basis under CAO 95.55 will be replaced by a compliance basis under something similar to the regulation under which Limited category aeroplanes operate. (That means, inter alia, pilot licences, maintenance releases, etc)

 

 

Read this one very carefully, gentlemen. Think about what it says . . .

 

 

When are you people going to recognise that you have a fundamentally impossible situation? The structure of the association places professional staff who have responsibilities under the Civil Aviation regulations that are quite complex, under the control of elected representstives, most of whom are (by definition) amateurs with little or no detail knowledge of the regulatory constraints. This always produces a set of working conditions for the professionals that are intolerable; you need top calibre professionals - and they will not tolerate those working conditions (why should they?). RAA will never be able to acquire and keep the quality of professional staff it needs, because the fundamental structure of the organisation makes that impossible. The slippery dip has just about reached vertically down . . .