AdamZ
Touchdown! Greaser!
- Joined
- Feb 24, 2005
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- Montgomery County PA
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Display name:
Adam Zucker
I was reading the Mike Busch thread and it reminded me of a question I've had for a while regarding What I'll call engine facts and myths. The biggest is with regard to TBO.
So Who came up with the concept of TBO and when and why? I'd think that TBO is a good way for Mx shops and engine manufacturers to keep selling their services and products. But is could also be an important safety concept. Not knowing enough about the subject I can't say. But similar to my thread regarding statistics in over water flights there have to be numbers behind the concept of TBO. Did one of the manufacturers find that a large percentage of their engines fail after a certain number of hours or a certain number of years in service ( or out of service as the case may be)? Did a metallurgist opine that the metal that the engine was made of would begin to show stress fractures after a certain number of hours at a certain temp? Or did some corporate type guy say if our engines last indefinitely that will be bad for business or we need to do something to limit or shed or liability in case of a failure.
Getting back to my thread on statistics of over water flights, I would think that somewhere there is a body of statistics that show how many engines that reach TBO and are flown past TBO fail and at what point.
I guess my question comes down to are we all just drinking the coolaide or are we being truly safety conscious pilots?
So Who came up with the concept of TBO and when and why? I'd think that TBO is a good way for Mx shops and engine manufacturers to keep selling their services and products. But is could also be an important safety concept. Not knowing enough about the subject I can't say. But similar to my thread regarding statistics in over water flights there have to be numbers behind the concept of TBO. Did one of the manufacturers find that a large percentage of their engines fail after a certain number of hours or a certain number of years in service ( or out of service as the case may be)? Did a metallurgist opine that the metal that the engine was made of would begin to show stress fractures after a certain number of hours at a certain temp? Or did some corporate type guy say if our engines last indefinitely that will be bad for business or we need to do something to limit or shed or liability in case of a failure.
Getting back to my thread on statistics of over water flights, I would think that somewhere there is a body of statistics that show how many engines that reach TBO and are flown past TBO fail and at what point.
I guess my question comes down to are we all just drinking the coolaide or are we being truly safety conscious pilots?