Dagnabit!

AuntPeggy

AuntPeggy

Final Approach
PoA Supporter
Joined
May 23, 2006
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8,479
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Oklahoma
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Namaste
We allowed three weeks for the WAAS upgrade before needing the plane to fly to our youngest kid's wedding.:dunno:

Well, already one week late, we are told it will be ready in another week!!!

Here I am trying to find airline tickets, or a rental plane, or a rental car at the last minute to get to Arkansas.

Or, if we can trust the plane to be:hairraise: ready when he says now, we can fly all night Thursday and arrive breathless and weary in time for the wedding on Friday.

aaargggh.
 
AuntPeggy said:
Or, if we can trust the plane to be:hairraise: ready when he says now, we can fly all night Thursday and arrive breathless and weary in time for the wedding on Friday. aaargggh.
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ooh, that doesn't sound like a very good idea! :eek:
 
I trusted a mechanic to get something done within 3 weeks of the promised time ... and ended up driving 1100 miles and working 5 hours in two days.
 
AuntPeggy said:
We allowed three weeks for the WAAS upgrade before needing the plane to fly to our youngest kid's wedding.:dunno:

Well, already one week late, we are told it will be ready in another week!!!
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*sigh*

I feel your pain.
 
Ken Ibold said:
Sorry for your frustration, Bill. What, 5 months now?
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Signed the contract November 30th, so yes, almost 5 months to the day.
Painting the right wing today, left one Monday, ground run mid next week.

Hopefully.
 
What I wonder is how much of it is contributed to lack of parts or supplies for the unexpected surprises versus putting your plane aside in order to take on other customers and make more money. He should be able to validate the former. The latter is just plain in considerate. If a mech or tech makes a commitment, they should keep it even if it means a few late nights.... short of a real surprise in accomplishing the work.
 
I was feeling just the same until I got this e-mail which I forwarded to the shop that put in the G-530.
I got your messages but I've been on the phone for the last 2 hours with various tech support people some related to your airplane.

I hate to tell you this but If you could make other arrangements to get to Oklahoma, I would do that. We found another large issue. I just cant believe that someone did this kind of work on the plane. While inspecting the wires in the GNS-530 connectors, one pin backed out of the socket. The pin was soldered into a crimp stlye pin. This is absolutly a no no. The pins are to be crimped using a Mil Spec special pin crimper. All of these pins are like this and need to be done over the right way. There is no was I can sign this off as airworthy if we dont do this. I am very distraught about this and I'm planning on calling Garmin to show them how this was installed because this person or shop should not be a Garmin dealer!! This is not good. I am sorry I cannot call you at the moment but I am typing at the same time as talking on the phone with Garmin.
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I wish he had sent the e-mail earlier. Now, I'm trying to slog my way through travelocity.
 
AuntPeggy said:
I was feeling just the same until I got this e-mail which I forwarded to the shop that put in the G-530.

I wish he had sent the e-mail earlier. Now, I'm trying to slog my way through travelocity.
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I gather all this as done before you purchased the bird?
 
Sorry to hear about your troubles. If you paid for the original install, you might see if your shop argues the point. I would expect the new shop will file an ASRS (or equivalent) report to document the fact that the previous workmanship was substandard.

Who knows, you might get some $$$ out. Regardless, I'd love to hear what (if anything) the original shop had to say, and would also appreciate the name, so I'd know to avoid them if in fact the installation was as alleged.
 
I, for one, am not surprised. Not at all. I had tales of woe with an original Garmin 430 install 7 years ago. I quickly came to the conclusion that SOME avionics shops are crooks.

As painful as it is, better for you to get it cleaned up now.

Knowing the size of the connectors, I would really like to know how someone managed to solder them in the first place.
 
wsuffa said:
Knowing the size of the connectors, I would really like to know how someone managed to solder them in the first place.
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I was thinking the same thing. I remember seeing the wiring harness for the Garmin stack that we put in the RV. We bought the radio stack 'pre-wired' and shipped to us from a reputable shop in Florida. The idea of getting a soldering iron in those SMALL multi-pin connectors without getting some cross-bleed would be difficult if not impossible!
 
CJones said:
I was thinking the same thing. I remember seeing the wiring harness for the Garmin stack that we put in the RV. We bought the radio stack 'pre-wired' and shipped to us from a reputable shop in Florida. The idea of getting a soldering iron in those SMALL multi-pin connectors without getting some cross-bleed would be difficult if not impossible!
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Generally the pins can be removed from the connector. It sounds to me like you are supposed to remove the pins and crimp them onto the wire followed by reinserting them into the connector. Instead the installer removed the pins from the connector and soldered the pins onto the wire instead of crimping them onto the wire. Personally--if they were soldered well I'd have no problem with it. But I suspect in the avionics business things are to be installed as per the manufactures instructions and there are no exceptions.

I suspect you probably get the pins from Garmin along with the connector. You crimp the pins to the wire and insert them into the connector. I could be wrong though--I've never seen any of the Garmin 430 hardware.

I don't know why you'd try to solder them. It'd be more work and crimping as per the instructions would be fast and strong. I've known some people though that refuse to crimp and always solder.
 
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If these are the standard round-barrel pins I'm thinking of, the only way to crimp them correctly is the mil-spec tool which basically crimps in 4-8 places simultaneously. I can see that if someone didn't have the tool, they'd think solder was a decent second choice, but it's nearly impossible to get a good solder joint in one of those things.

If I remember correctly, the crimper costs several hundred dollars. I distinctly remember a Chief Avionics Technician going absolutely nutso on the poor third class who was maintenance control for the day when one of the crimpers wasn't in the tool chest at the end of the day. They found it in one of the airplanes, fortunately away from any spaces where it could have been damaged or caused damage.
 
I'm holding my breath on an autopilot repair prior to Gaston's. I've been in the shop 2 1/2 weeks.
 
TMetzinger said:
If these are the standard round-barrel pins I'm thinking of, the only way to crimp them correctly is the mil-spec tool which basically crimps in 4-8 places simultaneously. I can see that if someone didn't have the tool, they'd think solder was a decent second choice, but it's nearly impossible to get a good solder joint in one of those things.

If I remember correctly, the crimper costs several hundred dollars. I distinctly remember a Chief Avionics Technician going absolutely nutso on the poor third class who was maintenance control for the day when one of the crimpers wasn't in the tool chest at the end of the day. They found it in one of the airplanes, fortunately away from any spaces where it could have been damaged or caused damage.
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The GPS installation was done by the shop that we used for all our repairs and annuals at the time. The chief mechanic had left the shop shortly before the installation, but the guy who installed the GPS was still someone we knew.

For some reason, the owner of the shop that did the install thinks that his ex-chief did the install and forwarded my email to him. As a result, we heard from him this morning. After explaining the entire series of problems the new shop found along with the problem of the soldered wires, he said, "Ah yes, I had the only crimper in the shop and I took it with me." Which explains why the connectors were soldered.:no:

Anyway, the first maintenance shop stopped doing annuals and now we have followed the original chief mechanic to his new shop, so he will get a good look at everything during the annual.
 
jesse said:
I don't know why you'd try to solder them. It'd be more work and crimping as per the instructions would be fast and strong. I've known some people though that refuse to crimp and always solder.
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You crimp, because they come loose if soldered. We had one come loose during flight awhile back and the same guy who soldered it in the first place "repaired" the connection by soldering it again. Another one came loose during the upgrade, which is how they came to find that all the connectors were soldered instead of crimped.

I'm glad they found it. The thought of being in the soup and losing my radios and GPS is not entertaining.
 
AirBaker said:
I guess my post to your previous thread, is answered here.
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I guess so. We're leaving today in a giant tube and will return Monday/Tuesday midnight. Gift wine for the bridal party goes into checked baggage along with deodorant > 3 oz.

BTW, the original shop has apologized and offered to pay.
Sorry to have involved [mechanic] in this issue I did not realize this work was done after his departure from [original shop] and did not involve him in any way. My error sorry! Tell me how much [new shop] has invested in fixing these connections and I will compensate you.
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AuntPeggy said:
I guess so. We're leaving today in a giant tube and will return Monday/Tuesday midnight. Gift wine for the bridal party goes into checked baggage along with deodorant > 3 oz.

BTW, the original shop has apologized and offered to pay.
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Kudos to a stand up shop owner! That's a rare treat to find.

Enjoy the trip and be safe. Best wishes to the Bride and other affected party.
 
AuntPeggy said:
You crimp, because they come loose if soldered. We had one come loose during flight awhile back and the same guy who soldered it in the first place "repaired" the connection by soldering it again. Another one came loose during the upgrade, which is how they came to find that all the connectors were soldered instead of crimped.

I'm glad they found it. The thought of being in the soup and losing my radios and GPS is not entertaining.
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There are times to crimp. There are times to solder. It just really depends. The strength of the solder is very dependent on several different variables. The strength of the crimp--is pretty straight forward.

I wasn't saying that you shouldn't crimp these wires. You should crimp these wires. They were trying to solder into a connector that was made to be crimped. That's no good.
 
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