Possible Piper AD

Its written in the AD you linked:

(2) Before further flight after completing the action in paragraph (g)(1) of this AD, calculate the factored service hours for each main wing spar using the following formula: (N × 100) + [T-(N × 100)]/17 = Factored Service Hours, where N is the number of 100-hour inspections and T is the total hours TIS of the airplane.
 
Its written in the AD you linked:

(2) Before further flight after completing the action in paragraph (g)(1) of this AD, calculate the factored service hours for each main wing spar using the following formula: (N × 100) + [T-(N × 100)]/17 = Factored Service Hours, where N is the number of 100-hour inspections and T is the total hours TIS of the airplane.

Thanks.... I went to a state school... :p
 
Might want to ask if the Piper Service Bulletin has been accomplished. The AD is just proposed at this point.
 
Look for one less than 5000 hours, just how many hours are on the one you are looking at?
 
Looking at the proposal, some places say 5,000 hours and in the examples, it states "factored service hours", and if the plane hasn't been used for training 12,100 hours becomes 711 factored service hours, so if the plane hasn't been used in flight training alot, it would take a long time to get to 5000 factored hours
 
I would not buy a PA28 right now..... that’s like buying PG&E stock today.
 
Look for one less than 5000 hours, just how many hours are on the one you are looking at?

Not necessary if it has not had a lot of 100 hour inspections. Our Warrior has 5200 hours and has had 34 100 hr inspections in the past which makes somewhere around 3500 hours factored time in service.
 
Based on what information do you say that?

Based on the fact the FAA is trying to rake the airframe over the coals. You can try and act like it won’t do anything, but you and I both know that if you try and sell your plane and it has not received this AD inspection, any buyer with more brains than money would balk.
 
My little piper has 3001 total hours, and NO 100 hr inspections.... The wing spars are corrosion free, and tight.... NOT ready to go do the NDI inspection for the rest of the time I own the plane!.... Hope that will be 30 years.
 
Based on the fact the FAA is trying to rake the airframe over the coals. You can try and act like it won’t do anything, but you and I both know that if you try and sell your plane and it has not received this AD inspection, any buyer with more brains than money would balk.

There is no AD, only a Service Bulletin currently. With our plane the AD would consist of the I/A calculating the factored time in service and signing the airplane as air worthy. End of story.

We are selling the plane to a club. We are having the SB done. If nothing shows up the deal will happen.
 
For the purposes of this calculation is an annual inspection equivalent to a 100Hr inspection?
 
For the purposes of this calculation is an annual inspection equivalent to a 100Hr inspection?

The way I read it, no. And therein lies the problem. Using a 100hr inspection as a means of determining what an airframe has been through in a prior life is poor at best. The flight school local to me does annual inspections every 100 hours and as the AD is written, their airplanes would be able to be treated the same as ones that were never operated for hire.
 
I would not buy a PA28 right now..... that’s like buying PG&E stock today.

PG&E stock... they are not going anywhere, they have a long history with Gain Newsom who has been very friendly to them and took a lot of campaign money from PG&E and many of its top executives...? Wait until they drop to $2.50 a share and buy.. it will only go up from there.

PA28 on the other hand... think I am going to hold off on this for a while to see where the dust settles...
 
PG&E stock... they are not going anywhere, they have a long history with Gain Newsom who has been very friendly to them and took a lot of campaign money from PG&E and many of its top executives...? Wait until they drop to $2.50 a share and buy.. it will only go up from there.

PA28 on the other hand... think I am going to hold off on this for a while to see where the dust settles...

I guess we will see where they end up after the BK is settled.....
 
The way I read it, no. And therein lies the problem. Using a 100hr inspection as a means of determining what an airframe has been through in a prior life is poor at best. The flight school local to me does annual inspections every 100 hours and as the AD is written, their airplanes would be able to be treated the same as ones that were never operated for hire.

By contrast our Warrior had a slew of 100 hour inspections done and signed by an A&P and then an annual sign off on the same day and tach time by an I/A.
 
By contrast our Warrior had a slew of 100 hour inspections done and signed by an A&P and then an annual sign off on the same day and tach time by an I/A.

It happens. My friend has an Archer with a couple 100 hour inspections in the logbook for the same reason despite the very low total time. Thankfully in his case the total time is so low and the number of 100 hour inspections are so few that it won't be much of a detriment when it comes time to sell but it is still going to be a factor.

I really hope that the FAA and Piper come up with a better solution for determining when to perform this inspection if it becomes an AD.
 
It happens. My friend has an Archer with a couple 100 hour inspections in the logbook for the same reason despite the very low total time. Thankfully in his case the total time is so low and the number of 100 hour inspections are so few that it won't be much of a detriment when it comes time to sell but it is still going to be a factor.

I really hope that the FAA and Piper come up with a better solution for determining when to perform this inspection if it becomes an AD.

I did some figuring using the formula. If the plane has another 5000 hours put on it with no 100 hour inspections it will never trigger the additional inspection.
 
So to add to this, where would a 50 hour inspection lie.... that is about 6 of them in one year.. would it be safe to say this would be treated as 3 100 inspections?
 
I did the math on my Cherokee today. It was used as a trainer extensively in the first 20 years of its life, and it has had a fairly leisurely life since then. It has about 6100 hours and 40 100-hour inspections. This came out to about 4118 factored hours, which doesn’t sound great. Interestingly enough, if you use a little algebra and assume 100 hours a year in the future, it will be at the factored service life of 5000 hours in about 149 years. If my math is correct, the sky is not falling.
 
Mine is at almost 5900 hours and comes to a factored life of 2200. If they leave it as is I will be happy.
 
Buy a Cherokee made at Lock Haven. None have failed wings.

More King Air wings have fallen off than Cherokee!!
 
Buy a Cherokee made at Lock Haven. None have failed wings.

More King Air wings have fallen off than Cherokee!!

When did the stop making them in Lock Haven? I know there was a flood there in 1972.... Hurricane Agnes, that made them move some of the production to Flora - duh! and the Tomahawks were the last plane built there.. did they keep the PA28 there until the end as well?
 
There is no AD, only a Service Bulletin currently. With our plane the AD would consist of the I/A calculating the factored time in service and signing the airplane as air worthy. End of story.

We are selling the plane to a club. We are having the SB done. If nothing shows up the deal will happen.

To tie up a loose end. SB1244c was performed on our Warrior by an A&P I/A that the club we're selling to chose. We closed on the sale Tuesday afternoon. We subtracted the cost of performing the SB form the price and closed at $39k. 1976 Warrior with 5200TT and 1500 on the engine, no ADSB out and a Garmin 430W
 
When did the stop making them in Lock Haven? I know there was a flood there in 1972.... Hurricane Agnes, that made them move some of the production to Flora - duh! and the Tomahawks were the last plane built there.. did they keep the PA28 there until the end as well?
PA-28s were never built at Lock Haven. Piper already had a development center at Vero Beach, and the factory there was built in 1960, specifically for Cherokee production. All PA-28s have been built there, other than those assembled under license in South America.
 
NTSB has weighed in on the proposed AD - they are suggesting a much smaller footprint of aircraft in scope - Removes every fixed gear, 4 cylinder PA 28. Also they mention the risk of the bolt removal vs. the potential gain from the inspection. Lastly, they point out some of the limitation of the FAA formula.

So Piper is against it, NTSB is against it, except in limited circumstances.. I really hope this gets modified and cools the hype.
 

Attachments

  • National_Transportation_Safety_Board Wing Spar Inspection.pdf
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NTSB has weighed in on the proposed AD - they are suggesting a much smaller footprint of aircraft in scope - Removes every fixed gear, 4 cylinder PA 28. Also they mention the risk of the bolt removal vs. the potential gain from the inspection. Lastly, they point out some of the limitation of the FAA formula.

So Piper is against it, NTSB is against it, except in limited circumstances.. I really hope this gets modified and cools the hype.

I've been sayin the same sh--t since this started. Some bureaucrat parrots what I say and the argument is all of a sudden worthy of attention. Plagiarism is what this is. I'm suing. LOL
 
Its written in the AD you linked:

(2) Before further flight after completing the action in paragraph (g)(1) of this AD, calculate the factored service hours for each main wing spar using the following formula: (N × 100) + [T-(N × 100)]/17 = Factored Service Hours, where N is the number of 100-hour inspections and T is the total hours TIS of the airplane.

Something seems wrong with this formula... Is the FAA saying inspections and not time are making our planes less safe? because that's what the math says.

My privately operated 1986 PA-28 with 200 hours per year and a 4 lapsed annual every year resulting in 25 inspections in 33 years has a factored service hours of 2647.
My privately operated 1994 PA-28 with 200 hours per year over 25 years receiving only annuals has a factored service hours of 2647.
My for hire 1994 PA-28 with 200 hours per year that spent the first 10 years privately operated receiving a total of 40 inspections has a factored service hours of 4058.
My for hire 1994 PA-28 with 200 hours per year over 25 years receiving both annuals and 100-hours has a factored service hours of 5000.
My for hire 2002 PA-28 with 250 hours per year over 16 years receiving both annuals and 100-hours has a factored service hours of 5000.

Note the oldest plane is 33 years old is 8 years older than the next 3 and 16 years older than the last plane but it has the same or lower number of factored service hours in its life span despite having the same total number of hours as the 1994.

The newest plane is 8-16 years younger than the other 4, has flown 1,000 less total hours in 16-17 years of service at only 4000 hours but has a factored service hours that is 25% higher than actual time flown which is nearly double the factored service hours of the plane that is twice its age and has 1000 more flight hours.

For that matter, if I fly my privately operated 1994 PA-28 for 5000 hours and have 0x 100 hour inspections done and then sell my plane to a flight school who immediately does a 100 hour in order to put it on their flight line, the factored service hours immediately jumps to from 2647 to 2741 hours without having actually flown a single hour more, all because an additional inspection was performed.

All of this because of a PA-28R that had an inflight wing separation resulting in a deadly crash during a commercial checkride at a school that was on an Approved Progressive Maintenance Plan so it isn't even doing 100-hour inspections.

I also read that the NTSB has attributed the accident to metal fatigue of a bolt which affixes the wing to the aircraft. That said bolt showed no sign of visual corrosion or pre-existing damage and that cracks in the same bolt in another PA-28R owned by the same school and identified as potentially at risk were only detected thanks to eddy current inspection which involves observing the electromagnetic properties of a surface for minute disruptions in the flow of current to find microscopic cracks and impurities.

Based on the fact the FAA is trying to rake the airframe over the coals. You can try and act like it won’t do anything, but you and I both know that if you try and sell your plane and it has not received this AD inspection, any buyer with more brains than money would balk.

The FAA has tried before and this isn't the first PA28R to have an inflight wing separation. It happened back in the 80's or 90's I think but no one could conclusively determine the precise cause of the wing separation (which is still the case with this latest incident; they know the how but not the why) nd a lack of further findings in inspections to comply with an AD issue at that time, the AD was ultimately rescinded.


NTSB has weighed in on the proposed AD - they are suggesting a much smaller footprint of aircraft in scope - Removes every fixed gear, 4 cylinder PA 28. Also they mention the risk of the bolt removal vs. the potential gain from the inspection. Lastly, they point out some of the limitation of the FAA formula.

So Piper is against it, NTSB is against it, except in limited circumstances.. I really hope this gets modified and cools the hype.

Again the cracks found on this bolt are so microscopic it takes eddy current inspection to find... Stressing the bolt with metal on metal hits with a wrench or other tools and torquing of the bolt in removal and reinstallation, seems like a sure fire way to create microscopic cracks to me.
 
Small nit pick: The spar, not the bolt, is where the crack propagated. But who cares, distinction without difference as far as the real issue at hand here is....

So it sounds to me like the so-called Progressive Maintenance Plan didn't quite work out the way FAA intended when it comes to letting greedy piggy ERAU to operate on their own... recognizance, to pick a fitting euphemism. Socializing losses for the rest of us.

So far all the chicken littles on the piper board that have preemptively done the inspection in accordance to the not-even-finalized-yet AD proposal (<---not all baby turtles make to the ocean kinda thing, chicken littles will do what chicken littles do), have come out negative on the inspection. This is gonna end up going the same way the 1980s wing pulling one did. The only question for me is whether the FAA will take ERAU to task by giving them a shave, especially in this economically exploitable environment of airline aspirant oversupply. You gotta hit 'em where it hurts: the wallet. Otherwise they'll never change.
 
NTSB’s proposal isn’t too left field. A PA-28R operated by Joe Typical will not have the same stress issues that a ERAU PA-28R will have over its life.

I’ve done and seen some crazy a$$ maneuvers in a university PA-28R. This AD carved down to addressing only flight school PA-28 and 32s might not be a bad idea. The complex trainer market is dying off. So the economic damage will be limited.

I could very well see ERAU and other large schools going to a 100% fixed gear single engine fleet soon. Especially since this issue seems to be majority retract Pipers.
 
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I could very well see ERAU and other large schools going to a 100% fixed gear single engine fleet soon. Especially since this issue seems to be majority retract Pipers.
At our home field, Lufthansa-owned Airline Training Center Arizona is phasing out its F33A Bonanzas in favor of new Cirrus SR20 and SR22 aircraft.
 
And on the OEM side I fully expect piper to mothball the arrow for good, with said drop in demand from the training market. It was a good run for the arrow, that's for sure. All comes to an end. C'est la vie.
 
And on the OEM side I fully expect piper to mothball the arrow for good, with said drop in demand from the training market. It was a good run for the arrow, that's for sure. All comes to an end. C'est la vie.

I'm surprised the Arrow has been kept in production this long. For the most recent decade of stats available from GAMA (ending in 2017), Piper produced a total of only 37 Arrows in ten years.

In that same ten year period it produced 138 Seneca twins and 172 Seminole twins.


A while back I tried to make the case the retractable piston single airplane is an endangered species.

https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/com...ed-species-retractable-piston-singles.102288/

I don't see anything has changed in that outlook. As an example, year-over-year, Piper's production of piston Malibus dropped to 9 in 2017, from 26 the year before. At the same time turboprop Meridians increased from 34 to 47 planes.

The Arrow has had a very good 50+ year run indeed. But all things, except taxes and FAA regs, come to an end eventually.
 
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PG&E stock... they are not going anywhere, they have a long history with Gain Newsom who has been very friendly to them and took a lot of campaign money from PG&E and many of its top executives...? Wait until they drop to $2.50 a share and buy.. it will only go up from there.
That sounds a whole lot like what I thought about GM back before 2008/2009. A few hundred AMUs later, I changed my mind about stocks that aren't going anywhere.

That was the dumbest play I ever did, and hopefully, I never do a dumber one.
 
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