Cable Tracker

On Jan 1, 10:53*am, "RST Engineering" wrote:
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And it takes about 20% more time to do the wiring on a NEW airplane or a
COMPLETE REBUILD on an old one . . . . .
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An along about there Mr. Newbie shakes his head and sez, "Well, I can't see any way that you'd EVER need to re-wire some of them ol' birds," with the clear implication that, as a new owner of an old airplane he is liable to be practiced upon by one of them CERTIFIED fellers who are the only ones ALLOWED to touch his antique battle-damaged warbird.

He's wrong, of course.

Here... lookit this. It's what's left of a 1943 grommet. ("What IS
this stuff?" he asks.) Usta be rubber. No, not Neoprene -- RUBBER.
Came from a big plantation in AFRICA, not Brazil. Sixty years ago.
Sixty years, tucked into a hole in an aluminum bracket of a war-bird.
( This was a coupla years ago.) The 'rubber' is harder than a bride's
biscuits -- you can't even dent it with your thumb-nail. It dried
out, cracked, vibrated loose and left a small bundle of wires to
vibrate against the aluminum bracket, which they did for Heaven knows
how many hours... before it wore through the insulation, shorted out
and set the insulation on fire. Lotsa sixty year old white smoke but
that was about it, plus welding the wire to the bracket and blowing
the breaker. And no, this thing right here in my hand is NOT the
original grommet, it's the one next to it... there were about six of
them, all in this condition.

But here's the Lesson that goes with this little billy-dew: Almost
every piece of rubber in the whole damn plane is in similar condition.

(And here's another lesson: Where are you going to find someone to
rewire it? Because with that attitude of yours it sure as hell ain't
going to be me -- nor by any one I know, least ways not at this
airport :-)

-R.S.Hoover

PS -- Nope, I'm not an A&E. But neither are about 90% of the people
maintaining America's airplanes, from Piper 'Cubs' to Boeing 747's.
What they are, are guys working 'under instruction,' meaning there's a
certified Someone, somewhere out there on the hangar floor.
Bucking rivets, pulling wire, assembling an engine, replacing a
tire... all that sorta work. But don't expect to find 'Am Pan' on the
back of his coveralls nor anyone passing out 1099-R's neither.