.....Oh, and before anybody starts rattling their cages about me not blaming the mods....

I will point out, again, I ain't smart enough to "blame" any of the myriad factors in play.

Frankly, I don't really care who's "fault" it is.

I'm just kicking around ideas with much more knowledgable folks (yall) in hopes of finding potential corrective action.

It could be that all I can do is remove the mods. If that's the case, they'll be off like a prom dress.

However, if there is something that can be done which would allow me to SAFELY fly with my hoopty-toys....I'd kinda like to explore those options.

Make sense?

Cole

Cole,

I re-read my message and it sounded a little pointed. I apologize. I did not intend to be advesarial.

Cole

Take attention to the items you discovered with a good IA. Make corrective repairs based on good airframe practices. Fly the airplane within the limitations stated in the STC for the mod's.

If you have to do anything it would probably be remove the winglets. The NTSB may find that mixing STC's may be ................, but who knows. There are lots of Skymasters flying with extended wing tanks and lots with winglets but very few with both. Removing the winglets would be the least amount of pain.

Just some thoughts.

No doubt.
I have three a&p's (two are IA's) digging around in her.

They started today and the FAA Accident Investigator is already calling to see what they are finding. I have a hunch he may come take a look, himself.

I'm a teensy bit surprised Aviation Enterprises hasn't sent a rep to take a peek and get out ahead of this. Oh well, I offered.

Yeah, if I gotta choose, I'll lose the winglets and go with some "knots-2-u" tips

we shall see what tomorrow brings. As I said, wish me luck.

Cole

Well....
Still no word on my bird.
But given the established history of fate having a very uncomfortable fetish for doing things to me....I have a hunch it wont hurt to do some contengency planning...just in case I gotta lose my winglets. :(
I know I could always put the factory tips back on. I could also put OEM Firestones back on my truck, but that aint gonna happen (Micheline's are sooooo much better).
By that same reasoning, I'm looking for the BEST option.
I checked out the knots-2-u wingtips. They sound great...but naturally are not available for the 337.
I looked into the Met-co-aire Hoerner Tips. They sound great...but naturally are not available for the 337.
Anybody have any other suggestions?

Again. I dont know that I gotta remove the winglets. Simply planning ahead. It gives me something to do to keep my mind off of the inspection in progress.

Cole

we don't need ostrich management
 

why is owen bell not posting information? to me that would reduce all the
speculation and rumors. he may not have all the answers; but he is close to the
source. he needs to step up and communicate!

Cole
The only choices I know of are the factory tips or Horton Stol wing tips. The Horton tips are fiberglass and $1600 a pair. If you still have factory tips that would make the most sense until all the smoke clears.

Rick
Owen is working with the NTSB investigation and probably is best that he doesn't say anything until the smoke clears too.

It should also be noted that my extended tips and winglets were both installed by Owen, 10 years / 766 flight hours ago.

I told that to the FAA Investigator, but don't recall having mentioned it in any thread.

Admittedly, I fly like a rookie scaredy-cat cuz my boss likes smooth rides ( climb at 110, don't touch the gear under 500 agl in climb-out, break-check and gear d/l-green, try to avoid anything more than 10-degree banks, avoid anything more than light turbulance, avoid anything that registers on either of my radars, 500fpm decents, when I turn that's ALL I'm doing, I only fiddle with stuff when I'm wings level, GUMPS checks on approach AND on downwind AND on base AND on final, completely sterile cockpit under 1,000 AGL, and I'm FULLY configured BEFORE turning final. Yeah, flying with me is boring. But I already got my airplane crash merrit-badge and have no use for an oak-leaf cluster.

But I have no idea how the previous owner flew it....I've only been involved with it for the past 9 months and it's only been in my possession for the past 2 months.

Soooo..... Even with stacked mods and a decade of flying, it seems to have held together. And while there is some deformaty, it's minor enough to warrent further investigation and not merely write it off at a glance.

Owens shop has done a LOT of work to my plane. It's actually less of a "Cessna 337" and more of an "Aviation Enterprises 337". Again, much of the work pre-dates me, but we've had them do a LOT since we bought her.

Although Owen doesn't over emphasize PR at Aviation Enterprises, the workmanship and attention to detail demonstrated by his crew are commendable.

In short, I wouldn't be too hasty to question the value of what Aviation Enterprises does for our rarified fleet.

Anybody can have a problem....it's how they respond to the problem that reveals their character.

We'll see what happens.

Patiently waiting....

Cole

that is fine; however he should have said so. it leaves very little creditability to have someone
else suggest this (not much more than a rumor). i have had his mods for many years and could not be more pleased. rick

I wonder if anyone knows if the european phantom 337 with the wing root problem that predicated the entire Cessna SID fiasco, had any tip or tank mods?

That was so long ago, the tips were not available then. I am not certain about Flint tanks being available at that time.

Don't forget, Friends, the same basic airplane as the 337 are the O-2s that proved immensley tough in Vietnam! As originally built these planes are tough birds!!

Alrighty, then....

I told yall I'd let you know what my tech found out when they inspected my wing. Here is what they said:

"Tell everyone you know that has wing mods from this company to get their wings inspected ASAP."

They said that you can deal with a bad this or that....but you cant deal with a wing that falls off.

So...what did they see? Yall saw the pick I sent. A couple of smoking rivets and some minor disfiguring of the top skin.

Inside there were many MANY more smoking rivets. Bent stringers. Cracked mountings. all of which could be attributed to the stacked mods (extensions AND winglets).

However, they said that their primary concern was the workmanship (which has nothing to do with stacking mods). They said that 3/4 of the screws that they could see that were holding the extension to the original had no nut and no nut plate. They were simply relying on the threads contacting the skin.....they dit not like that at all. Additionally, the cap-stringer (the last orignial stringer to which the wing extension abuts) didnt quite mate to the extension perfectly, so whoever installed it had used a pair of pliars to rip the "lightning hole" to enlarge it to allow passage of one of the lines. All of which are text-book no-no's and very bad from their point of view.

I asked the crew chief what I should do, he said, "Call Carlie Emering at the FAA, he already has the info and is VERY concerned." I called Charlie, and he expressed his concerns very professionally and diplomaticly, but made his point very clear. "Tell everyone you know that they REALLY should take CE-10-20 extremely seriously."

I asked him what I should do about my plane. He told me to call Harry Sunderland at Cessna. They are trying to develope a uniform fix as opposed to having A&P's all over the country dream up their own solutions.

So thats where I am. Grounded. With very significant safety concerns.

Naturally, everyone must choose for themselves how seriously they want to take the issue. I've paraphrased the hour of phone conversations I've had fairly accurately. But I cannot convey their tone very accurately. Suffice it to say, I recommend taking it very seriously.

No, the mods didnt cause the crash in NJ. But that crash did shine a light on something we needed to be aware of.

Plan accordingly.

Cole

So who installed the wing tips on your 337? Who signed off the FAA Form 337?

owen bell
October 24, 2000