PA-28-R200 - Gear Transition Light

Lol. Try flying for a living with that ridiculous attitude.

I guess if you think the airplane runs on black magic, I could see that.
35+ years with this "ridiculous attitude" and it's been good, safe, decent $
As to the black magic I'm not too sure how to respond. ?
Good luck, hopefully you must have a tremendously fantastic superior Black magic. Attitudes like yours are the problem in our industry, you wouldn't fit well in our group, since all my people have what you deem "ridiculous attitude".
Disrespectful post my friend !!
 
The club has apparently spent a few grand trying to isolate what to repair and it's been an intermittent issue.

This is the rub. You will probably run into this everywhere you go. I certainly haven't been able to get away from it yet. Notwithstanding if any of you work somewhere that has good maintenance and wants to give me an internal rec, I'm all ears ;)

There are many excuses for not fixing something. Legally, I think you need to get this fixed because the warning system is part of the design and you can't just remove it. There are things which aren't required and could simply be removed, if so, placarding and securing might be appropriate. If someone challenges you on wanting it fixed, maybe ask and see if they are ok with simply removing the system in order to not get a false warning. The reaction should be telling.

I'm familiar with some Piper gear warning systems but not this one in specific. Ultimately, the system consists of some wires and microswitches, possible the pressure switch is involved? Intermittent problems stink, but that's not an excuse. Where are you going to draw the line, mr. PIC? I wish I had an easy answer but I don't. I do know that often mx shops have a pathetic lack of willpower to fix things.

Story time:
The mx shop sent back our only RG trainer. It was very difficult to start and something didn't seem right. One of the instructors took it out and said it felt like it was pulling a drag chute. I looked at it and sent it back to mx, it was clearly not producing full power. We sent it back, they sent it back, etc. Finally they told the most jr. instructor just to take it flying. Knowing that it was producing only a fraction of it's rated power, I sent out an urgent emailing stating that no one should take the airplane flying no matter what anyone said until it was fixed. But, but, the mechanics who walk on water said it's good. But, but, all commercial and CFI candidates depend on this one airplane and it's causing a nightmare for everyone. Too bad. I said it's not flying until its fixed. Mind you, I was a senior flight instructor, not the director, or anything of the sort, but I wasn't going to back down. Finally, the shop learned that the last work they had done (install the dual mag) was done improperly. The gear was not aligned and the timing was wrong, result in a huge power loss and the difficulty starting. They fixed it and sent it back. Personally, I don't think that mechanic should be allowed to continue to hold his certificate after pressuring a jr. CFI to take the airplane after he had induced a dangerous fault making it unsafe to fly. Unfortunately, that CFI is still PIC and the buck has to stop with the PIC. This can't be overstated. Don't let people push you around. In the end I was the director so I didn't have any say in whether we continued to do business with that shop.
 
If they’ve already troubleshot switches and wiring, they probably need to go through the system and rebush and rebolt everything and rig from zero. If it’s not hitting the switch every time something is probably worn and that slop means it doesn’t always get full travel depending on air loading, g-loading, temperature, phase of the moon. We had similar issues on my Navajo, did that and it worked flawlessly for a long time. Then someone else tried that and screwed it all up but that’s a story for another time.
 
Yea, as planes get older, everything gets a bit loose. It could also be that the gear swings fine, but then after 30-45 minutes the pressure bleeds off and the gear sags a little. You'd probably get a cycling of the gear pump in that case.

This is one of those instances they need to go through the gear, check the tensions/clearances and put it on jacks for a couple hours to see how it behaves.

Bonanza/Baron gear is all electric/mechanical (rumor has it the electric motor once powered turrets in WW2 aircraft. One of the common problems is a sagging gear door, so your normal wrench starts tightening everything up without bothering to read the book. Once you start messing with adjustments without following the book, everything gets messed up in a hurry and you basically have to re-rig the gear from scratch.

As far as engines...these engines designs are all 60+ years old. They have been completely vetted and their behavior is well known. If something isn't right, there is a REASON it's not right. Had a local guy fuss with his Lyc O-360. Said it was hard starting. There is no O-360 on the planet that is set up correctly that is hard starting. He had gone through a few mechanics at this point, and I told him start looking for an intake leak. Sure enough....everyone else had missed it.
 
Part 91 is a LITTLE bit different. You get a little bit of wiggle room to inop something if it's not required by type of operation (my Bonanza POH has a chart in the front, for example.)

But yea, it's not meant as a "ahh, don't worry about that...it never worked" or "it always does that" kind of thing.
 
Um, if it is doing something it shouldn’t do, it gets written up.

Source: flies for living.


Wow, didn't know we were the only shop with an MEL, CDL and NEF and a telephone to call the manufacturer for engineering orders.

35+ years with this "ridiculous attitude" and it's been good, safe, decent $
As to the black magic I'm not too sure how to respond. ?
Good luck, hopefully you must have a tremendously fantastic superior Black magic. Attitudes like yours are the problem in our industry, you wouldn't fit well in our group, since all my people have what you deem "ridiculous attitude".
Disrespectful post my friend !!
You must not fly to make money. Airplanes need to move and if it's not all that important it usually has relief. Logbook entry, mx review, sticker and away you go. With broken items. So dangerous. I crossed the pacific once with an IDG deferred! GASP!

The Black magic refers to not understanding your systems to the point that you wouldn't be comfortable with deferred mx. You going to cancel a flight because a light just came on, it's been confirmed it's a sensor, deferred, and a new one is days away? But you didn't learn the system well enough to understand what the O and M sections even really mean? Good luck with that.
 
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