c/avionics-technicians

Just heard a hangar rumor about counterfeit connector pins

I was grabbing parts in Tulsa last Tuesday and overheard a supply guy mention a batch of fake gold pins moving through two distributors. If those corrode or lose contact mid-flight, that's a nightmare we can't troubleshoot on the ramp. Has anyone else seen suspicious hardware lately, and what did you do to verify it before install?

0 comments

the_wendy•4d ago

Hit 500 wire terminations last month, here is what surprised me

I passed 500 terminations on a single 737 tray install last month. Everyone in the shop says you need 200 to feel comfortable. I felt solid at 150, actually. The surprise was my first 50 were cleaner than my last 50 because I stopped double-checking continuity. Has anyone else noticed their quality dips after a certain count?

1 comments

sandra_bennett59•4d ago

Hit 1,000 connector inspections today. Weird feeling.

Been tracking my daily checks in a little notebook since March. This morning I passed 1,000 terminated connectors inspected on the bench. Mostly D-sub pins and coax ends from the last batch of C-130 harnesses. Not one loose pin or cold solder joint found in the last 300. That surprised me. I guess all those years of tugging every wire finally paid off. Has anyone else kept count on something small and then realized how far you've come?

1 comments

rubyk26•5d ago

Two crimp tools, 12 years apart, and my bad habits finally broke

Back in 2008 I used a beat-up ratcheting crimper from my first shop in Houston, and I never thought twice about the way I staggered splices until last month at a retrofit job. I switched to a handheld indent tool from the other tech's box, and watching him land a tray of 22 gauge wires made me realize I had been doing the whole thing backwards for over a decade. Has anyone else upgraded tools and suddenly noticed their old hand motion was the real problem all along?

1 comments

wade871•5d ago

Warning: that cheap wiring harness tester cost me $460 in rework

I grabbed a no-name harness tester off Amazon for $130 to check some bundles on a King Air last month, figured it would save me a shop call. Turns out it missed a chafed pin that only showed up under vibration, and the owner found it during a preflight two weeks later. Anyone else had a budget tool bite them worse than the repair bill?

1 comments

ruby_henderson36•9d ago

Pro tip: heat shrink labels peel off connector hoods unless you rough them up first

I spent 3 hours redoing a harness in a Cessna 172 because every label I put on the backshells came off during a routine inspection last month. Turns out the teflon coated wire and the smooth connector surface just won't hold adhesive no matter how high end the label maker is. My fix is to scuff the hood area with 220 grit sandpaper and wipe it down with isopropyl before applying the label, then hit it with a clear heat shrink over the top. That combo has held through two line visits and a wash down so far. Anybody else run into this on the newer Garmin connectors or is it just me? What do you use for permanent identification that doesn't turn into a disaster?

0 comments

parker_palmer44•10d ago

Watch your crimp dies after heavy use, mine drifted 0.003 inches

I do D-sub and pin crimping daily at our shop in Tulsa. Last week I had a batch of connectors fail continuity checks on the bench. Turns out my main crimp die had worn unevenly after about 4,000 cycles. The tolerance drift was small but enough to make intermittent contact on vibration. I checked with a micrometer and compared against a known good die. How often do you guys calibrate or replace your crimp dies? I used to go until something broke, not anymore.

0 comments

riley_wood84•17d ago

Over-relying on self-tests is making us lazy troubleshooters

I keep seeing guys swap a box because the BIT says faulty, then it fails again on the bench. That test only checks half the channels, I learned that after chasing a ghost on a 737 in Atlanta for two days. Anyone else run into false positives from built-in tests that wasted your time?

1 comments

vera_lewis2•19d ago

The avionics test bench that lied to me last week in Phoenix

My IRU spin-up test on a 737 passed twice on the bench, then failed twice in the air over the same weekend, so which reading do you trust when the plane says one thing and the manual says another, has anyone else hit this split between ground checks and flight data?

0 comments

kim.jake•21d ago

Full harness tape or speed tape, picked wrong at 2 AM in Orlando

Had a cracked sensor housing on a ramp call and grabbed speed tape out of habit, then realized the vibration was gonna shred it before dawn. Swapped to the full harness wrap and it held fine, but now I'm curious, how many of you trust speed tape for anything past a quick grounding fix?

1 comments

tarabell•23d ago

Hit 500 test points logged this month without a single rework

Pulled up my ledger before clocking out Friday and there it was, 500 continuity checks with zero callbacks, and honestly that number felt bigger than any raise I've gotten, anyone else track test counts just to prove the boring stuff actually matters?

1 comments

wood.faith•26d ago

That retired F-16 guy in Tucson made me recheck my own wiring

Ran into this guy at a diner outside of Tucson, he flew avionics for the ANG for 22 years. We got to talking about wiring chafing, and he said something like, "The worst faults I ever found were the ones I was sure couldn't happen twice." That hit different because I spent three hours last week chasing a loose ground that I had sworn I torqued right. He went on to explain how he always double checks the last connector he touched before moving on, no matter how rushed he is. Since that conversation, I've started walking away from the bench for thirty seconds and coming back to verify my own work. It feels slow, but it caught a bad pin on a Cannon plug yesterday that would have cost me a return trip. Anyone else have a random chat that changed how you inspect your own installs?

1 comments

ray356•28d ago

A supervisor's one remark fixed my wire harness routine for good

Back in 2012 at a Mesa shop, I used to bundle wires tight with zip ties every few inches. An old inspector named Dale watched me for a minute and said, 'You're building a rod, not a harness.' He made me strip one section and flex it, the stiffness was obvious. I switched to lace cord with looser loops and more drip points, and we stopped seeing cracks in the Teflon runs during thermal cycles. Has anyone else gotten a comment like that that rewired their whole approach?

1 comments

the_wesley•29d ago

That old wiring harness smell made me question my test gear

Last month in Phoenix I pulled a harness out of a 1998 737 that had that burnt phenolic smell, real faint. My multimeter showed continuity fine, but I sent it to the shop anyway and the megger found a short at 47 volts. Has anyone else had a case where the standard checks passed but the high-pot test caught something the aircraft logbook said was cleared?

1 comments

rose_reed•1mo ago

That 16-hour wiring harness job on a CRJ-200 turned into a 3-day disaster

A loose cannon plug behind the avionics bay took 2 days to trace because the prints didn't match the actual pin layout, and I finally found it by checking resistance at the relay rack, so has anyone else had schematics that were flat wrong from the factory?

2 comments

victor_robinson•1mo ago

Pitot-static drain ports got clogged on a Gulfstream at KSDL

Ran into this last Thursday at Scottsdale Airport. The drain holes on the pitot mast were packed with some kind of bug nest, air data showed zero on the captain's side during preflight. Spent 45 minutes chasing it because the block was buried deep in the fitting. Now I blow through every drain port with compressed air and check with a pin on any aircraft that's been parked outside over a week. Has anyone else seen insect buildup cause flagged air data errors in dry climates?

1 comments

rowan969•1mo ago

Stop trusting those cheap pin testers on 28V DC feeds

I watched a guy last week at the Orlando hangar chase a ghost fault for 3 hours because his $15 pin tester showed 28V on a feed that was actually dead. The load was only 0.4A so the tester lit up fine, but the wire had a break under the bundle. How do you guys verify voltage on low-current loops without pulling the whole harness?

2 comments

charlescraig•1mo ago

Took me 14 years to try the dual-channel continuity trick on a Falcon 900

Every bench test I ever ran on the Collins radios used a single probe until a 4-hour wiring fault on a 2006 Falcon 900 forced me to test both channels at once, and the intermittent break showed up in 20 minutes, so has anyone else switched to that method or am I late to the party?

1 comments

ellis.faith•1mo ago

Hit 10,000 flight hours logged and it felt different than I expected

Crossed 10,000 hours on my logbook Tuesday during a routine pitot static check on a 737. Realized that milestone sneaks up on you when you're not chasing it, and now I'm wondering if anyone else stopped counting the big numbers and just started noticing the small stuff like harness runs and connector pins.

2 comments

wesley_jones•1mo ago

Radome paint stripping changed my lightning strike repairs entirely

Back in March I had a CRJ come in with a small burn mark near the static wick. We used to just feather out the paint and re-seal, but this time I stripped the whole radome section down to the base coat. The difference was night and day, the old paint was trapping moisture and hiding micro-cracks in the substrate. I re-did it with a two-part primer and now I'm checking every radome for that same issue. Has anyone else switched their repair process after pulling paint off and seeing what's underneath?

2 comments

olivia_moore•1mo ago

Rant: old lead asked if I even know what a transistor does, 8 years in

Been doing avionics bench work for 8 years now. Last month a senior tech with 30 years in watched me reflow a board and goes "you know what that part actually does, right?" in front of two apprentices. I said it switches current, he laughed and walked off. He never explained anything further, just that one line. Is it normal for old timers to gatekeep like that, or was I supposed to prove something I didn't ask about?

2 comments

paul_taylor21•1mo ago

Still think digital gauges are better than analog for troubleshooting

I pulled out the old analog multimeter last week on a 737 and found a intermittent ground fault in 10 minutes that my Fluke 87 missed for 2 hours. The needle bounce told me exactly what was happening. Has anyone else had better luck with analog tools on certain faults?

2 comments

wood.eric•1mo ago

The engineer who told me my wire routing was 'aerodynamically inefficient'

Had a QA guy in Fort Worth pull me aside last Tuesday and say my bundle ties were creating too much drag on a Gulfstream G550 belly panel. I've been doing this for 12 years and never once heard that from a real mechanic. Dude probably read one book and thinks he's smarter than the guys who actually fly these things. Anyone else deal with engineers who have never touched a plane giving you garbage advice?

2 comments

max_torres44•1mo ago

That $300 multimeter I bought off eBay was a total dud.

I picked up this used Fluke from a seller online thinking I was getting a steal for half the retail price. Got it in the mail and it looked fine on the outside but the readings were all over the place. I hooked it up to a known good power supply and it was showing 2 volts off. Tried calibrating it myself with the manual but that just made it worse. Ended up sending it to a shop and they said the board was fried inside. So now I'm out the $300 plus another $50 for the diagnostic fee. Has anyone else gotten burned buying used test gear from random sellers?

2 comments

spencer_park26•1mo ago

Bought a $90 coax crimper on Amazon and it stripped the dielectric on 3 fittings before I caught it

Picked up one of those cheap ratcheting crimpers last month to save some cash. First job was replacing a BNC connector on a Garmin GNS 530W antenna cable. On the third crimp I noticed the center pin was wobbly. Pulled it off and saw the crimp die was chipped, gouging the insulation. Cost me two more fittings and an hour of troubleshooting before I borrowed my buddy's $400 Daniels crimper. Anyone else get burned by budget tools on coax work?

2 comments