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https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/eppages/superior08-11691.php

I was a career aircraft mechanic. Alternator brush wear and failure were the biggest problems with alternators. Not bearings, not rectifiers. Brushes. And that's because they are turning near redline most of the time, just like the aircraft's engine. They are geared or belted to that engine in a...

I once had a 1978 Dodge pickup (worst vehicle I ever owned, btw) that had the 225 Slant Six in it. The exhaust manifold cracked in a couple of places. I think a previous owner had "snugged-up" the nuts of the manifold studs, exactly the wrong thing to do there. The torque specs are fairly low...

Don't discount those temperature fluctuations, and try to understand the temperature gradients between parts. That exhaust system can glow red-hot at full climb power, so expansion and contraction are a big issue. The riser flange is bolted flat to the head, and the head conducts heat out of it...

I was fairly new at our little rural airport. One day I taxied the Champ to its tiedown after a flight and shut it down. A scruffy, older gentleman in a ragged logger-jacket came up to me, holding a Goodyear brake disc clip. "It fell off while you were taxiing," he said. He was about to pull out...

Such good inspections it was getting. The exhaust was one of the first things I looked at once the cowl was off and the oil draining. Cracks are common, some systems being worse than others, and I wanted to see if I would need to order new parts right away, or take off the cracked piece and send...

You figure that Arrowflyer86 can't visually tell the difference between 600 feet and 1600 feet? That's an inch of mercury.

That's what I did with my tailwheel students. The syllabus usually called for some upper air work first, including intentional spins (normal entry), slow flight, steep turns and the like, then off to the circuit ("pattern" for you "Murricans") for some takeoffs and landings. I usually had...

Making it simpler for the pilot usually means complicating the plumbing. The Bellanca Viking's system looks like this: The selector valve returns fuel to the tank it came from. Note that there is only one return from the engine; in the diagram above we see return lines from either Lycoming or...

Yeah, I've worked on a few airplanes for their new owners. Nice paint and upholstery and radios sure do sell, but they are sometimes just lipstick on a pig. I used to find some sick stuff that should have killed the deal if they'd had a proper prebuy done.

Is an "overexaggeration" worse than an "exaggeration?" Those of us who are mechanics know that most pilots would be shocked at what we find in airplanes. Are you a mechanic?

And yet, the annual requires inspections of "all systems," meaning that someone should be looking under that panel at the wiring and plumbing and instruments, including for signs of overheated connections due to loose hardware or corroded crimps, and that mag switch should be checked to see that...

The airframe manufacturers will usually issue an SB regarding issues with stuff they didn't build but installed in the aircraft, sometimes in the form of a Service Letter, like so: https://cessnaowner.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/ourpdf-2.pdf

The manufacturer's websites. For instance, McCauley props: https://mccauley.txtav.com/en/service-bulletins Amsafe seat belts/harnesses: https://www.amsafe.com/support/technical-documents/ United Instruments: https://www.unitedinst.com/ Marvel Schebler carburetors (including their predecessors...

And propellers. And magnetos and vac pumps and all sorts of other "appliances."

The exhaust system glows red hot at high power settings. I have seen it. A ruptured oil line is every bit as dangerous as a propane leak.

https://blog.ashcroft.com/absolute-vacuum-and-compound-pressure

The first Eviation Alice was an amazingly unworkable design. It started out as a trike, but morphed into a taildragger. I'd bet there were serious CG issues that would have prevented flight anyway. Almost all the mass there is behind the wing. The prop behind the tailwheel would soon get...

And he burned through $100 million, too.

Failure of the companies holding air conditioning STCs is one reason. We had to remove the compressor from a P210 because we couldn't get a new mounting bracket to replace the broken one. In Canada we could have had one made, at horrific expense. The laws here are tough on that stuff.