And the potential for major issues and or crashes cannot be overemphasized…
Earlier this month, it was discovered that thousands of engine part certifications supplied by AOG had been falsified. On Sept. 20, The London High Court issued a ruling that gives the company 14 days to hand over details on any CFM56 and CF6 parts it acquired and sold, along with relevant supporting paperwork. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed Sept. 7 by CFM and its co-owners, GE Aerospace and Safran, against AOG Technics and its founder, Jose Zamora Yrala.
Full article, HERE.
In addition to the commercial airlines, this also has the potential to impact the Navy P-8 program, which also uses those engines…
I’d be thinking twice before I climb on an airplane until this one is resolved…
Just sayin…
Let the firing squad be composed of aircrews.
Chineseium crap. Sounds like it’s widespread. Gonna be a while to sort this mess out. Rolls Royce or Pratt and Whitney engines anyone?
I’ve been wondering when this would happen. I predicted this years ago when I learned that Dubai was buying up Fixed Base Operators around the US and that they also had partnerships with China.
I decided quite awhile ago to quit flying. My reasons were the safety issues and the uncleanness of the cabins. If the airlines don’t keep the cabins clean then how much care is taken to the engines and the rest of the plane?
You’re not kidding about cleanliness:
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/vomit-plane-seats-air-canada-b2407488.html
I have many many reasons for never wanting to fly again. The industry just keeps giving me more.
Re safety: Look up the term “Tofu-Dreg Construction” on YouTube.
Here’s a sample: https://is.gd/nQouJq
(youtube video: s-2DtL-Wjkc if the is.gd url shortener is acting up for you.)
I had a metallurgy prof in engineering school in the 1980s who said “we have about 50 years of cheap steal left until the buildup of tramp elements in global steel recycling contaminate everything.”
We’re starting to see it now:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1016/S1006-706X(15)30043-1
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921344921006807
This is what ALWAYS happens if you do business with China.
In ANY industry where there are safety issues, Chinese owned or partnered companies need to be banned, and imports of those parts from China need to be banner – under penalty of death.
Honestly? If it was up to me I would put a ban on all trade with China and be done with it. Barring that, 1000 percent tariff.
The Chinese ALWAYS CHEAT and ALWAYS LIE.
It’s their culture.
I worked on what was euphemistically called balance of plant “design finalization” for the Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear power plant. As part of that I was loaned out a few times to work on the Chinese AP1000 plants. It was clear that the Chinese were going to take everything worthwhile and market the design separate from Westinghouse and Shaw as soon as possible. Sure as hell, when the plants were nearing completion, China started marketing a CP1400, the similarity in the names was not a coincidence.
Decades ago when US company owners were overjoyed with the profitability of canning US machinists and operators and shipping tooling and jobs to China, the Square-D company found out that the Chinese had created look-alike knockoffs of standard US circuit breakers, by running extra units of the plastic Square-D housing and stuffing them with “other (cheaper) things.” The Chinese devices had internal springs and cantilevered contacts that gave the click and feel of a circuit breaker when you flipped the lever, but they were just switches – no overload protection. There are tens of thousands of these counterfeits installed in the US right now…
Then we had those wiseguys who registered SAE bolt strength marks overseas as “trademarks” in several Asian countries trademark registries and “marked their trademark” on bolt heads for import into the USA. I encountered those on an engineering job in the mid 1980s where bolts marked Grade 8 and Grade 9 that held truck cabs to the frame were popping at 27-30ksi loads (i.e, Grade 1,) and I always wondered whether the jackscrews that failed on the MD-80 of Alaska Flight 261`crash in 2000 could have been a counterfeit material problem (evidently it wasn’t, it was improper lubrication/maintenance intervals.)
I also do not like the idea of plane crews flying that have been vaccinated for COVID. This is just another reason pilots and co-pilots can drop while taking off, flying, or landing. There has been reports of this happening but so far only one of the pilots have been affected and has been able to handle the flight. I do not plan to fly again.
Such a high percentage of airline level pilots were mandated to get the jab in order to continue to fly (all the international rated pilots due to restrictions by other countries, IIRC), that it is not feasible to require one of the pilots to be unvaxxed at this point. Hopefully those vaxxed pilots were not required to get further boosters. Wouldn’t be surprised, though.
Something that’s happening now is people who can afford Charter Jets for their travel, are asking Charter (Part135) Operators for un-‘vaccinated’ Pilots… and it’s difficult for most of them to do so, as “Corporate” was all-in, like Airlines, with forcing Pilots to get ‘jabbed’. My perspective on this from a ‘corporate’ Jet Mechanic (40 Years’ now) is that they ‘got what they deserved’. Some friends of mine who Wrench for a 135 Operator were told to get Jabbed or get Fired, and the Director of Maintenance called the FAA FSDO and told them that next Week, Nobody would be doing Maintenance at that Operator. The FSDO informed them they would be Shut Down (Certificate Suspended) a Day Later. None of the Mechanics got jabbed, nor played the Face-Diaper game, and nobody in Management dared to say a Word.
Hey Old NFO;
I read the news, so far my employer hasn’t been affected, but it is scary because those clowns fabricated 8130’s to get those fake parts into the system, this is massive fraud and deception. I have a feeling that more planes and more airlines will start parking planes and removing parts as fast as possible.
All- Thanks for the comments! And yes, this has been going on for a long time…
I saw, terrifying.
Latest iteration of the C-5, the C-5M, also uses GE CF6 engines…
I’m going to predict that AOG Technics are not the only people doing this and it isn’t limited to one engine family, these are just the ones where it was noticed, as far as I can tell, partly by chance. There are almost certain to be various others in countries where corruption is more common than the UK.
In theory you’ll be able to tell by looking at statistics for delays caused by mechanical issues but in practice many of those countries either don’t collect those statistics or they are unreliable because of airlines/airports failing to report stuff that they think makes them look bad.
Just because a part wasn’t documented up the wazzoo (which drives the production costs sky high), doesn’t automatically make it a bad part.
The problem is that without that documentation you can’t prove the part is what it claims to be. Add to that the fact that China falsifies the documentation, sells you a crap part for the price of the real thing and you have airplane parts failing, nuclear power plant valves failing to open or close when needed, structural components breaking at much lower than design load, etc. The net result is that people can die because China doesn’t give a s**t about anything but lining their own pockets.
Friend Joe was torquing down some bolts on his John Deere (made in INDIA!) when they sheered at half the spec.
He replaced ALL the nuts, bolts, and screws (that he could reach) with US made ones. Mailed the sheered ones with bill for replacements. Enclosed note read “Retaining all other hardware for testing should trial be needed.” He got his check.
Jim….
If you ever wonder why we retain the monarchy, it’s because it works.
I was only just reminded that we had a situation like this in 1975. That’s a while back, but the situation is very similar in that the Senate refused to pass the monetary supply Bill, which was required to give the Government the money to do its job.
The Monarch’s representative – the Governor General – did *his* job, which is to hit the Reset button, and call an election.
If the Government cannot govern, the choice goes back to the People, who get to choose one that can. In this case, we overwhelmingly voted for a different alternative and the problem was resolved. You can do this, if you have someone at the very top who is not affiliated with any Party and is not worried about standing for election. They act as an “umpire” who has very few real powers, but giving the People the ability to pass judgement when the Government is at an impasse, is one of them.