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That Tuesday shift on a Cessna 172 that nearly broke me
I had one of those days last month where everything that could go wrong did. Started with a simple annual inspection on a 172, found a cracked exhaust riser that took two hours just to get the bolts out without snapping them. Then the oil filter wouldn't budge, had to use a strap wrench and heat to finally get it loose. To top it off, the logbooks were a mess, missing about 50 hours of entries from two years ago. I spent the rest of the week tracking down the previous mechanic to get signatures. By Friday I was so fed up I nearly considered going back to working on cars. Anyone else have a single aircraft that just seems to fight you at every step?
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bennett.vera1mo ago
@carter.gavin I did soak them overnight, but by that point I think the bolts had made a pact to stay put forever. That Cessna 172 is like the stubborn mule of the hangar, it knows exactly which bolts to rust and which logs to disappear. @carter.gavin probably has his own horror story about a single aircraft that made him question his career choices, because mine sure did that Tuesday. Between the exhaust riser and that oil filter, I was half convinced the plane was possessed by the ghost of a disgruntled mechanic from the 1970s. By the time I got those logs sorted, I felt like I'd aged ten years, but hey at least I didn't end up back in the auto shop.
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