SA Bulldogs?

[TBkiller]

Guys,

not sure if this is the right place to post, but do any of you know of any SA Bulldog RAF TMk1's for sale in the UK?

Be great if you could let me know.

Geoff

[Dan the weegie]

PlaneCheck Aircraft for Sale - New planes and price reductions (http://www.planecheck.com?ent=da&id=17931)

It's in france but so long as its been maintained on a CofA getting it here shouldn't be an issue.

It's also a little over priced.

justplanetrading had one fairly recently but it's gone.

[Rod1]

Bulldog aircraft can go on an LAA permit from April so getting it approved should be relatively simple.

Rod1

[englishal]

On a permit, is it still subject to the Fatigue index and meter? The Foreign Bulldog's were never fitted with Fatigue meters.

I'd say this one is overpriced by £10,000.

[Dan the weegie]

Any ADs whilst on a CofA should still apply whilst on a permit, the upside is that you don't need a form 1 or a part 145 organisation to get it fixed :)

[InfraBoy]

I was talking to the owner of that Bulldog a couple of days ago, so if you want to see what the real FI is, he sent me this:

F-AZLZ

Hi,

I do not have the fatigue index (we do not have a limitation in France). I can provide you the record of the fatigue meter since its entry into service in the RAF wich is:

-1.5 =****** 3
-0.5 =*** 366
0.25 =**** 88
1.75 = *7806
2.50 =* 4947
3.50 =***971
5.00 =**** *0
6.00 =***** 0

Regards,

Nicolas.

Your best bet is to join the club and do a fair amount of advert searching as not all of the ones that come up for sale appear in the normal places!

If you can afford the spar mod there are at least 2 for sale in the UK that I know of that need it - one which hasn't even been reregistered onto the G reg as it was sold with 116 FI!

Best of luck,

Chris

[Rod1]

“Any ADs whilst on a CofA should still apply whilst on a permit”

Not necessarily. When the LAA take on an orphan it carries out an engineering review and often recommends changes to ADs etc which are normally rubber stamped by the CAA. The Austers and Jodels both benefited from this, no idea if the Bulldog will to.

Rod1

[Fake Sealion]

I must have added a few digits to the fatigue meter of the French registered Bulldog ex XX531.

I flew it for one hour, Feb 22 1979 whilst at RNEFTS Topcliffe.

[jxk]

Two friends of mine are very disappointed to hear the news from DHSL with regard to the Bulldog; both had spent money making their aircraft well equipped, mode S and Garmin 430 etc. If they move to the LAA permit they will lose their night flight, instrument and training capability, if they go TRA route it will cost them more than current CofA,
As I understand it if they choose LAA permit, they will still need to comply with ADs lifed items and their LAA inspector will need to have evidence of maintaining the type.

[Dan the weegie]

Appropriately equipped LAA Permit aircraft will soon be provided with both IFR and Night clearances subject to inspection.

Your friends can't see the forest for the trees, it's a good thing.

[Rod1]

“they will still need to comply with ADs lifed items ”

I was under the impression that that decision was still to be made – LAA inspectors have wide latitude to allow use on condition. The fatigue meter is also being reviewed. I am not saying things will change, but it is still possible. There is a lot of scare mongering about as a small number of individuals want to continue to hire their aircraft out and it is in their interests that as many owners as possible stay on cofa to share the TRA cost. As regards fitting Garmin 430’s there are much more capable uncertified kit available for 1/4 of the price which can now be fited.

Rod1

[foxmoth]

Can I ask why you are specifically after one of these? There are other aircraft that will do the same job but presume you have a reason you are not looking at them.

[A and C]

I cant understand how metal fatigue in a C of A aircraft suddenly disapears when given an LAA permit to fly !

As one who holds an LAA inspectors ticket I would not want the sort of "lattitude" you speak of and I am sure that the LAA managment are wise enough not to give it.

[A and C]

I have no objection to a review of the fatigue issues with the Bulldog with regard to the change of the way the aircraft is used, however there is no getting away from the issue that cracks will start to form around the wing spar bolt holes. So some sort of inspection program is required to control this problem.

The aviation authoritys are often accused of not acting untill there is a death, at the moment a wing has not come off a Bulldog in flight and I for one would like to keep it that way.

In my view the price set by BAe for the fatigue life extention was based on what they could get away with and keep the price just below that of replacement of the RAF trainer fleet but the govenment was not buying this cost. Unfortunatly BAe did not take the hint and it took the cutting up of new Nimrods to get the mesage to BAe that the UK tax payer was no longer willing to put up with BAe's overpricing antics.

The biggest cost of the life extention program is the manufacture of the new wing bolts to make one set it would cost £30K+ but if ALL the buldog owners were to get together and buy a set each the costs would tumble to somethig affordable. The same is true for the jigs & fixings that are required to drill the holes, I would guess that the whole job could be done for £10-15K per aircraft if the owners got together and let an engineeing company set up with a contract to do a life extention program on the whole fleet.

Silvaire 1 I think the cost to owner of a wing failure is death, it is hard to put a price on that in £ or $.

[englishal]

The funny thing is that it is only British Bulldogs subject to the fatigue meter life AFAIK. The foreign ones are based on total time...which is why the foreign ones are more desirable I suppose.

[jxk]

A and C

Do you know for sure whether any of these cracks have been found in the field or was it just in the fatigue rig at SAL/BAEs?

I have no objection to a review of the fatigue issues with the Bulldog with regard to the change of the way the aircraft is used, however there is no getting away from the issue that cracks will start to form around the wing spar bolt holes. So some sort of inspection program is required to control this problem.

[foxmoth]

I have no objection to a review of the fatigue issues with the Bulldog with regard to the change of the way the aircraft is used, however there is no getting away from the issue that cracks will start to form around the wing spar bolt holes.

My understanding, talking to our engineer who knows the 'Dog pretty well, is that there has only EVER been ONE instance of cracks being found around the bolt holes, and even this one could have been at the manufacturing stage, if this is the case I would have thought there is a good case for reviewing the requirement.

[Rod1]

“I cant understand how metal fatigue in a C of A aircraft suddenly disapears when given an LAA permit to fly !”

As has been said above metal fatigue in UK c of a dogs is different from that of all the other arrears.

Rod1

[gasax]

BAe might not be much of a company when it comes to designing aircraft - but they have been superbly successful in extracting money from the MOD across a huge variety of 'issues'.

Things like the in excess of £1M Nimrod safety case - which was not wortht he paper it was written on come to mind.

A set of inspection hatches and routine ndt is going to be far far more effective at spotting fatigue than a calculated fatigue life which features all sorts of global modifiers to try and account for manufacturing tolerances and differences in use.

In my day job we routinely deal with structures which have negative fatigue lives, for steel the research suggests actual fatigue lives typcially vary from the calculated life to in excess of 20 times the calculated life - with failure at calculate life being exceptional.........

So a great deal of potential for a structured review of real life performance and the methodology that BAe used to arrive at their fatigue index.

[airborne_artist]

Fake Sealion I must have added a few digits to the fatigue meter of the French registered Bulldog ex XX531.

I flew it for one hour, Feb 22 1979 whilst at RNEFTS Topcliffe. 2 IF trips on 21 June 79

Solo GH on 27 June 79

GH with sycamore on 28 June 79 :D

[foxmoth]

If it is ex RNEFTS Topcliffe then I will have put a few hours on it back in '76, might even be the one I came back from one trip in with the G meter reading max permitted in both directions!:cool:

[ShyTorque]

If it is ex RNEFTS Topcliffe then I will have put a few hours on it back in '76, might even be the one I came back from one trip in with the G meter reading max permitted in both directions!

I used to hate those limited panel IF recoveries from unusual attitudes.... :p

[Rod1]

“In my day job we routinely deal with structures which have negative fatigue lives, for steel the research suggests actual fatigue lives typcially vary from the calculated life to in excess of 20 times the calculated life”

During my time at Rolls-Royce we revisited early 70’s work and with a combination of simulation and CBM we got some of the calculated lives increased by an order of magnitude and that was on CAT.

Rod1

[BEagle]

A chum of mine was flying a Lightning one dark night. He went 'head-in' to the radar scope, then some sixth sense made him realise that all was not well. Looking at the attitude indicator, it was showing 90º dive angle, also the ASI and Mach strip was romping towards the right hand edge....

All he could do was close the throttles and pull like a barsteward.....

When he came to, he was very low, in a slight climb with the speed decaying through 200 KIAS. So he recovered gingerly back to Binbrook.

He told me he had lace marks from his anti-'g' suit on his legs for weeks. But the BAE engineers had a perfect overtress test specimen to work from (the aircraft, that is!) and found that there was actually rather more life left in the Lightning than they'd computed!

The last RAF Meteors were operated very carefully and their fatigue consumption closely monitored towards the end of their time. Then some engineer discovered a fatigue calculation error and both aircraft were found to have rather more life left than was expected. Unfortunately one later crashed at Mildenhall, killing both occupants, but the F8 still soldiers on in New Zealand.

For all things Bulldog, contact beagle pup and bulldog club home (http://www.beaglepupandbulldogclub.co.uk) .

[Zulu Alpha]

The biggest cost of the life extention program is the manufacture of the new wing bolts to make one set it would cost £30K+ but if ALL the buldog owners were to get together and buy a set each the costs would tumble to somethig affordable. The same is true for the jigs & fixings that are required to drill the holes, I would guess that the whole job could be done for £10-15K per aircraft if the owners got together and let an engineeing company set up with a contract to do a life extention program on the whole fleet.

I think the LAA owners will find a way of getting or making bolts for less than this.

£30,000 for wing bolts is incredible.

[englishal]

Actually for a competent place, manufacturing all manner of spars, skins, bolts etc., is easy peasy.

We had an elevator spar develop a crack around the bolt holes. Had to get a new one at quite some cost, but you* could easily manufacture one in a short time out of the same materials to as high a standard. You could even repair the cracked one so it is stronger than new if one were allowed.

* if you know WTF you are doing!

Doesn't the Baron need a Spar mod which cost about 10 grand? Couldn't someone approved (i,e, EASA145 with design authority or whatever it is called) come up with a bulldog repair scheme and then make rather a lot of money fitting the mod for 5k per aeroplane? Or would CAA test fees make it not worthwhile...?

[sycamore]

A-A, I`m still suffering from PTSD/PMS/QGH/OCA whatever from that very flight...still, the Nurse is nice,and the `blue pills` seem to be working....:ok:

[jxk]

I think the LAA owners will find a way of getting or making bolts for less than this.From what I recall the original spar modification included a longer spar doubler and something like 1/64th oversize bolts (to produce these bolts was the expensive bit). I believe there was a jig for this with the appropriate reamers. It was suggested by someone that it may be possible to ream and bush the holes and use standard bolt sizes.

[jxk]

Silvaire1

I don't know for sure but I would guess that www.dhsupport.com (http://www.%3Cb%3Edhsupport.com%3C/b%3E) would have the instructions and possibly the jig.

As I understand it, it was the cost of the oversize bolts that is/was the 'killer'. (I believe £11,000)

As you probably know the Bulldog was developed from the Beagle Pup as a trainer for the RAF; both aircraft are a delight to fly. However, the Bulldog is a relatively difficult aircraft to maintain and parts are becoming an issue. It's a good idea to change the brakes to Clevelands as this eliminates problems with wheel hubs, discs and brake pads.

As you say, many of the near end fatigue lifed UK aircarft were exported to the US for use in the Experimental category.

[englishal]

Next time I see an inexpensive Bulldog pop up I'll think about it more seriously.
Me too ;) The BD is a joy to fly and a lot of fun, and if some way of getting around this fatigue index then you can get a lot of aeroplane for your money.

It is still interesting that the foreign Bulldogs (Hong Kong etc...) were never subject to this FI....but had time lifed items which makes me think that it is not really a safety issue. Times were in the 10,000 hr range though, so a lot of useful life left in the ones you see flying. Is there any way of getting this FI removed from the UK Bulldogs?

[Rod1]

If you want a Bdog in the uk without an FI I suggest you hand on a few months. I have a friend with a UK aircraft who is convinced that the FI is to be abandoned and if that does not work you import one which does not have a FI and you can put it on a permit. It will be lifted at a set number of airframe hours - probably 10,000, but that is not confirmed yet.

Rod1

[Aviator1512]

There is virtually no chance of the fatigue life being withdrawn for CofA or Permit aircraft. The life (without the currently unavailable wing spar mod) is 5000 hrs or FI114 if monitored using a calibrated (every 3years) fatigue meter and the result interporated.

The LAA has already stated that there will be no concessions on permit Bulldogs (or chipmunks) and they are even removing the type from the normal inspector approval - to sign off a permit Bulldog or chipmunk the LAA inspector will have to gain additional approval from the LAA.

Airworthiness Directives (which includes the fatigue life) are mandatory regardless of the operating regime. The time-expired Bulldogs (lots in the US & France) are just that - time expired, and will not be eligible to operate on a UK CofA or Permit. The ex-RAF Bulldogs where sold off as scrap!

The LAA Permit for these aircraft is not to be considered an 'easy' option.

[InfraBoy]

Yes there is a Bulldog for sale in the UK at the moment. G-UDOG at North Weald has been bought (along with G-KDOG) by a Belgium Team and are both being re CofA'd prior to departure. I've spoken to them and they are willing to sell G-UDOG with it's new 0 time engine for £45K....

I looked at buying either of them last year at a lot less than those prices but without the new engine. The FI I beleive (I don't have the emails chain anymore) of UDOG was around 110 with KDOG less than that. UDOG from memory has the standard military fit except for the removal of the UHF where as KDOG (that they are definately keeping) had about £12K of avionics and a new paint job.

If you want to be put in contact with the seller then email / message me direct.

As for the other conversations regarding CofA to LAA Permit and FI. The FI issue does not disappear with the move to the LAA Permit. To remain on a CofA just requires the continuation of certified mainteance and the payment of the TRA. It's all on the DHSupport and LAA websites and I heartily recommend the Beagle Pub an Bulldog Club, as has been mentioned before.

[A and C]

The cost of producing the wing bolts wont change much be it the CAA or LAA who holds the oversight, to get someone to produce one set of bolts would cost IRO £30K, most of this is in the set up costs for the tooling.

Once the tooling is in place if you can sell 100 sets the tooling cost comes down to £300 per set, by the time manufacture, inspection & distribution are taken into account I would guess that the price would rise to around £ 1000 per aircraft set.

A properly run production line for the Bulldog life extention I would guess would result in a cost of £10-15K per aircraft but I would think you would have to have 80+ aircraft commited to the program before you could drive the costs down that far.

[steve_l]

if the Bulldogs were sold as scrap, what prices were they fetching