Well T Shirt, I never said "industry standard" just "typical for the industry." For the first item on my list, a mandatory SB is one that has been made mandatory by a recognised means. If the FAA make it mandatory then the SB is mandatory on everybody in the USA plus everybody outside the USA that automatically mandates ADs from the "country of origin"
Item 1 on my list is a normative decision taken by the individual engineer assessing the SB. Sometimes he will refer to his colleagues or even (heaven forbid) his boss. We are practical engineers, with a view of safety moulded by healthy scepticism arising from our constant exposure to the faulty reliability predictions so excellently explained above by Lu Zuckerman (By the way Lu, I work for 'Royal Bumdung' in the far east. We're just as good at maintaining aircraft as any US outfit and better than most... Just so you know...
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My post simply pointed out that invisible though we may be, there are a bunch of hard nosed sceptical and experienced engineers hiding in the back rooms of most airlines. We are skilled, experienced, dedicated to safe engineering and we are not easily talked out of our decisions as to what is or is not safety related. Having said that, being practical people, we do recognise that the aim can never be safety at any price. One of my major worries though, is the degree to which standards are coming under pressure these days. More amazingly, some of that pressure is now coming from the regulators themselves.
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Through difficulties to the cinema
[This message has been edited by Blacksheep (edited 27 May 2001).]