Dervish,
Quote: 'the published evidence suggests they did know...'
Thanks for coming back. My apologies for not being clearer on that point. Please let me clarify. Yes, the RAF knew, but my view is that they didn't know until 2014.
It's clear that the deterioration in the state of the ATC aircraft fleet started at some time soon after their entry to service, and continued for some years. That's the RAF's first failure.
Then the RAF's engineering management systems failed to understand what was happening to this fleet. Why do I come to that conclusion? Because they didn't do anything about it until 2014. Second failure. And probably a more serious one than the first, because it points to a major failure of basic engineering supervision and quality control. And that could very well be a systemic issue across the service.
My guess (and thats all it is) would be that the exercise to gain full CAMO status was the trigger for this realisation.
To repeat: we are talking here about a large fleet of simple and basic aircraft. A fleet that the RAF bought and were responsible for maintaining. A task that should have been absolutely routine, basic, day to day, bread and butter engineering management. The fact that they failed to do this should be a major concern. Financially, it's a disgrace.
Best regards as ever to those engineers doing the job properly,
Engines
Last edited by Engines; 2nd Nov 2016 at 13:41.