Stupid Design Award
 

Recently I had to replace a TAI pop out indicater on a 757. The formentioned beast is situated on the engine intake at about the 3 o'clock position. The access panel is big enough to get one hand in comfortably, but ideally you need two hands and your head in. Removal presented no problems. You undo one pipe and remove the indicator's mounting bracket which is held on by two bolts which in turn go into anchor nuts; but refitment was a nightmare. Getting the brackets' bolts started proved to be difficult as you cannot see what you are doing, and trying to line everything up with a podger helped, but the holes still were still slightly off. After a while my supervisor suggested I go and have a coffee, and let someone else have a go. I suggested that this had got to the personal pride stage and I would see the job through, but not in those words. I did get the job finished, but on reflection I could see that there was plenty of scope to drop something down the inside of the intake, but how would you recover it? Certainly there are two access panels situated at the bottom of the intake, but they are riveted on for goodness sake. Just how many 757's are there flying round, I wonder, with a tub or two of PRC dumped inside them in the vain hope that something that has been dropped down and cannot be retrieved won't rattle round too much? (I bet that bit of maintenance wouldn't get recorded)

So for me, the RB211 intake designer gets the award for 'I designed it but I will never work on it' Stupid Design Award

Unless you know better.

Civi Aviation only for this one please as we all know that military aircraft were only ever designed to be shot down, not fixed.

If you don't like nasty jobs on 757's, do not volunteer to change the right hand IP check valve!! That is unless you have top gaenacology skills. (I think that's how you spell it)

Careful what you wish for. If it was easy, the pilots could do it.

Don't you like how Boeing has problems getting the access panels lined up with the component being accessed, or vice versa?

Have you ever carried out the titanium to improved stainless steel pipe and 'P' clip modification on the A320 V2500 engine. That must really get an award. It is more like a complicated chinese puzzle, than anything to do with engines.

Try a Tristar HP Duct clamp fit after an eng change.
Grown men with pry bars and planks of wood reduced to tears on this one.

Hi,Guys
Mainwheels on 146s.Eight pieces of wirelocking.Jesus wept!
On small stuff,some of Lycoming's designers must be Gynaes at heart.Vacuum pump comes to mind.
regards in scarred knuckles!!
TDD

Boeng has listened to the complaints of the mechanics and service personnel and have tried to eliminate those problems on the B777. They created Integrated Product Teams (IPT) and on each major system and component installation there was a line mechanic and a Maintainability Engineer on the team. Final approval of the design could only be signed off by the Mechanic and the Maintainability Engineer. Did they get it right, only time will tell.

On all modern aircraft from the 727 onward there have been Reliability, Maintainability and Systems Safety engineers involved in the design. However, there was always an adversarial relationship between the Product Assurance engineers and the design engineers who fought tooth and nail to reject the input of the Product Assurance engineers. There are human factors manuals that identify the problems indicated in the first post in this thread. The manuals set up the work space access and the tool access as well as the visual access for maintenance. The design engineers refuse to work to those manuals as they are not applicable to the design. They say that the contract specifies the manuals to be used by product assurance to verify the design. But when they
bring the design deficiencies up to the designers they are told to piss off.

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The Cat

A show of hands, please, for all who have gone to the point of panic with a 747-100/200 cowling. Did you save it, or did it get loose?

[This message has been edited by redtail (edited 02 October 2000).]

redtail, you mean the good old JT9 cowls...
lift it up just a touch moore....look out...crash...another cowl hits the floor with everyone running for cover.....
No never did that!

To me the Stupid Design Award was awarded permanently to Shorts for the Belfast CMk1.

All of it. But especially the engine cowlings .. "oh God chiefy not again pleeese chief, sob,sob...Gimme a VC10 just this once."

I have visions of Republican designers working away into the wee small hours cackling with glee -- "Sure and begorrah dis'll sort out dem British Air Force b*ggers when it gets to the squadrons..."

I still have the scars to prove it.

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Through difficulties to the cinema

Has anybody out there had the pleasure of working on an ATP.(Advanced Tater Pie-as it is known at Woodford)Surely the whole aircraft warrants a stupid design award!!!!

I know the man who did the emergency exits very well. He's a very decent fellow and certainly not stupid. He did some really good design work in our office anyway. Do you suppose some of those Shorts chaps went to work on the rest of the ATP?

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Through difficulties to the cinema

The ATP is also nominated by me. Who designed those stupid doors that never close properly. Even worse the thing got a type cert.

It has other horrors too numerous to mention.

Blacksheep ref your Shorts comments.
I didnt know they spoke with that accent in the north of Ireland!
Also Shorts is most defintely not a republican company, being in the province!

(I know I know, nit picking.......)

Also another Tristar cherub, the rudder fine steering actuator wire locking. Done by feel bent over backwards over a load of avionics.
Brilliant.

[This message has been edited by spanners (edited 09 October 2000).]

[This message has been edited by spanners (edited 09 October 2000).]

Hello All,
I was never a When-We, but I have to nominate the DC 10 as one of the most engineer friendly aircraft I have ever worked. Typically liked things such as the cowlings on number two opening to form a work platform, and the steps up behind the F.E's panel. You won't see that on the tri-heap. Also found similar nice touches on other Mc Donald Duck airplanes, such as the two footrests in the nose wheel well on the MD 80 that allows access to the V.G.'s and rear of the Centre instrument panel.
Speaking of Instrument panels, I remember the Shorts 330 centre instrument panel had quick release clamps on the indicators, unfortunately they only worked one way. You could remove the instrument easily enough, but the clamp would lock up when you tried to slide a new indicator in, and you would then have to remove the hard wired glareshield (lots of in-line splices required afterwards) in order to free the "quick release clamp" and get the indicator in.
I'm also a great fan of Airbus aircraft, but I can't believe thay still use that stupid rubber tube to hold up the P.S.U.'s etc.
Still if they were easy to fix the bean counters would have the trained monkey's in doing our jobs.
Regards,
SomeFokker :)

Hi all,

My vote goes to the DC8 main hydraulic resevoir. They built the a/c around it.

[This message has been edited by HateThe8 (edited 13 October 2000).]

In reply of Lu Zuckerman's message I have to say that the B777 is a very engineer friendly aircraft indeed. Boeing did a nice job there. I simply love working on it

747-200 / JT9 Epr transmitter has to be the worst job I've done in a while.

Boeing's design philosophy seems to be: Install part with as many lose nuts/brackets/inaccesible fasteners as possible, install access panel approx 1/8" bigger than component to be removed then move it at least a foot away from said component. Just to give the engineers a real challenge then put the fire bottle just close enough to the access hole to prevent the removal of the txmtr without MR Rubik's guide to aircraft maint!

This may sound simple to some but I think changing those faucet assemblies on the A320's proved challenging. I reckon Airbus was experimenting on a new assembly method whereby the fauctes were suspended on thin air and built the airplane around it.

Like Somefokker said?!, I must agree that the Death Cruiser 10 was Engineer friendly. The platform was smart, but you don't want to be up there when it's -30C and the wind howling like crazy.

Macdu, you neglected to mention the character building aspect of being in the crow's nest of a DC-10 when it is raining, everything is covered in oil, and you are cranking cowlings (fan and core) open with your speed handle.

Other moments of fun have been:
- 747-200s with P&W Q engines (where'd that leak really originate from?)
- 727 MLG brakes: do they really need all of these bolts to hold them on?
- 747-100/200s P&W engine, anything under the inner fan cowl.
- Convair 580 generators
- Fuel tanks where you have to remember the exact number of twists and turns to exit that you used to enter (usually exiting by doing a handstand)
- Position sensors (LVDTs, pots, etc) that require two people to adjust, or positioning your hands in tight areas while hydraulic power is on.

And my favorite: Sweringen (Fairchild Metro) ground power receptacles that are mounted in line with the arc of the propellers.