Has your Mechanic just cost you $10K and the Sale of your Aircraft?
Over the last several years I have seen many logbook entries from mechanics, some good, some bad and some just downright ugly. In the last several weeks I have been involved with a buyer looking for a used Flight Design CT ($70K - $90K). This has given me a unique opportunity to really look at logbook entries and documentation (or the lack of it) and see just how that might affect the ultimate selling price of the aircraft itself. Surprisingly, many poor entries have also come from A&P’s and not only RLSM-A’s from the logbook entries I have seen. These poor logbook entries and lack of documentation will cost the owner dearly when it comes time to sell. From what I have seen lately, it’s not hard to lose $5K-$10K in value due to lack of documentation. These are legal records and need to be treated as such. This is one of the only legal ways you can show either someone did something to your plane or did not. As important, log books showing compliance to not only the aircraft manufactures Service Bulletins for the airframe but also for its Rotax engine greatly increases the Aircrafts total value!
In flight Engine Failure and what not to do!
It was one of those wonderful summer evenings you wished would last forever. The air was dead smooth and cooling as the sun moved towards the horizon and not a cloud could be found in the sky. My student and I had done our pre-flight walk around including topping up the fuel tanks in readiness for our one hour training flight. On my way to the airport I had hoped that the 25 gallon portable fuel tank we used to fill our aircraft would have enough fuel in it for our evening training flight. I was relieved to see that one of the other instructors had already filled that tank with a fresh batch of fuel/oil pre-mix as required for our Rotax 503 powered Aircraft. In this case this engine was a pre-mix model with no metering oil injection pump to do that job for you automatically.
