Aircraft Maintenance Technology

APR 2013

The aircraft maintenance professional's source for technological advancements, maintenance alerts, news, articles, events, and careers

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RECIP TECHNOLOGY Wrenching at Reno The challenges of air racer maintenance are unique to most aircraft mechanics R By Tim Kern Tim Kern has attended and reported on all the Reno races since the no-race year of 2001, and has done some light lifting on a number of teams in several classes. eno. Nineteenth-century boom town. Gambling mecca. The biggest little city in the world. And host city for the only pylon air racing in the world. Every September, at Stead Field, just over a hundred of the world's most "Type-A" pilots and some of the best crews in motorsports gather to go faster than anyone else. With six classes and a week of qualifying and racing, the courses are vacated only briefly — and in the interval, top airshow performers keep everyone looking skyward. Since virtually all the racers are flying under some sort of experimental clearance, innovation is key. Without taking anything away from the determination and skill of the pilots, he who innovates best has the best chance of winning. Rules constrain some innovation; but the rules apply to everyone in the class, so each team tries to tweak its airplane to the top of the chart. The challenges of wrenching at Reno exceed the imagination of most who haven't been in combat support. Not only is routine maintenance of unique machines difficult and often unorthodox, it must be performed with tight precision and often with no guidelines, as it is not uncommon to fabricate and test entirely new ideas during race week. Although many of the T-6s and biplanes fly regularly, many others, in Sport, Formula One, Jet, and Unlimited classes fly only rarely; some are in one piece, literally, only a few weeks in the year. This doubles the load on mechanics, some of whom may never have seen the airplane in this year's configuration. (And sometimes, the modifications don't fit, or don't work!) Photo by Tim Kern 12 April 2013 Aircraft Maintenance Technology • www.AviationPros.com • www.AMTSociety.org

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