Pre Buy Check List Do Not Buy With Out This

[Skywalker]

I have been looking for Pressurized P337,post 1973 model and invested some money and time, compiled a complete pre buy check list, i can tell you that , with out ;Pre buy inspection it can be huge financial disaster, and also i think this is the best investment we can do , , its vital you get the professional shop, not just a free lance A & P ( no offend to them) ,but my experience has proved that not every one of them have the proper tools to perform this Job honestly and if they are not familiar with SkyMaster you can bet ,it will be a night mare for you later on. If big shop is equipped with well trained personal and tolls ,,although they do not have SkyMaster experience , they can /will do the pre buy as guided and inspect every thing , which the check list shows.
I have put a deposit on highly well equipped P337 ,2100 TT, 1979 ,With G-500, GTN 750, GTN 650, JPI 960, Speed Brakes, Vg Kit, Rear engine 80 SFRM, Front engine 960 with fresh Top overhaul, Fresh Props, Stec 55-x A.P ,Gear door kit, Pressurized Mags, Air Oil separator, flaps seal, new overhauled fuel tanks ,almost all the gadget you can have to Enhance the performance.
Aircraft extremely well maintained, (i should write here well paid for the maintenance , with blank cheques by owner ) , Owner is a Doctor and not flying a lot for last year , and the aircraft was maintained in perfect condition as per his Mechanic,s declaration ( translate into well paid too ) and has valid ;Annual and you guess what ????
2 weeks ago aircraft was sent to Brant Aero in Canada for the pre buy inspection and test flight, and the work shop made list of 132 ;snags;/squawks after physical inspection and its not the end, now they are studying the technical logs and we are afraid list will grow.Our Skymasters are complex machines and they are very old, and if u put pressurization, turbos, waster gate, and twin engines, it gives you ;great cocktail, and our lives and lives of our loved one, depends on these machines health, so any short cut in Pre buy gonna bite the next owner, as in Aviation we say, PAY IT NOW OR PAY IT LATER , BUT PAY YOU WILL , in the attachment pre buy check list,and if i missed some areas , pls do add in , in coming days i will post the Test flight report and pre Buy ;Report , So we and future owners can educate themselves and have as less troubles as possible.
FLY SAFE
Dennis Nazir
Poland
Poznan

[kilr4d]

Originally Posted by Skywalker

its vital you get the professional shop

Yes. You must have a shop or mechanic that has LOTS of experience with the airframe you are buying.

Originally Posted by Skywalker

...the work shop made list of 132 ;snags;/squawks after physical inspection and its not the end, now they are studying the technical logs and we are afraid list will grow.

Sorry to hear about the problems, but it doesn't matter the aircraft...the first inspection with a new mechanic is always BRUTAL. Can you share some of the snags/squawks with us? Anything major?

Also, what happens now? Will you be able renegotiate the price?

[Skywalker]

John
i have agreement with Owner that aircraft will be sold with all the ; squawks; /snags sorted out, as i am paying a premium price.
Work shop has got green light from the Owner to go head and clean up the things
Lot of them are small issues, but some are real problems, and every thing will be sorted out before delivery across the Atlantic.
Dennis

[rrolland]

Dennis:

While I have not seen the list of defects that Brant Aero gave you, the number of items is not unusual. Our P337's/C 337's are at best 40 years old.

Large maintenance organizations apply a very high standard when inspecting the aircraft. When I owned my Rockwell Commander, which had had several annuals and worked well with no obvious defects, the fist large shop that took it in for an annual came up with around 8 full pages of snags. And that was for a normally aspirated, non-pressurized single...


Many of the items were small and very few could actually have been classified as serious i.e. impacting airworthiness.


They all got fixed and while the cost was substantial, I felt more confident after the whole process.


When I bought my P337, I took it to a large shop specialized in Cessna aircraft and they also came up with a long list. That is the way I wanted it. Find and fix what matters.


I have had a mainly snag free experience for the last two years, and the annual that I went through in July had a very short list of snags as expected.


I detailed some of those in a previous post. Recently, my Hobbs decided to stop working so I am getting that fixed. The panel got opened during the annual so there is a good chance that some connection got loosened while the mechanics were in there
.

So I feel your pain, but in the end, it is for the better....



Richard

[Skywalker]

Hello Richard
good to hear from you, i have sent you the snags list on your private mail, pls have a look and advise. also i want every thing to be fixed, minor or major one,overall plane is dream machine with all the bells.
and main reason i think is The mechanic who has been working on it ,did not know the plane well .
I will keep posted about the progress, as we are working with Owner to solve all the issues, Mean while we have decided to ferry via Azores ,Southern route due to winter coming ahead and also one Guy sent me a link of one incident where One Swedish guy ditched his SkyMaster in Atlantic in August, , as both his engines stopped working, we will never know what happened exactly, but there are lot of speculations , and ice formation in the fuel or oil lines is one of them. so we do not want to take any chance, This will require us fitting 100 Gallons of fuel tank and HF radio , its getting interesting day by day ;-))))))
Dennis

[hharney]

Originally Posted by Skywalker

Mean while we have decided to ferry via Azores ,Southern route due to winter coming ahead and also one Guy sent me a link of one incident where One Swedish guy ditched his SkyMaster in Atlantic in August, , as both his engines stopped working, we will never know what

If this is the same incident that happened several years ago, I understood the issue was the oil breathers froze up and pumped all the oil overboard. This is why there should be an alternate air path in the breather tube. The airplane is on the bottom of the ocean so probably will never know for sure but that was the theory that I heard.

[Skywalker]

Hello Herb
yes the accident happened in 2009 ,we will check if the oil breather has alternate path or not, if no , it will be installed
But we have decided to take the southern route any how.
Dennis

[JAG]

Not to bump the thread - but that incident in 2009...everything looked like an oil loss, but I do not remember reading anything about the props feathering. can an oil loss still be explained without the props feathering at cruise RPM?
Jeff

[hharney]

The ongoing Drama

pls see the snags list, its ;Enlightening

[kilr4d]

My goodness.

Dennis - What is the estimate cost for this prebuy???

[Skywalker]

Originally Posted by kilr4d

My goodness.

Dennis - What is the estimate cost for this prebuy???

Hello John
the Cost to do the prebuy was 4000 USD and to fix all the snags will cost around 50 k USD,but u see lot of items are preventive maintenance ,for example Hoses were never changed, so they are 40 years old, its alone 6 k USD for both engine, although they are still good, but common sense says after 10 years they should be changed, although there is no requirement for the part 91 operators, Power pac need complete overhaul ,4 K USD, Brakes lines , 1000 US,aux. fuel pumps were never overhauled, cost 1700 each installed,
Fuel selectors never overhauled also around 1700 USD each , Installed
but as wrote before Owner reduced the price and for the preventive items , i will have to pay ,
Dennis