Lycoming tear down inspection shop recommendation

[Dickard]

Any preferred shop for sending off a turbo Lycoming for a tear down inspection after a prop strike?

[jetdriven]

Poplar Grove is one and there’s another shop called Columbia over in Pennsylvania that has a good reputation. I sent my last engine to Triad and ended up costing 4 grand over… due to “corrosion in cylinders requiring honing”.  I’ve never seen honing cost a grand a hole.   We ask for a new Lycoming cam and new DLC lifters, now these things retail for $110 apiece at aircraft spruce. But their price was $2400 for the set of hardware. I do not feel that’s even remotely fair, especially since he’s the Lycoming distributor and gets the parts at wholesale  distributor pricing. Then, the oil drain is leaking, but upon further discovery, the pipe nipple that threads into the oil sump is on the wrong side of the engine and it’s too close to the exhaust. When I went to go unthread it, it appears that it was installed cross threaded and it stripped out the threads in the sump and it would not come out. So I ate four hours of labor And $125 for a Helicoil NPT kit, on behalf of the customer for this. I’m not using them again. 

[LANCECASPER]

17 minutes ago, Dickard said:

Any preferred shop for sending off a turbo Lycoming for a tear down inspection after a prop strike?

If you're in COS you might think about Western Skyways in western Colorado. http://www.westernskyways.com/default.asp

[Dickard]

15 hours ago, LANCECASPER said:

If you're in COS you might think about Western Skyways in western Colorado. http://www.westernskyways.com/default.asp

That's who my A&P suggested.

[LANCECASPER]

10 hours ago, Dickard said:

That's who my A&P suggested.

Sounds like a smart guy 

[MikeOH]

11 hours ago, Dickard said:

That's who my A&P suggested.

@Dickard

No personal experience, but they aren't perfect...you might want to contact this guy if you want a complete view of a Western Skyways OH gone wrong on a turbo Lycoming: Kareem Fahmi.  I don't have a direct number but you could contact him through LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kareemfahmi

[Ragsf15e]

12 hours ago, Dickard said:

That's who my A&P suggested.

I used them to rebuild a cylinder. They were helpful, responsive and on time/price.  Obviously a big difference between a cylinder and the whole engine, but that’s my experience.

[affricate]

These guys did excellent MOH on my TIO-540-AF1B in 2021.

https://www.airmarkoverhaul.com/propeller-strike/

 

[Dickard]

19 hours ago, MikeOH said:

@Dickard

No personal experience, but they aren't perfect...you might want to contact this guy if you want a complete view of a Western Skyways OH gone wrong on a turbo Lycoming: Kareem Fahmi.  I don't have a direct number but you could contact him through LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kareemfahmi

This is why I asked, even though my A&P recommended them.  Trust but verify.

[kortopates]

This is why I asked, even though my A&P recommended them.  Trust but verify.

Virtually Every shop, including the most loved shops here on MS gets it’s share of complaints or negative reviews. It’s genuinely challenging for anyone to sift through the available information to determine if one shop is better for you over another.
But Western Skyways is one of bigger and most capable engine shops in the country.
One of ways you can help success is by clear communications that comes from being able to drop by periodically; not be pain but being interested in seeing it come together. They’re close enough you can do that - if that interest you. Not everyone would want to. But perhaps after the inspection is complete you’d like to be able to see the stuff that did pass, see stuff that is worn that might be worth replacing etc You’ll be much better informed being able to see them in person than by phone.

[201Steve]

15 hours ago, kortopates said:

It’s genuinely challenging for anyone to sift through the available information to determine if one shop is better for you over another.

This is so true. Real tough. I’ve got examples of good shop, bad work. And bad shop, good work. End of the day it mostly boils down to capability and willingness for remediation in the event of problems. 

[Shadrach]

On 9/14/2022 at 9:30 PM, MikeOH said:

@Dickard

No personal experience, but they aren't perfect...you might want to contact this guy if you want a complete view of a Western Skyways OH gone wrong on a turbo Lycoming: Kareem Fahmi.  I don't have a direct number but you could contact him through LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kareemfahmi

Wow, I remember the beginnings of that story from the red board. Kareem had a TSIO360 done by Western Skyways. I believe it came back with a starter issue initially and spiraled from there. That had to be 08 or 09. Must have been a mess if he is still stinging.

[KSMooniac]

My local shop, Midwest Aircraft in Newton KS, deals with a ton of big turbo Lycomings. I've used them happily for cylinder IRAN 13 years ago, dual mag work, and engine assembly (long story) and recommend without reservation.

Sent from my LM-V450 using Tapatalk

[carusoam]

Nice pirep for Midwest Aircraft in Newton KS, Scott!

Best regards,

-a-

[Will.iam]

20 hours ago, Shadrach said:

Wow, I remember the beginnings of that story from the red board. Kareem had a TSIO360 done by Western Skyways. I believe it came back with a starter issue initially and spiraled from there. That had to be 08 or 09. Must have been a mess if he is still stinging.

Wouldn’t gold seal warranty cover this issue? Or is that why it went so far south?

[Shadrach]

6 hours ago, Will.iam said:

Wouldn’t gold seal warranty cover this issue? Or is that why it went so far south?

Honestly, I don’t know. There were multiple issues with Kareem’s overhaul. I think a major factor was geography. Kareem’s plane was based in the East Bay Area and Western Skyways being in Colorado was not local to the installation. That means there are necessarily third-parties involved which adds to the expense.  An owner who just spent 45 grand on an overhaul doesn’t want to spend more money to prove that the overhaul shop delivered a faulty engine. The overhaul shop doesn’t want to invest any money in proving that they are or are not liable for a problem. That means that if there’s an issue both parties are at a disadvantage. That’s why I’m not a fan of using far away engine shops no matter the reputation. 

[Will.iam]

Thanks point well taken! 

[MikeOH]

1 hour ago, Shadrach said:

Honestly, I don’t know. There were multiple issues with Kareem’s overhaul. I think a major factor was geography. Is there a plane was based in the East Bay Area and Western Skyways being in Colorado was not local to the installation. That means they’re necessarily third-parties involved which adds to the expense.  An owner who just spent 45 grand on an overhaul doesn’t wanna spend more money to prove that the overhaul shop delivered a faulty engine. The overhaul shop doesn’t want to invest almoney proving that they are or are not liable for a problem. That means that if there’s an issue both parties are at a disadvantage. That’s why I’m not a fan of using far away engine shops no matter the reputation. 

Yeah, that was my recollection as well...things got 'uncomfortable' over the long distance communications.  Still, I didn't come away feeling Western Skyways was blameless in the whole debacle.  Does anyone know if you can still access the red board archives on AOPA?  Even after they shut down the red board you could access them.  Not sure if that's still true. The OP could read for himself what Kareem went through...it went on for 20 pages or more!

[Shadrach]

4 hours ago, MikeOH said:

Yeah, that was my recollection as well...things got 'uncomfortable' over the long distance communications.  Still, I didn't come away feeling Western Skyways was blameless in the whole debacle.  Does anyone know if you can still access the red board archives on AOPA?  Even after they shut down the red board you could access them.  Not sure if that's still true. The OP could read for himself what Kareem went through...it went on for 20 pages or more!

 

I don’t think Western Skyways lived you to their reputation in this case. We’ll never know. The red board is long gone. AOPA claimed that it was a data security liability. The  red board was a pretty interesting place in the early aughts but deteriorated in later years.

There was a very long thread there that I started after a knee dislocation while away from home with my aircraft. It was a saga of multiple hospitals, a compartment syndrome diagnosis followed by a four compartment fasciotomy (look it up if you have a strong stomach) followed by a two week hospital stay. I wish I had access to it today. I was in a very strange headspace.

 

[KSMooniac]

I remember that thread as well back when that was board was good and useful. It was the first aviation board I joined, but eventually migrated to beechtalk and here as the signal to noise ratio turned awful.

Western Skyways didn't impress me with that saga, but honestly, I think that is the only bad experience that I can remember with them from my years of reading. One of their main guys used to active on BT and seemed very helpful.

Sent from my LM-V450 using Tapatalk

[LANCECASPER]

On 9/14/2022 at 9:14 AM, Dickard said:

That's who my A&P suggested.

One major advantage of using the shop your A & P recommended is expectation bias. He expects a good result so isn't likely to put any blame on the shop he chose. He is likely to go above and beyond to make it work to prove his point. 

If you use a different shop, especially far away, any problems that come up will tend to be blamed on not using the shop he told you to use.  You will find a bad review on any shop out there - you can't please all of the people all of the time. The fact that the collective braintrust of Mooneyspace only remembers only bad review says quite a bit. 

[MikeOH]

3 hours ago, LANCECASPER said:

One major advantage of using the shop your A & P recommended is expectation bias. He expects a good result so isn't likely to put any blame on the shop he chose. He is likely to go above and beyond to make it work to prove his point. 

If you use a different shop, especially far away, any problems that come up will tend to be blamed on not using the shop he told you to use.  You will find a bad review on any shop out there - you can't please all of the people all of the time. The fact that the collective braintrust of Mooneyspace only remembers only bad review says quite a bit. 

You raise a very good point about using your A&P's recommendation; use anyone else and something goes wrong...he's going to wash his hands of the problem!

However, I take an exception to what appears to be rather harsh criticism of those of us that share knowledge of "bad experiences". Should only positive reviews be allowed?  Should the consensus advice to these kinds of inquires really be, "picking a mechanic or OH shop is a crap shoot so just 'roll the die' because every shop has a bad day sometimes?"

[LANCECASPER]

2 hours ago, MikeOH said:

You raise a very good point about using your A&P's recommendation; use anyone else and something goes wrong...he's going to wash his hands of the problem!

However, I take an exception to what appears to be rather harsh criticism of those of us that share knowledge of "bad experiences". Should only positive reviews be allowed?  Should the consensus advice to these kinds of inquires really be, "picking a mechanic or OH shop is a crap shoot so just 'roll the die' because every shop has a bad day sometimes?"

Since I am far from perfect I try to expect excellence from a shop but not perfection. If they make a mistake and make it right, then good for them, they acknowledged they can do better. If a shop is continually getting bad reviews then I’d rather go somewhere else. One bad review does not make it a bad shop. It could turn out to be just that the customer’s expectation of perfection wasn’t met. There are always three sides to every story - the shop’s side, the customer’s side and what really happened. . 

[Fly Boomer]

2 hours ago, MikeOH said:

because every shop has a bad day sometimes?"

This part is certainly true.

[MikeOH]

26 minutes ago, LANCECASPER said:

Since I am far from perfect I try to expect excellence from a shop but not perfection. If they make a mistake and make it right, then good for them, they acknowledged they can do better. If a shop is continually getting bad reviews then I’d rather go somewhere else. One bad review does not make it a bad shop. It could turn out to be just that the customer’s expectation of perfection wasn’t met. There are always three sides to every story - the shop’s side, the customer’s side and what really happened. . 

While there is nothing unreasonable in your comments, the reason I value negative posts is exactly your point: "If a shop is continually getting bad reviews then I'd rather go somewhere else".  Yet, many times here, there seems to be an adverse reaction by many when a negative experience is posted??  How does one form an informed opinion about a shop when negative reviews are discouraged and questioned?  It always seems the poster is the one called on the carpet to "prove" his claim of a poor experience.  Even your "three sides" remark, which is certainly valid, hints that the shop should be given all benefit of doubt...but typically that courtesy is NOT extended to the poster when relating a negative experience.  Even if the bad experience is validated, the nearly universal response is, "oh, all shops have a bad day."  How is that helpful?

Frankly, I wish there was a YELP for aviation so that you could have ready access to a multitude of opinions on shops.  Absent that, I'd like to think forums such as ours would serve that purpose.  But, the push-back on posters when they share a bad experience works against that worthy goal.