AV-MECH
Your Aircraft Maintenance Resource
CALL 352-617-2029
AV-MECH's main objective is to provide truly world class aircraft services with an unparalleled empahsis on customer service and satisfaction
Cessna 350 Structural Repair
We received a call from a loyal friend and long standing customer that he had just bought a damaged Cessna 350. First question
he had was if I could repair it? "of course" I replied, "what’s wrong with it?". This airframe had suffered from a severe
vibration during landing and roll out that was so strong that the shaking actually failed the composite structure just in front of
the horizontal stab. It seems that a combination of landing hard and applying aggressive braking can cause each of the main
landing gear legs to "duck walk". This out of phase displacement with the gear aggressively shakes the fuselage so
hard that the weight of the tail swinging back and forth collapses' the fuselage shell.
Skid marks showing main landing gear displacment during roll out. This picture is from a different Cessna 350 landing incident
than the aircraft shown below.
Failure of outer facing, core material and inner facing
Failure of outer facing, core material and inner facing
Minor damage to gear fairings and wheel pants
Damage just forward of Horizontal Stab
AV-MECH...Known Around The World !!!
The repair was designed by Martin Hollmann of Aircraft Designs Inc, Monteray CA. Martin is an FAA/DER and has a lifetime of
composite engineering experience. Martin not only did the engineering but also provide the FAA Form 8110-3 making the repair
scheme legal. I, as the IA did the work and signed off the FAA form 337 for Major Repair.
Cutting access hole in left side of fuselage.
Shot showing the access panel. This looks bigger than it really is. Turns out that in most cases I could only get one
arm inside. From here you can see the nav shelf, elevator pushrod and right side rudder cable. Notice that the horizontal
stabs are off, you can see their supporting stub tubes.
This is some of what we found when we opened it up. This damage extends up the left fuselage wall into the vert stab.
Due to liability issues we cannot show you pictures of the repair procedure but look at the next picture to see the results of our
efforts.