Broke Again, Mechanically and Monetarily

A short while ago, while taking off for a circuit, I looked on my dash and saw my generator light was on. I turned to my instructor and asked, "Is that light supposed to be on?". He scrutinized it for a moment, then replied, "No, it's not." What followed was the typical procedure for determining the draw from the generator (and no, this is probably not the official title for it, remember, I'm a beginner and can't quite remember all the lingo): checking the circuit breakers, turning off and then turning back on anything using electricity, etc. Nothing worked, so, once again, my stop and go became a full stop, thwarted once again by my plane. Under direction from my instructor, I was grounded again until given the ok from an AME.

I called the AME, who came across as a lovely man, helpful and quite good at getting back to me. He informed me that the generator was wrecked and we'd have to find a new one. He said he'd do that for me. I tried a little myself, and I'll tell you, tracking down a generator that's basically been out of production for the past twenty years is no easy task. I managed to do it, but so did my AME, and as I was anxious to get back out practicing, I left it up to him. Even told him to fly it in instead of using ground shipping as that would put me out a good couple of weeks. He was happy to do it.

A week or so later I got the call that I could go flying again. I was excited and immediately cleared my schedule to go. And hopefully this time, after I fueled up, it would start again, as the old generator could only handle one start up. I was crossing my fingers that this one would actually recharge the battery and I would no longer have to push the fargo away from the pumps, feeling like a complete chump.

And it started. It flew. I fueled up and it started again. The only thing better than flying is flying an airplane that actually runs properly and starts when it's supposed to. It finally felt like the Fargo was going to be that airplane.

Then, the other day, I was refueling after a flight, and an Central Mountain Air flight was coming in right behind me. I'd heard often enough that they get rather irritated when they are held up at the pumps, so I quickly jumped into the Fargo to taxi away. Except, the damn thing wouldn't start. I tried to prime it, added throttle, and it didn't want to do anything. Now I was stuck by myself at the pumps, trying to find a way to get this thing out of the way without looking like a complete idiot.

I started my long trek back to the hangar, stopping a few times for a break as my legs were turning to complete rubber. Along the way, I noticed the AME who'd fixed the problem in the first place putting his 180 onto floats. They didn't seem to notice me struggling my way back to the hangar. At least, not until the Fargo was safely stowed in the hangar, and then he happened to see me and came to "chat". And by chat, I mean, ask for a cheque. He did wonder why I was putting the Fargo's battery back on the charger, but didn't push it too far, and I was much too tired and fed up to bother with any discussions about the Fargo's failings at the moment. So, I told him I'd go get my chequebook and meet him at his 180. As it was, he'd checked out the Fargo a few times earlier without any invoice so I had a bottle of scotch to give him also in token of appreciation and thought I'd run and grab it for him, be the nice person I was and give him his little gift before I got mine.

And what a gift it was. He greedily snatched up the scotch and then dug in his truck for my invoice. I nearly fell over when he gave it to me. It was almost three times as much as it should have been. I was charged shop rate for his phone calls to find a generator when I had one lined up. Then I was charged a full days shop rate for putting the generator in, even though they'd finished by lunch time. And the generator I wanted to buy was half the price as the one he managed to find for me, even though they were the exact same thing. I was floored. And not only that, the Fargo was still sitting, broke down once again, in the hangar. Apparently, when you're an AME and you know your client is eager to fly, you can make them pay anything you want as they really have no other option, what with the regulations stating the owner is unable to perform any repairs themselves (unless it was on owner maintenance, I know, but that is a whole other story). I even had to double check the amount, as I couldn't quite believe he had the nerve to charge that much. I've heard of mechanics screwing you over, but for some reason I thought that those who worked on airplanes were of a different kind. I mean, aren't we all in this together? Apparently not. I had a mind to ask for my scotch back, I sure could have used it.