Lol. That reminds me of the epithet assigned to the manufacturer of the notoriously unreliable electrics of British motorbike of the 50's & 60's: "Electrics by Lucas, Prince of Darkness." :)
-----Original Message----- From: Aus-soaring [mailto:aus-soaring-boun...@lists.base64.com.au] On Behalf Of Gary Stevenson Sent: Wednesday, 15 March 2017 9:07 PM To: 'Discussion of issues relating to Soaring in Australia.' Cc: bobgrimst...@compuserve.com Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] Oratex UL600 and the unexpected Hi Noel, Loved your story especially "... manufactured in hell by Satan himself." Surprise! Thank God for engineering conservatism and the notion of "factor of safety". Look forward to your next instalment. Where exactly are you doing this work? Surely Col is NSW based? Looks like the "local" expertise For Oratex will all be in SA, but it is early day yet. How long have these products been on the market? Cheers, Gary -----Original Message----- From: Aus-soaring [mailto:aus-soaring-boun...@lists.base64.com.au] On Behalf Of Noel Roediger Sent: Wednesday, 15 March 2017 8:33 PM To: 'Discussion of issues relating to Soaring in Australia.' Cc: bobgrimst...@compuserve.com Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] Oratex UL600 and the unexpected Dear All. Colin Turner and I made the decision last year to recover a Scout Gliding Club Falke fuselages with "ORATEX", (VH-GVZ) after downloading their instruction manual and spending time with Redmond Quinn who has run trials using a sample kit. This is included as part of its 50yr inspection. Colin ordered all material and tools from the factory in Germany and they arrived at his front door about 1 week later. A real surprise was the low airfreight cost compared with other systems due to no component being listed as "Dangerous Goods" and that alone is a good reason to use it. Along with that, nothing within the system exudes any noxious or toxic fumes. However - when the fabric was removed from fuselage and steel tubes cleaned - it appeared that it had been manufactured in Hell by Satan himself. Minor dents appeared where there was no possible cause - some welds were not completed and serious corrosion was found in some of the lower tubes and there was evidence of repairs from a heavy landing. Neither the original ??? European log book or its Australian counterpart indicate any damage or repairs. Needless to say we were getting rapidly out of our depth so just about every GFA/CASA qualified person in SA were called upon to cast their opinion. It was unanimously agreed the fuselage had been built using slightly damaged steel tube and the prufer had overlooked some weld areas. Colin purchased a 6mm dia. Camera and initially we had NFI what we were looking at. When the offending tubes were cut out the corrosion displayed by the camera could be easily identified. More in a separate post. Any-way, I reckon we'll be ready, by the end of next week, to commence the "ORATEX" covering. In reaching this point we performed the following after the fabric was removed. All of the steel tube structure was cleaned back to bare metal. Corroded tubes were cut out and new tubes welded in place after an inner survey was conducted using a camera. Any surface corrosion that occurred after initial cleaning was scrubbed off using fair dinkum "Scotch Brite" - cleaned with "Prepsol" - and then immediately sprayed with "Poly Fibre" epoxy primer. The reason for this results from my previous experience using the Ceconite process. The primer does not separate from the steel. We've still got to manufacture and fit new rudder cables and re-assemble a few other internal items and the - off we go. Redmond and Steve Kittel have been called upon to assist. Steve recently attended an "ORATEX" covering course and, along with Redmond, will be invaluable assets. Keep watching. Noel. -----Original Message----- From: Aus-soaring [mailto:aus-soaring-boun...@lists.base64.com.au] On Behalf Of dam...@quietflight.com.au Sent: Wednesday, March 15, 2017 3:55 PM To: Discussion of issues relating to Soaring in Australia. Cc: bobgrimst...@compuserve.com Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] Oratex UL600 Bob Grimstead who owns my old Fournier RF4 just recovered his fuselage in what I think is this Oratex product. Have copied him in on this communication. Very good result by my observation. Regards Damien O'Reilly Sent from my iPad > On 15 Mar 2017, at 1:11 PM, Peter Champness <plchampn...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Has any one tried this covering material? > > IS there an agent in Australia? > _______________________________________________ > Aus-soaring mailing list > Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au > http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring ----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2016.0.7998 / Virus Database: 4756/14117 - Release Date: 03/14/17 _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring
