[throwaway0a5e]

This is basically the FAA putting everyone on notice by saying "yo, we found a few that were real bad so y'all gotta make sure you check yours real good." It's a bushing on a control surface, of course it wears over the course of normal use. If it sat for months and corroded slightly the corrosion would cause it to wear faster. This is all perfectly normal. These things are meant to fly so the engineering more often favors dainty little parts that can barely do the job with maintenance tacked on over heavier overbuilt parts that you don't need to check as much.

>I can only imagine that in aviation, there are even more advanced tools, especially with a well-respected corp like Boeing.

Lol. "More advanced" often being something a long the lines of a $100000 dollar go-nogo gauge because you don't trust your employees to read a measuring tool.

>If these flapper bushings are bad consistently,

Bushings are probably (i.e. "almost certainly" but I wasn't in that engineering meeting so I don't know for sure) a wear item and of course they could build beefy ones but the OEM has to balance between weight and maintenance hours. Doesn't surprise me that a little extra corrosion grit in there makes them go out of spec fast.

>if guys are bringing me the same rifle with the same issue over and over, it makes me really uneasy because it's inefficient for my shop, and it points to carelessness from the vendor

The whole value proposition of a Hi-point or a Chinese pump shotgun is that the manufacturing tolerances are wide opens so that your wallet doesn't have to be.

[adenozine]

Suffice to say, nobody in my unit was rolling out with Hi-point.

Thanks for your post, you are clearly much more aware of aviation than I am, and what you've explained makes perfect sense.

I could've clarified that while I wasn't in control of ordinance, I had some level of trust in those who were, as I'd expect the engineers at Boeing have some level of trust in the designs and blueprints they are working on.

I'm curious to know more about the attitude that an engineer might have about their role in Boeing. It often seems that Boeing is being dragged through the mud, and rightfully so in some part due to the 737 MAX. However, I know enough to know that shit often rolls downhill, even onto those who never ate in the first place. I imagine there could be some disgruntled vibes going around in the shops, far from the boardrooms.