O.K., Time to gripe!
I got a POSTCARD from Cirrus today telling me that they had issued SB 2X-57-04. Of course, DLK Aviation (A Cirrus SC in ATL) sent me a note with the same information a week ago! So, 2 gripes:
(1) Why the lag time in telling the OWNER about an issue with the aircraft?
(2) Why didn’t I get a paper copy of the actual SB for my records?
Yes, I know we can get the text of the SBs on-line at the Cirrus site. That’s not the point. The point is that all of a sudden, (1) a SHOP is telling me I have a maintenence issue with my plane before the manufacturer does, and (2) I have to do the leg work to find out WHY I may have a problem! (Oh, and while I’m at it, I had to spend about 5 hours figuring out that I needed an Acrobat software upgrade and had to use a different internet browser just to SEE the @#$#% SB on the Cirrus site!)
Cirrus used to be oh so “Johnny-on-the-spot” about informing us of issues about our planes. What happened? Is this some cheap-ass attempt at cost cutting? Do they think we shouldn’t know or don’t want to know the specifics of what’s wrong with the plane? It P!$$#S me off! Pretty soon, its going to be - “well, you just have to take the plane in for work. Nevermind what kind of work, or how long it will take, or how serious it may be, just do it.” I do NOT respond well to the “trust me, its for your own good” treatment!
I want paper copies of SBs/ SAs/ ADs that affect my aircraft. I want them in-hand by the time service centers have them so I can discuss the details when I call my A&P to schedule my plane in for work. I DO NOT want to have to chase down electronic copies and print them myself. At the VERY least, they should have sent individual electronic copies to us! Are you reading this Ian? (Unlike many owners, but like many other owners, it takes me an entire day just to get to a service center and home again if I have to leave the plane overnight for work. That’s two days wasted if it turns out to be a 1 hour job, plus the cost of the rental car, gas, and meals enroute. Also, if I can wait to have the work done when other non-warranty work needs to be done on the same part of the plane, I save $$ in disassembly / reassembly time. Lastly, this SB has what appears to be a generous compliance time (100 hours or next annual inspection). Not for me. If this spring is anything like last spring in terms of my business flying, I will have logged 100 more hobbs hours by the end of June (6 weeks from now), so getting on the schedule for anticipated maintenence is a “do it right now” requirement, not something that can be put off.
I think Cirrus is moving in the right direction going paperless. The post cards are fine with me. However, it would not take to much effort to also e mail a notification to all Cirrus owners that the SB list has been changed and for us to check the website. (This way you would be notified sooner)
I am sure the mailing of the postcard to the registration of record would still be required since e mail addresses are sometimes not up to date.
But, lets work with Cirrus to cut some cost out of aviation when we can.
Barring that they should make it as easy as possible to get and print SBs off of their website. Their current setup is hardly that. I would envision an online database where you type in your serial number and it gives you a list of all applicable service bulletins and the compliance status of that aircraft for those SBs. It would not be that hard to do and would be immensely useful to their customers.
In addition to this new practice Cirrus has shut off access to routine SB completion at non-service center FBO’s. Maybe Cirrus has a reason for that but in my mind there is no reason to fly from Glens Falls or Syracuse to have simple things done like checking the #2 manifold. Of course we can have it done at our local but at our own expense. Cirrus should restrict certain SBs to be done at a Service Center because of special training or tools but simple things owners should be able to complete locally. Those SBs are going to cost every owner who is not based at a Service Center a lot of money and time. And how about when I bring in my Saab Aero and they give me the keys to the “car of the day” which might be an Aero or a Saab 2003 wagon so I can complete my business without inconvenience. Somehow aircraft warranty work has relegated owners to a level of inconvenience. I wonder if Mooney or Piper or Socata require service only at a Service Center? I’d like to have a chat with the Czar of new Cirrus policies.
Mason,
Like you, I’m all for cost-cutting… but it would be nice if Cirrus would:
[]e-mail all owners that a new SB or AD has been issued (if they want to be paperless, they need to
go paperless — or at least make an attempt);[]include a line on the appropriate page of the web site with a statement like “To access these documents, you must use BrowserMadness v3.7 or higher and Adobe Acrobat v5.0 or higher.”[/list]These steps just seem like common courtesy.
Don’t get me wrong. In general I’m all for paperwork reduction and saving trees. In this particular instance though, I want paper records and I don’t think its unreasonable for me to want the manufacturer to supply them, especially when the alternative is making me track them down over the internet, where they’re hidden and only available by clicking url links from within a document accessed from a third level menu. That document, by the way, not being accessable itself unless you use the very latest version of a third-party software package running in conjunction with only certain browser software. Then, I have to take the time to download the documents to my computer and print them at MY expense…why?
(1) We’re talking about the maintenance record trail of an aircraft, here. I want to have all the docs in a binder, indexed, with a compliance checksheet right in front where an A&P/AI can see them if necessary. The same goes for a prospective buyer or buyer’s mechanic, who may know about the “thingamagidjet” mandatory SB from a few years back but have no idea what the SB number is – he’s going to want to see in my maint. log where that SB was complied with and he’s going to need a copy of the SB itself for cross-checking the numbers(remember, there are still VERY few A&Ps out there who have even touched a Cirrus in their official capacity!)
(2) At least three times in the last 16 months (the time I’ve owned my Cirrus), I have taken my plane in for mandatory SB work only to discover that the Cirrus Service Center did not actually have the SB documents, even though these were pre-arranged visits, not “drop-in” maintenance requests. Had I not had MY copy of the SB with me, those 3 3-hour round trips would have been wasted time and money. In another instance at a different shop, I caught the tech actually doing the SB work wrong, but only because I had already read the SB and therefore knew what he was supposed to be doing. I had to point out the instructions in my copy of the SB to the shop supervisor to get the correct work done.
In short, its worth it to me if Cirrus adds the extra $1.00 to some small part to cover their reproduction and mailing costs for each SB. If they’re hurting for cash that much, they can set up a service documents subscription-based publication system.
As for the timing issue, well that’s just me wanting to be at the top of the notification list instead of the bottom when it comes to maintenance issues for my plane. I’m the one who shelled out $200K for the airplane, I’m the one who flies it. I’m the one who’s ultimately responsible for its airworthiness and safe operation. I should NOT be the last one to know there may be a safety issue or other problem with it!
I should point out that I’m referring to mandatory SBs here. Optional things aren’t an issue as long as I am eventually notified of them (and from looking at the on-line index, there are evidently quite a few optional SBs that apply to my SR20 of which I was never informed!)
I love it when you get Passionate about something !!! (especially before 5am — yehaaa ! )
And I agree with you completely - it’s all about effective communication and can transcend any company vis-a-vis their relationship with their customers.
When looking at the Cirrus site, I can see only one way of navigating to the online SB’s, and that is going to the PDF index then clicking on the SB of choice. The problem is that when I click on SOME of the SB’s, I only get the 1st page of the SB. What’s the trick?
It looks like Cirrus needs to update the links in the SB index so that the entire SB is available online for all of the SB’s in the index.
Yes, thats a worst problem then having to download and print them from their
location online.
For example these two SB’s have broken links:
SB 2X-57-03 R1
SB 22-51-01 R2
For example these two SB’s only have page one of the SB:
SB 2X-71-04
SB 2X-32-06
As far as I know, there is no way for me to access the SB’s above, and my
service center does not have a copy of them either. So Cirrus is behind the
airplane on these, and needs to fix up their website quickly.
It looks like Cirrus needs to update the links in the SB index so that the entire SB is available online for all of the SB’s in the index.
Cirrus has made a business decision to print only the first page of some optional SB’s to protect their intellectual property. But they are still trying to figure out which optional SB’s need protection and until they decide have posted only the first page of most.
I agree with Bill in that I also want paper copies of the SBs in my mail as soon as possible!
For those who said something about “going paperless ist the right thing”…hey, we aren’t going paperless by that because we want the paper in our hands to discuss it with our mechanics. Thus we are going to print it! It’s just one more task being transferred (“outsourced”) from the producer to the customer. A damn old trick and everybody knows what time but also money it would cost if everybody printed their own service bulletins. Hey, this doesn’t save money at all!
What this does is it effects the communication between the company and its customers. While this has always been Cirrus’ biggest flaw with its european customers like us, they don’t seem to learn from it.
Phil
N199CD
Did Netscape fix page 2 and 3 being missing from this SB? SB 2X-32-06
I tried with Mozilla and Acrobat it didn’t work at all. I then did an FTP of the entire file and ran it with Acrobat 5.1. There is only 1 page in the file. The problem is with Cirrus not your software.
I personally have no issue with electronic distribution and have no problem with them protecting their IP.
BUT, if they don’t send it to us AND won’t make it available electronically, I guess I need ESP to figure out what to do. That really is unacceptable. For those of us with planes out of warranty or others that just want to make informed decisions on what optional SB’s we want done or want to use other options than Cirrus service centers to do the work (at our own cost), we have the right and frankly the requirement to get this information.
This action potentially encourages unsafe behavior (although one could argue it would be mandatory if that was the case) or sets us up for high operating costs. Either one is not in the spirit of safety or customer service and not the company I have come to respect. COPA should press this point home with Cirrus. We deserve the SB’s in one form or another. And electronic or email is fine with me, I do want them to improve their productivity. My .02 anyway.
I’m with you Roger, I don’t care if I get them electronically or not. But if the trend is electronically, then Cirrus should make them ALL available electronically.
What intellectual property is involved in adding countersunk washers to the nose wheel pant screws?