Old timer at the depot taught me a trick I still use 10 years later

I was tracing a ghost voltage issue on a 737 pitot-static panel at a depot in Phoenix when a guy who'd been doing avionics since the 70s walked over and told me to stop chasing the meter and listen to the relays clicking instead. He showed me how the contactor was sticking about 2 seconds late, which I never would have caught with my multimeter. Has anybody else had an old hand show you something way outside the book that just stuck with you?

2 comments

2 Comments

dixon.ryan17d ago

Jumping off what @the_sean said, that listening trick is something else entirely. I had a similar thing with an old radar tech who taught me to feel for heat off relay panels instead of probing them. He could tell a failing solder joint just by the way the circuit board smelled when it got hot. SMOKE and heat tell you more than any spec sheet ever will. That kind of instinct is just pure gold, and it saves you HOURS of chasing ghosts with a meter. The 70s guys had to learn that stuff because they didn't have the fancy tools we do now.

the_sean17d ago

Wait, he tracked a sticking relay by LISTENING to the clicks on a 737? That's absolutely insane, I would've been staring at my meter for hours. I'm still stuck on the fact he knew the contactor was pulling in 2 seconds late just from the sound of it. That kind of ear comes from decades of experience you just can't learn in a classroom.