Aircraft General Knowledge and Maintenance Practices: Systems Overview and Safe Work
Airframe, systems and powerplant overview
Candidates need a working map of aircraft systems: hydraulic, pneumatic, fuel, electrical, flight controls, landing gear, pressurisation and ice protection. Understand how systems interact (for example, hydraulic pressure sources and their redundancy), the meaning of redundancy and fail-safe design, and the difference between normal, alternate and emergency modes.
Maintenance practices
Know standard practices: torque procedures and the meaning of a torque wrench calibration, lockwiring and tab-washer techniques, safetying, fluid line identification, and the use of approved data. Understand the role of the maintenance manual, the illustrated parts catalogue, and service bulletins versus airworthiness directives (ADs are mandatory; SBs are usually not unless mandated).
Safe work
Understand hangar and ramp safety: fuel vapour, bonding and earthing before refuelling, foreign object debris control, lock-out/tag-out for energised systems, and the dangers of hydraulic injection injuries. Know the correct use of PPE and the reporting of hazards.
Traps
- Treating an SB as automatically mandatory; only an AD makes it so.
- Forgetting that bonding/earthing prevents static discharge during refuelling.
- Assuming redundancy removes the need for inspection; it changes the failure mode, not the need for checks.
Rule of thumb
Before any task, confirm three things: approved data, correct tools (in calibration), and the aircraft in a safe configuration (systems isolated, warnings placed).