Japan has virtually zero GA and the Japanese investigators must have been desperate to investigate a GA accident. A landing gear collapse without serious injury would not be investigated over here.
They even created drawings of the taxi route that lead to this accident where nothing happened. Hilarious.
An amazingly detailed report – clearly somebody had a lot of time on their hands.
So Socata screwed up and sent out some 28V TB20s with 12V relays… no surprise there. They upgraded those relays anyway for the GT, because the contacts used to burn out too quickly.
Socata have gone through several different hydraulic pumps over the years of the TB20/21.
A fascinating and very interesting (almost too thorough) report. I note that the electrical/hydraulic pump is the same as used on the Piper Arrow and others; so not all American stuff is bad. Would be good to know if anyone found the incorrect relays fitted to other aircraft.
Looking for any relevant information on the landing gear relays I found this interesting accident report from Japan (2013), which, apart from other findings, questions Socata manufacturing quality and control: Link [ local copy ]
It thus looks like somebody has done a cockup on the part numbers – probably me!
That’s odd because I am pretty sure I took that number off the actual relay. I might have a photo somewhere.
The TB20GT landing gear relays are very different anyway.
This is what came from Socata today. 48 EUR a piece. Ordered as a landing gear relay for TB20 around s/n 900. The number is the same as yours but looks completely different – standard automotive part, made in Morocco.
Check the Kissling.de website…..they make the GPU and Battery relays for my plane….don’t know about for the starter…
Try a GOOD motor vehicle scrappy. (Vehicle Dismantler and Recycler) .Their mechanics might recognise it by sight. Or a car and commercial vehicle components seller (new parts).
None of the car dealers I tried are any good. They all seem to want the vehicle type and then they can look it up.
Valeo themselves don’t want to know.
I used to work for Valeo…..years ago, but not in starters.
Valeo Distribution or Valeo service as I think they now call it deals with aftermarket. In the UK they are in Redditch, try contacting them on this link, see if they can help.
http://www.valeoservice.com/html/unitedkingdom/en/contact.php
