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Is A/C Spruce selling bogus fittings?

GAHco said:
...
Order what you want and will work best for your design, just check to make sure you get what you expected..... From every supplier, period.
...
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Precisely the point of this thread. Thanks Tom.

Tim, please let us know what you find out or decide with the fitting.
 
New development

I have been following this thread with some interest. As a result I went and looked through the fittings that had been supplied by Vans in my kits.

They were all marked AN components...with one noticeable exception. The 4 off AN822-4D fittings in RV7A Fuselage Bag 1966-2 were counterfeit. And they look exactly like the ones shown in the photo posted by Tim when he started this thread....shiney blue finish and no markings.

I raised this matter with Vans and they are obviously concerned. They asked me to send the parts back for examination and promised to replace them.

According to Vans all their stock should carry the appropriate markings.

I'm now wondering if Vans gets their fittings from ACS.

At any rate it may pay for builders to check the above Bag and see what it contains.
 
Captain Avgas said:
I have been following this thread with some interest. As a result I went and looked through the fittings that had been supplied by Vans in my kits.

They were all marked AN components...with one noticeable exception. The 4 off AN822-4D fittings in RV7A Fuselage Bag 1966-2 were counterfeit. And they look exactly like the ones shown in the photo posted by Tim when he started this thread....shiney blue finish and no markings.

I raised this matter with Vans and they are obviously concerned. They asked me to send the parts back for examination and promised to replace them.

According to Vans all their stock should carry the appropriate markings.

I'm now wondering if Vans gets their fittings from ACS.

At any rate it may pay for builders to check the above Bag and see what it contains.
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Very interesting. I don't recall having seen any of the shiny "cast" looking fitting before, but they obviously look very irregular.

I still think one of these days (next annual) I'll probably look at retrofitting my critical fittings with "name-brand" steel components.

Thanks for pointing this out!!
 
Tim,

Just curious... How did the packing slip identify the part? I looked back at an old ACS packing slip I have where I ordered some AN fittings. It does ID the part as "AN Fittings AN825-4D." If your packing slip says something to that affect and the fitting is not a real AN fitting, well.... I would see how Jim Irwin would respond to an inquiry from you about this. In any event, now knowing ACS's position and VAN's position about their fittings having markings on them, I'll buy mine from VAN'S.

Bill Settle,
Winston-Salem, NC
RV-8 Wings
 
FYI, I received a Spruce order today which included two unions with nuts and sleeves, the bags were marked as usual like in Tim's pic but all my parts had AN markings.

Steve
 
A/S Parts

When in Doubt...Throw it Out.

I got a funky looking AN bolt....and so did my friends....turned out OK, but I still wonder why they take such an attitude.
 
AN Fittings from Aircraft Spruce

We have reviewed the comments from the group regarding AN fittings supplied by Aircraft Spruce. We obtain our AN fittings from several different suppliers and have confirmed that our fittings meet AN specifications. We appreciate the business we receive from RV builders and invite our customers to contact us at [email protected] with any questions or comments on any product offered by Aircraft Spruce.
Aircraft Spruce & Specialty Co.
Customer Service Dept.
 
Aircraft Spruce Info said:
...We obtain our AN fittings from several different suppliers and have confirmed that our fittings meet AN specifications...
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I thought it had to have the AN or AS stamp to meet specifications. :confused:
 
That's my understanding too. If it meets spec "except for etc...." then it doesn't meet spec.

What I'm hearing, maybe, is Spruce got some bogus fittings that they unknowingly passed along and that they will be happy to replace them with true AN fittings. Right?

Personally, I've been buying most of my hardware from Tom Brink lately. No reason in particular other than he carries the nutplates I need, and I need hundreds of them. In case anyone's wondering, advertising on VAF works :)

Any chance of doing something with the minimum quantities, Tom? I'd gladly pay a premium (say, an extra $1 "packing" charge for each group of items under the minimum) for the convenience of ordering in quantity + a few other odds and ends I need. I hate having to place a large order with you and then having to buy odds and ends from someone else because I don't want to pay $40 for the 3 bolts I actually need. You've already addressed this but I'm gonna ask again anyway :D
 
jcoloccia said:
What I'm hearing, maybe, is Spruce got some bogus fittings that they unknowingly passed along...
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I'd tend to agree with that.

jcoloccia said:
...and that they will be happy to replace them with true AN fittings.
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I'm actually reading it as "Just trust us" :rolleyes:
 
Email per invitation, cc'd here. A simple question, and I think we would all like to hear the answer.
______________

Dear Aircraft Spruce Customer Service,

Re your post to the VansAirForce website:

<<We obtain our AN fittings from several different suppliers and have confirmed that our fittings meet AN specifications. We appreciate the business we receive from RV builders and invite our customers to contact us at [email protected] with any questions or comments on any product offered by Aircraft Spruce.>>

Could you please explain why the fittings in question do not exhibit the required markings?

Dan Horton
(long time ACS customer)
____________
 
jcoloccia said:
Personally, I've been buying most of my hardware from Tom Brink lately. No reason in particular other than he carries the nutplates I need, and I need hundreds of them. In case anyone's wondering, advertising on VAF works :)

Any chance of doing something with the minimum quantities, Tom? I'd gladly pay a premium (say, an extra $1 "packing" charge for each group of items under the minimum) for the convenience of ordering in quantity + a few other odds and ends I need. I hate having to place a large order with you and then having to buy odds and ends from someone else because I don't want to pay $40 for the 3 bolts I actually need. You've already addressed this but I'm gonna ask again anyway :D
Click to expand...

John, thanks for the Biz and the mention.

We still do not have a minimum dollar order, just a small order charge when the order is less than $25.00 and Minimum package sizes, for the purpose of exactly what this thread was started for, "Traceability".As far as small quantities go, I have tried to make them a small enough to not be too bulky and fit in a decent bin box setup, and large enough for a few man shop to not need to order many packages just to replenish stock. Many shops wish we put more in each pack. I try to keep the balance and be aware of the in house economics of every decision.

FYI as an example an3 bolts package sizes are -3A thru 6A=50, -7A thru -14A=25, -15A thru-24A=10, and the same in drilled except it goes 25,10,5 the drilled ones are typically used in lesser qtys.

Yes, the more items you add to the cart the better the price gets.
(even if they are different items!)

This is due simply to the economics of motion and the fixed costs inherent to purchasing, receiving, checking, packaging, placing, pulling ,checking, packing, invoicing, checking, shipping, processing payment, and collections if necessary. (not to mention possible returns) All of that happens for even the sale of one bag of cotter pins.

When more items are purchased at the same time, We both save money.
We are not trying to replace the suppliers that market primarily to homebuilders, there will be times when they are the best choice for certain purchases. There will be times when we are the best choice.

I am offering within the realistic restraints of economics (mine and yours) One more choice.

And to everyone reading, when you buy from us, we appreciate that choice. :)
 
A/C Spruce fitting update

FYI. Yesterday I received two new "AN" fittings from A/C Spruce. These fittings were the real McCoy. As to the first two I was told to detroy them. To date they have not produced the certification tags which is understandable since, in my opinion, they don't have any.

A/C Spruce made it right by sending me the correct fittings free of charge. I wonder if they will make it right to all the others who purchased the wrong fittings before me?
 
RV4er said:
FYI. Yesterday I received two new "AN" fittings from A/C Spruce. These fittings were the real McCoy. As to the first two I was told to detroy them. To date they have not produced the certification tags which is understandable since, in my opinion, they don't have any.

A/C Spruce made it right by sending me the correct fittings free of charge. I wonder if they will make it right to all the others who purchased the wrong fittings before me?
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Glad to hear that! I was beginning to get concerned by the lack of their willingness to rectify the problem (from what it seemed like, anyway). I wonder if they would've been as responsive had this thread not existed. :eek:

Anyway, I'll continue to do business with them so long as they do good business. Thanks for bringing this to everyone's attention!
 
Thanks Tim!

RV4er said:
FYI. Yesterday I received two new "AN" fittings from A/C Spruce. These fittings were the real McCoy. As to the first two I was told to detroy them. To date they have not produced the certification tags which is understandable since, in my opinion, they don't have any.

A/C Spruce made it right by sending me the correct fittings free of charge. I wonder if they will make it right to all the others who purchased the wrong fittings before me?
Click to expand...
Thanks for the follow up Tim. Good to hear everything worked out!
 
Fittings without AN Markings

Dan,

Thank you for your email regarding our AN fittings. We purchase most of our fittings from Nelson Aerospace and HK Fittings. We did find that we had some fittings that met the manufacturing AN specs but did not have the stamping, and we have requested that the supplier exchange them for stamped fittings. All of the AN fittings we have in stock do have stamping on them.

We appreciate your business and look forward to continuing to serve you in the future.

Best Regards,

Aircraft Spruce Customer Service
 
<<We did find that we had some fittings that met the manufacturing AN specs but did not have the stamping,...>>

Thank you for your response.

The above quote takes us back to the original post that began this thread. You were previously asked (twice) to demonstrate that the questioned fittings did meet AN spec. That request was apparently denied.

Here you state that the questioned fittings do indeed meet the spec. I think we're all willing to overlook a lack of stamping on the odd piece. Are you now willing to provide evidence that they meet the specification?

One more request please; could you identify yourself?
 
az_gila said:
Question ... would any A&Ps on this list have reservations on putting this part on a certified aircraft where the parts manual calls for a ANxxx part?

gil in Tucson
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Yes, I'd have reservations.
I personally would have one of my QA/QC reps take a look at it and give me a yea/nay before I installed that different-looking, unmarked fitting on a customer's $5million+ helicopter.

I can predict what my employer's QA would say, too: "No."
His next action would be to call our Stock Manager and find out what the deal was with the hinky-looking parts. IAW our Repair Station Manual and Operating Specifications, parts like that one aren't supposed to make it to the floor.

I definitely wouldn't install it in my own aircraft.



The FAA has a program to deal with stuff like this - the Suspected Unapproved Parts program. It's not just for certificated stuff, it's for standard hardware, etc. as well.
 
Fittings without AN Markings

Thank you for your email regarding our AN fittings. We purchase most of our fittings from Nelson Aerospace and HK Fittings. We did find that we had some fittings that met the manufacturing AN specs but did not have the stamping, and we have requested that the supplier exchange them for stamped fittings. All of the AN fittings we have in stock do have stamping on them.

We appreciate your business and look forward to continuing to serve you in the future.

Best Regards,

Aircraft Spruce Customer Service
 
Let's assume the re-post from Aircraft Spruce Customer Service was accidental. I'm sure we'll soon have a clear answer from a real person.
 
DanH said:
Let's assume the re-post from Aircraft Spruce Customer Service was accidental. I'm sure we'll soon have a clear answer from a real person.
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You must never have exchanged email with their customer service "specialists". I moved a couple of years ago, and somewhere my old address was in their computer. Every third order or so it would cause my credit card to be declined because the billing address didn't match what the bank has on file. I sent multiple emails to customer service requesting that they fix my address in their system, and got a form reply every time. Regardless of what I wrote in the email, I got the same answer every time, as if they weren't even reading the emails. After 4 phone calls with cutomer support who could not understand that calling my bank wasn't going to fix the problem, I lost my temper and was quite rude to the lady on the phone. Apparently that was the ticket because it was fixed the next day and I haven't had a problem since.

That said, I've never had a problem with their products, and I continue to order quite a bit of stuff from them.

PJ
RV-10 #40032
 
Reply from Prez of Aircraft Spruce.

Got this email from Jim Irwin today....


"Doug:

Regarding the thread on AN fittings, Aircraft Spruce purchases all AN fittings from established manufacturers and distributors, and all fittings come to us with certification that the fittings meet AN specifications. I do not know what more we can do to demonstrate that the fittings meet spec other than our suppliers' certification. As our Customer Service Department stated before, we did receive some fittings that were not stamped, and we have requested that the supplier exchage them for stamped fittings.

Please let me know if you or anyone at VAF has any other questions or comments on the fittings. We appreciate your interest and assure you that Aircraft Spruce remains committed to furnishing aircraft hardware of the highest quality.

Best Regards,

Jim Irwin
President, Aircraft Spruce"
 
To Mr. Irwin

As the originator of this thread I feel like you are being misleading.

You say, "I do not know what more we can do to demonstrate that the fittings meet spec other than our suppliers' certification." That is what started this whole problem. I have requested the suppliers' certification tag three times from your company. To date I have not received it.

I could forget the whole thing if you do two things.

1) Provide the certification tag for the original fitting or admit they got into your system by mistake and that you don't have the certification tag.

2) If the later is true, provide a service letter to those that purchased the "bogus" fitting and provide them with the correct one.

It bothers me that you continue to insist that the original fitting were fine except for the stamp. Show us the cert tag.

What say you?
 
Looking through my box, I see that I have a few fittings as in the second pic, and a few "unmarked" that were probably installed at least five years ago. I have not purchased AN fittings such as these for several years.

Comparing the un-marked to the marked, they both have the same wall thickness, and the inside bore's look alike. Doe's it look like a cheap "knock off"? Not really, as it's nearly identical to another AN "marked" brand that I have, expect for the newer looking finish.

Just an observation, as I have no real answers.
 
I applaud Tim, as I am one of surely very many people that have some of the fittings in question now in my inventory. I'm not planning on installing them, or going to the trouble of finding the invoice (among hundreds) to send them back. Much less, replacing those already installed. I'm still with Tim, and very annoyed that ACS is still convinced that they are fully to spec even though they don't have the proper stamps and aren't providing the paperwork. We pay "extra" because of the paper trail, otherwise we would buy all kinds of stuff from the race shops, and some of us do, knowingly. I would love to see a service letter show up in the mail from ACS asking me to drop 'X' quantity of 'xxx fittings' in an envelope for replacement if not already installed based on their inventory and shipping records. Given the vagueness of the comments from customer service, I bet they have no idea how many unstamped funky looking fittings they have shipped and to whom. Yeah, I'm a little annoyed too, but I'll get over it.

RV4er said:
As the originator of this thread I feel like you are being misleading.

You say, "I do not know what more we can do to demonstrate that the fittings meet spec other than our suppliers' certification." That is what started this whole problem. I have requested the suppliers' certification tag three times from your company. To date I have not received it.

I could forget the whole thing if you do two things.

1) Provide the certification tag for the original fitting or admit they got into your system by mistake and that you don't have the certification tag.

2) If the later is true, provide a service letter to those that purchased the "bogus" fitting and provide them with the correct one.

It bothers me that you continue to insist that the original fitting were fine except for the stamp. Show us the cert tag.

What say you?
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Noticed this pic

I noticed this pic on Brad Oliver's site....By the way good job and great site Brad!

Looks like he got one of them bogus fittings and it is on his flop tube! :eek:
The color is like the one in the subject post and notice no markings.

060803_002.jpg
 
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Maybe

I am not certain? (I am on the road right now), but the stamp could be on the other side. I will get with my Quality manager and have him look it up, and I will try to let you know next week what I find out about the stamping/marking placement requirement.

As for the color difference, there are variations in known certified fittings that are greater than what I see here. I would say the original fitting in question that started this thread had the look of blue semi transparent shiny paint, this one still looks like it was properly anodized.

Lets not jump to conclusions or there may soon have to be an award given for the longest thread! :eek:
 
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Brantel said:
I noticed this pic on Brad Oliver's site....By the way good job and great site Brad!

Looks like he got one of them bogus fittings and it is on his flop tube! :eek:
The color is like the one in the subject post and notice no markings.
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Thank you for the kind words Brian. I saw the picture and thought, "Wow, that looks similar to a picture on my site, oh wait, IT IS a picture from my site!" :D

I did order some extra fittings from Spruce a while back but I am don't think this was one of them, I am fairly certain that this was an original from Van's. The color on the left fitting is darker for sure, but as far as quality goes the parts appeared to be identical. The fitting on the left of my picture doesn't look to me to be near as cheesy as the fitting in the original picture at the beginning of the thread. I can't remember if the other side of the fitting had a stamp or mark, and I am not opening the tank to find out, but if I had felt that the fitting were any lesser in quality than the fittings I am accustomed to, I would not have used it. That's my story and I am sticking to it! :)
 
Brad,

I received my wing kit from Van's a week ago. Some of my fittings are "bogus". I'll email them and see what they have to say. It's likely that yours doesn't have a stamp on it.
 
As I said, if I felt the quality was ANY less, I wouldn't have installed it. IMHO, the picture of the original fitting doesn't even compare to the "questionable" fitting in my picture. Let us know what Van's says.
 
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Last night, I checked my stock of various AN fittings purchased from ACS. About half have "AN" or "MS" stamp, and the rest are the generally darker blue, unstamped ones. One bag has some of each in it, but I can't swear that's the original bag they all came in.

I also remember one AN912-7D reducer I got from ACS last summer that looked like someone had used a vice-grip on the threads BEFORE it had been anodized. http://brian76.mystarband.net/engineJul06.htm#jul27 I ended up not using it. I didn't bother calling ACS customer service about it because my experiences with them before that told me I'd probably come off the phone more annoyed than before I called them.

If ACS is swapping these unstamped ones out for stamped ones, I will contact them and see what they say about it. I know the original poster said he's asked 3 times for some sort of certification for the parts he got, and AFAIK he still hasn't gotten it.

brian
 
I talked to Scott at Van's. They know about the thread on "Doug Reeve's site". He assured me that they're getting the mil spec fittings. Some have stamps and some don't, but all have the same paperwork trail. It sounds like Van's and ACS might be buying from the same provider.

I suspect if enough people are bothered with it and call to complain, Van's and ACS will put pressure to their source to stamp each piece.
 
<<They know about the thread on "Doug Reeve's site". >>

Speaking of which.....I think we all owe Doug a "thank you" for allowing this thread to run. It has to make him squirm a little. VAF is advertiser supported. So are the airplane magazines we read, but you'll never see this thread title in those magazines. Like it or not, that's business.

We must be able to have confidence in the aircraft parts and materials we purchase. The issue is too important to ignore or hide. Thanks Doug.
 
They are no Mil Spec parts

Paul Thomas said:
........
He assured me that they're getting the mil spec fittings. Some have stamps and some don't, but all have the same paperwork trail.
.....
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Interesting comment, since the parts are NOT correct Mil Spec parts if they are not marked....

If that is the extent of the paper work trail, every inspector that signed off even a simple visual inspection needs to be fired!

The drawing defines a Mil Spec. part, and these simply are not.

Perhaps they should just start calling them "Mil Spec Equivalent" parts... :rolleyes:

As I said earlier, I doubt these parts are legal for certified aiplanes, which is a large part of the ACS customer base. Our local aviation supply house in Tucson even gets a lot of his hardware from ACS...

gil in Tucson
 
Some have stamps and some don't, but all have the same paperwork trail.
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That seems bogus to me. What good is a paperwork trail for a part that has no markings on it to differentiate it from millions of visually identical parts?
 
Dgamble said:
That seems bogus to me. What good is a paperwork trail for a part that has no markings on it to differentiate it from millions of visually identical parts?
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For my buissness, I buy alot ($200K+ a year) of AN fitting from repetutable suppliers like Goodridge, H.K. Fittings, etc. Often I have the choice of getting my parts without the stamps...or I can wait often weeks for the parts to get stamped, the paperwork to go through, etc. For my non-certified applications, they have no problem pulling the parts out of the batch before they get stamped and selling them to me. So it is very possable to have quality, servicable fittings with out stamps on them. The color of the anodize has little to do with visual determination of its quality...most of the anodizing specs have a performance specification about thickness and conductivity, the hue of the color is less important. The material, and material surface prep (forged, extruded, machined) plays a big role in the hue of the anodize color, as does the skill of the anodize company in reguards to their pigment tank strength, dunk time, how its sealed afterwards, etc. Would I pull a non-stamped fitting off my aircraft if I knew it came from a reputable source? No. But in reguards to to ACS...they should be selling stamped parts, and aircraft consumers should accept no less.
 
First Pictures

Has anyone really looked at the pictures that started this thread? Take a close look. The fitting without ID is really rough and looks scary! :eek:
That part isn't something I'd want on my plane.....
 
RVadmirer said:
Has anyone really looked at the pictures that started this thread? Take a close look. The fitting without ID is really rough and looks scary! :eek:
That part isn't something I'd want on my plane.....
Click to expand...

Right, the one thing that throws me about the non-certified part is the fact that it doesn't seem to have the tapered down metal at the end of the fitting where a flared tube would go. That one thing I would think makes the part junk. How are you supposed to tighten a piece of tubing against the non-certified fitting?
 
Those are two totaly different parts. One is a 90 degree bulkhead fitting, the other ia a 90 degree adaptor, the side without the 37degree taper is a NPT pipe thread.

lostpilot28 said:
Right, the one thing that throws me about the non-certified part is the fact that it doesn't seem to have the tapered down metal at the end of the fitting where a flared tube would go. That one thing I would think makes the part junk. How are you supposed to tighten a piece of tubing against the non-certified fitting?
Click to expand...
 
G-force said:
So it is very possable to have quality, servicable fittings with out stamps on them.
Click to expand...
Sure, it's possible, but that's not the point...

The point is that the AS (formerly AN) specification in question calls for identifying markings to be stamped into the fitting.
If the fitting is not stamped, IT DOES NOT CONFORM TO THE SPECIFICATION. It's that simple.
 
Without the stamp, you have no way of KNOWING that the part conforms to the engineering limits called out in the spec. That's the whole point of the stamp, to serve as an indicator to the consumer that this part does indeed comform to all the applicable engineering limitations. Without that stamp, you cannot know for sure. It may very well meet those limits - or even exceed them - but there's no way to know that.
 
airguy said:
The whole point of the stamp, to serve as an indicator to the consumer that this part does indeed comform to all the applicable engineering limitations.
Click to expand...

So, what's stopping bogus parts manufacturers from putting bogus stamps on the bogus parts?
 
Paperwork

rv9builder said:
So, what's stopping bogus parts manufacturers from putting bogus stamps on the bogus parts?
Click to expand...

Actually, there are many stamps involved....

One is the marking (could be engraved or stamped) on the part.... the original picture.

The other stamps are the QC stamps on the accompanying paperwork, providing traceability back through manufacturing and lot testing.

These stamps could also be made bogus, but an audit would probably show that. The large aerospace companies do perform regular source inspections/audits, and the producer is also probably ISO (or AS) qualified, which again requires outside audits of his paperwork system.

The paperwork (certs) are an essential part of the system... we small buyers rely on Aircraft Spruce to do that part for us.... hence this whole thread... :)

The system can be fiddled, but the costs are great if you are caught - Federal jail time...

gil in Tucson
 
The two 90? main fuel line bulkhead fittings that I recieved from Van's in my wing kit do not have stamps on them. But they look identical in quality to the two smaller vent line bulkead fittings that do have stamps on them.

Van's is also providing fittings with no stamps....
 
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