F

Flying Scotsman

Well Known Member
Looking over various parts of the new engine, I notice that Lycoming has some sort of cool swaging or something similar on various safety wires...looks like squarish, sometimes cylindrical, "seals" on the ends of the safety wire, reminiscent of lead seals only much, much smaller.

Anyone else notice this? How did they do that? They look neat and clean, wondering if there's a tool available for doing this...

(I like neat, orderly, clean installations like this :) ).

TIA!

Steve
 
Sounds like this...

Flying Scotsman said:
Looking over various parts of the new engine, I notice that Lycoming has some sort of cool swaging or something similar on various safety wires...looks like squarish, sometimes cylindrical, "seals" on the ends of the safety wire, reminiscent of lead seals only much, much smaller.

Anyone else notice this? How did they do that? They look neat and clean, wondering if there's a tool available for doing this...

(I like neat, orderly, clean installations like this :) ).

TIA!

Steve
Click to expand...

...tool - in the hundreds of $$ I bet....:)

http://www.dmctools.com/Catalog/safe_t_cable.htm

UPDATE

Boy, did I blow the price estimate...:eek:

How about $1300!!

https://www.dmctools.com/store/cata...3099&BACK=/store/catalog.asp?CATEGORY_ID=4583
 
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Yikes! I like neat, clean installations, but that'd buy a lot of regular ol' safety wire to practice on, mess up, replace, redo... LOL!

That looks like what they used...sure does make a pretty installation, but I'll keep that $$ in my pocket (or rather, send it to Van's or ACS or...) :)

Thanks for the info...
 
Safety Cable

It's neat.... it's fairly simple... it's fairly quick........ but when you compare 1.1 Bazillion Dollars for a kit of 4 or 5 and the cables that you have to have, and the ends that you have to have... vs just a couple of bucks for a can of 32 safetywire... the choice is clear to me. Their application is actually limited. There are certain places where you cannot use Safety Cable. I believe it's in shear load applications.

Best
Brian Wallis
 
My DAR considered these temporary "shipping" installations and insisted I remove all of them and install conventional safety wire.
 
Go to your local salt water fishing store and they will have clamp pliers and "mini clamps (crimps)" for making salt water steel fishing leaders and rigs.

Probably max $20
 
If the right tool was used...

tomagin said:
My DAR considered these temporary "shipping" installations and insisted I remove all of them and install conventional safety wire.
Click to expand...

...you might want to refer your DAR to this page....:)

http://www.dmctools.com/Catalog/approvals_recognitions.htm

If Lycoming put them on as "temporary" I'm sure their lawyers would also make them put big red warning labels on each safety cable...:)...and it's not safety wire, it's a custom made mini stranded cable.
 
I've used one of those tools at a job years ago. Neat gadget, but actually somewhat limited. The premade cables with one end installed only come in fixed lengths. I think the main advantage would be in a production environment where there was some sort of requirement for consistent safetying with unskilled or semi-skilled workers.

The tool is actually a little inconvenient to use because you have to thread the cable throught the fasteners, slip on the ferrue, put the nose of the tool over the cable and ferrule, then put the free end of the cable in the tension jaws of the tool, only then can you pump on the handles - and you have to hold the tool nose squarely against the bolt.

I bet a good A&P could wire two bolts faster than you could use the tool.

On the job I did they were considered good enough to keep bolts from getting sucked in a running jet engine - hardly "temporary shipping" fasteners.
 
Do not cut them

A rep from the company that sells these came to the A&P school that I instruct at for a demo. The tool sells for about $300 and the cables can be a bit expensive, but the cables are stronger than conventional safety wire as the wire is multi stranded and not twisted for installation as conventional safety wire is, which induces stress into the wire. The swaged ends are VERY strong and take a lot of tension to pull off.
 
JHines said:
I've used one of those tools at a job years ago. Neat gadget, but actually somewhat limited. The premade cables with one end installed only come in fixed lengths. I think the main advantage would be in a production environment where there was some sort of requirement for consistent safetying with unskilled or semi-skilled workers.

The tool is actually a little inconvenient to use because you have to thread the cable throught the fasteners, slip on the ferrue, put the nose of the tool over the cable and ferrule, then put the free end of the cable in the tension jaws of the tool, only then can you pump on the handles - and you have to hold the tool nose squarely against the bolt.

I bet a good A&P could wire two bolts faster than you could use the tool.

On the job I did they were considered good enough to keep bolts from getting sucked in a running jet engine - hardly "temporary shipping" fasteners.
Click to expand...

We use these tools at the airline. On one count Jonhnathan is right we can saftey two bolts far easier by hand. But where these come in very handy is in confined quarters safteying components on a turbine engine where you dont have room for wire pliers. The tool head for these cables is very small and requires no movement at the end of the bolt. They definatly have there place but our enviroment is not it.
Ryan
 
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