FAA Investigation Centers on Van Nuys Firm : Probe Puts Spotlight on Bogus Plane Parts
Last week, it was disclosed that Boeing has installed more than 2,000 allegedly bogus ball bearings in its commercial jets from April, 1986, through January, 1988. If proven true, it would probably be the largest example of a trend toward counterfeit parts that aeronautical experts say is now a real threat to passenger safety.
The allegedly counterfeit parts were sold to Boeing by Alliance Bearing Industries of Van Nuys. The FAA is investigating whether the parts are a safety risk and how they got into Boeing’s planes.
Boeing has declined to say how many of their 737, 747, 757 and 767 models contain the parts under investigation or to which airlines the planes were sold. Boeing said its own investigation has not turned up any safety violations. But the company said it was continuing its investigation.
The allegedly counterfeit parts were first mentioned publicly in a July 28 lawsuit filed in U.S District Court in Los Angeles, by Torrington Co., a Torrington, Conn.-based ball bearings manufacturer, against Alliance Bearing Industries. Torrington, which is owned by Ingersoll-Rand, sued Alliance for trademark counterfeiting, among other charges.
Alliance has denied the allegations but admits that some of the bearings it sold to Boeing were not the bearings the labels said they were. Alliance says the alleged counterfeiting was the work of one employee, Valentino Flores. The company later dismissed him. Flores refused repeated requests for an interview.
‘Serious Problem’
Since the airline industry was deregulated in 1978, problem parts have cropped up with increasing frequency. “It is a very serious problem,” said Paul Powers, safety and certification director of Bell Helicopter Textron in Fort Worth, Tex. “And it’s a growing problem.”
The Alliance-Boeing incident is the third case of alleged counterfeiting involving parts distributors in the San Fernando Valley.
The most celebrated case involved William Allred--ex-husband of feminist attorney Gloria R. Allred--and his North Hollywood company, Donallco. Allred was indicted by a Texas federal grand jury in January, 1987, for selling bogus engine parts to the Air Force for its C-130 transport planes. Last October, he was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and four counts of making false statements to the government.
Christopher G. Caldwell, Allred’s attorney, has appealed the five-year prison sentence Allred received and filed a motion for reduction of sentence. Donallco maintains a North Hollywood office, but Caldwell says it isn’t doing any business. “They can’t do any business with the U.S. government at this time,” Caldwell said. “And most of the assets of the corporation have been sold.”
Another case involved Execuair Corp. in Canoga Park. The company and its president, Laurence Manhan, were indicted by a grand jury in Oklahoma in June, 1986, after federal prosecutors alleged that they had sold the Air Force counterfeit valve actuators.
The valve parts are designed to cut off fuel in emergencies to prevent explosions in C-141 jet transports. Air Force officials say Execuair’s parts were poorly made copies of parts made by Whittaker Controls, a North Hollywood aircraft parts-maker.
Manhan pleaded no contest to one count of conspiracy to defraud the government and four counts of mail fraud and was sentenced to five years in prison and fined $14,000. His sentence was later reduced and he served slightly more than one year at Lompoc Federal Penitentiary.
Prosecuting distributors for selling counterfeit parts has proved difficult. The FAA does not regulate distributors. “A guy can be willfully marketing bogus parts,” Powers said. “But he needn’t fear because the FAA has no jurisdiction or ability of enforcement.”
Aviation officials say typically there are two types of bogus or counterfeit parts: an inferior part that is stamped with the name of a more reputable firm; and parts that don’t work correctly but are manufactured to resemble genuine parts.
One reason for the growth of the counterfeit parts has to do with saving money. Airlines, airplane manufacturers and the military have been trying to cut costs and they often select part distributors primarily because their prices are lower than the manufacturer’s.
Typically, a parts manufacturer has a group of authorized distributors who resell the parts to other distributors. There are literally hundreds of parts distributors around the country who specialize in offering fast delivery to an aircraft that is grounded because it needs a new part. For the airlines, fast service is important because a plane sitting uselessly on the tarmac can cost as much as $50,000 in revenue.
Cutting Costs
“Dollars are tight and the airlines are looking for cheap ways to get things done,” said C.O. Miller, retired chief investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board. “That’s how bogus parts get into aircraft.”
Often, counterfeit or substandard parts look just like the real thing. “Bogus parts are very difficult to detect,” Powers said. “To determine if a part is bogus, very often you have to do destructive testing. It’s like determining if a match is good. You strike it and find out it’s good. But it is not a very profitable way of doing things.”
Plane manufacturers and the airlines test only a percentage of the parts they buy. The more critical the part, the higher number of parts that are tested.
But in Boeing’s case, testimony from a lawsuit filed in U.S District Court in Los Angeles indicates the bearings sold by Alliance were obvious counterfeits.
In court papers, a Torrington engineer, Alan Gabrielson, said the alleged counterfeit bearings had numbers and names whose order was reversed from that of Torrington’s legitimate bearings. Also, the alleged counterfeits had cadmium plating while the real bearings do not. And the sizes of the bearings did not match the company’s specifications. Finally, Gabrielson said, the allegedly bogus parts were packaged in brown cardboard boxes, not the green and white boxes Torrington uses for commercial aircraft customers.
According to court papers, the parts were actually made by a Japanese company--IJK--and were stamped with marks that identified them as Fafnir bearings. Fafnir is one of Torrington’s brand names.
No Link to Crashes
Despite the apparent proliferation of phony parts, the FAA says that no plane crash has been directly linked to a bogus or counterfeit part.
But the lack of airplane accidents caused by bad parts is not necessarily as reassuring as it sounds. Because counterfeit parts are usually small, they usually don’t survive a crash, leaving little evidence in their wake for an investigator to examine. “Most of them burn up,” said Anthony Broderick, associate administrator of aviation safety for the FAA in Washington.
According to the FAA, there have been several helicopter accidents that have been caused by phony parts.
Bell Helicopter Textron, the world’s largest helicopter manufacturer, prints a 50-page manual that tells owners how to identify phony parts. The manual contains pictures of confiscated counterfeit parts and the details of the damage they caused.
One case in the late 1970s involved a bogus clutch drum that failed in a helicopter as the pilot was taking off over a 125-foot cliff. The helicopter plunged to the ground and the pilot’s back was broken in three places.
