Investigating Material Failure Forensics Engineering
Summary
TLDRElvis Tepush, a forensic engineer at RJ Watering Company, investigates material and mechanical failures to determine their causes. He explains a case study involving the crash of a helicopter due to a tail rotor failure, which resulted from improper maintenance and lubrication. His team's investigation helped the insurance company recover losses. Tepush emphasizes the value of forensic engineering in providing answers, reducing uncertainty, and improving safety. By identifying the reasons behind failures, they aim to prevent future accidents, reduce injuries, and lower costs through improved processes and regulations.
Takeaways
- đ ïž The speaker, Elvis Tepush, is a forensic engineer at RJ Watering Company with a background in mechanical engineering and a PhD from UBC.
- đ The focus of forensic engineering is determining the cause of failure in materials, machines, designs, or processes.
- đ The range of failures investigated is wide, from small plumbing components to entire airplane and helicopter fuselages.
- đ A case study of a Bell 206B helicopter crash is used to explain the forensic investigation process, where a tail rotor failure caused the crash.
- đ„ The investigation revealed that misplacement of a cork led to poor lubrication in the tail rotor drive quill, causing overheating and eventual failure.
- âïž The maintenance firm responsible for the tail rotor was found to have improperly maintained the component, leading to the accident.
- âïž The insurance company pursued litigation to recover costs through subrogation, and the court ruled in favor of the client, awarding full compensation.
- đ”ïžââïž The forensic investigation was able to prove the maintenance firm's fault, even though they argued the cork placement was correct.
- đ§ Forensic engineering often deals with uncertainty, but the goal is to provide clarity and factual accuracy in complex cases.
- đ§ The ultimate value of forensic engineering is in preventing future failures, injuries, or deaths by improving manufacturing, inspection, and safety policies.
Q & A
What is the profession of Elvis Tepush, and where does he work?
-Elvis Tepush is a forensic engineer working at RJ Watering Company.
What educational background does Elvis Tepush have?
-Elvis Tepush has a background in mechanical engineering from the University of Manitoba and a PhD from the University of British Columbia (UBC).
What is the primary focus of forensic engineering according to Elvis Tepush?
-Forensic engineering focuses on determining the cause of a failure in a material, machine, design, or process, whether itâs a small component or a large structure, such as an airplane fuselage.
Can you provide an example of the range of failures that forensic engineering investigates?
-Forensic engineering investigates failures ranging from small plumbing components causing $300,000 in water damage to airplane or helicopter fuselage failures that involve loss of life and property.
What happened in the case study involving the Bell 206B helicopter crash?
-The helicopter experienced a loss of tail rotor authority, which caused the pilot to perform an emergency auto-rotation landing. While the pilot survived, the helicopter was destroyed.
What was the cause of the helicopter crash as determined by the investigation?
-The cause of the helicopter crash was the failure of the tail rotor drive quill, which stopped functioning properly due to sub-optimal lubrication, leading to overheating and material breakdown.
Why did the investigation focus on the maintenance of the tail rotor drive quill?
-The investigation focused on the maintenance because the quill had been recently serviced, and the incorrect placement of the cork during maintenance was suspected to have led to insufficient lubrication.
What defense did the maintenance firm present in the helicopter case?
-The maintenance firm argued that the helicopter flew for a significant time before the accident, which they claimed proved that the cork placement was correct and that the crash moved the cork.
What was the outcome of the legal case for the helicopter crash?
-The client of Elvis Tepush was awarded full compensation, including helicopter replacement costs, loss of business income, expert fees, and interest, as the judge ruled that the investigation should have ended much earlier.
What is the broader value of forensic engineering according to Elvis Tepush?
-Forensic engineering provides answers to those affected by failures and helps prevent future incidents by influencing changes in policies, manufacturing processes, inspection criteria, and material requirements, leading to fewer losses, injuries, deaths, and lower insurance costs.
Outlines
đ Forensic Engineering and Case Study Overview
Elvis Tepush, a forensic engineer at RJ Watering Company with a background in mechanical engineering and a PhD from UBC, discusses his work in determining the causes of various material, machine, and system failures. His team investigates a wide range of failures, from minor plumbing issues causing significant water damage to large-scale aviation disasters involving loss of life and property. The goal is to understand the underlying causes of these failures through thorough investigation. One example he provides is the crash of a Bell 206B helicopter, where a loss of tail rotor authority caused the helicopter to crash. Fortunately, the pilot survived, but the helicopter was destroyed, prompting an insurance investigation to determine liability.
đ Tail Rotor Drive Quill Failure: Cause and Legal Implications
The failure in the helicopter crash was attributed to the tail rotor drive quill, which was not properly lubricated due to the misplacement of a cork. This led to overheating and the eventual breakdown of the rotor's components. The investigation revealed that a maintenance firm had recently serviced the helicopter, and suspicion fell on them for improper maintenance. The firm argued that the helicopter's continued flight indicated the cork was correctly placed, but the accident damage prevented a conclusive determination. In the end, the client's claim was successful, covering helicopter replacement, lost business costs, and expert fees.
Mindmap
Keywords
đĄForensic Engineering
đĄTail Rotor Drive Quill
đĄFailure Analysis
đĄLubrication
đĄAuto Rotation
đĄSegregation
đĄMetallurgical Properties
đĄMaintenance
đĄLitigation
đĄAccident Investigation
Highlights
Elvis Tepush introduces himself as a forensic engineer at RJ Watering Company, with a background in mechanical engineering and a PhD from UBC.
Forensic engineering at RJ Watering Company focuses on determining the causes of failures in materials, machines, designs, and processes.
The scope of work includes failures from small components like plumbing parts to large systems like airplane fuselages, which can involve both property damage and loss of life.
Elvis highlights a case study involving a Bell 206B helicopter crash, where the pilot experienced a loss of tail rotor authority but survived due to proper altitude for auto-rotation.
The focus of the investigation was on the helicopter's tail rotor drive quill, which was determined to have separated, leading to the crash.
A key discovery was that the tail rotor drive quill was not optimally lubricated due to a misplaced cork, leading to overheating and eventual failure.
The breakdown of the quill's lubrication and material properties caused overheating, softening, and ultimate failure, resulting in the helicopter accident.
The investigation found that a maintenance firm had worked on the tail rotor drive quill shortly before the accident, raising questions about its role in the failure.
One defense from the maintenance firm was that the helicopter flew for a significant period before the accident, suggesting the cork placement was correct before the crash.
Despite this defense, the judge ruled in favor of the plaintiff, awarding replacement costs, business interruption losses, and even interest due to delays in settling the case.
Elvis notes that this case was unusual because the court awarded all requested damages, an uncommon outcome in litigation.
The forensic investigation revealed the failure early on, yet the opposing side prolonged the case unnecessarily.
Forensic engineering often deals with uncertainty, as investigators have only one opportunity to examine the failure evidence and cannot repeat accidents.
Elvis stresses that the value of forensic engineering lies in providing answers to those affected by material or machine failures, whether personally or financially.
Understanding failure mechanisms can lead to changes in policies, manufacturing processes, and inspection criteria, reducing future accidents, injuries, and insurance costs.
Transcripts
[Music]
my name is elvis tepush i do forensic
engineering here at rj watering company
i have a background in
mechanical engineering from the
university of manitoba and a phd from
ubc
[Music]
we
determine the
cause of a failure in a
material machine
designer process so if any kind of
system fails for whatever reason we try
to get to the bottom of it the range of
types of failures we do is
quite
vast and quite wide
we look at things from
small little plumbing components that
weigh a hundred grams and resulted in
three hundred thousand dollars in water
damage to
entire fuselages from airplanes and
helicopters that
you know involved loss of life loss of
property
and all sorts of other sort of cascade
damage so we can say comfortably at this
point that we
have investigated pretty much every type
of physical failure that i know has ever
been investigated
[Music]
so an example of the type of work we do
is best summarized using a case study
involving the crash of a belt 206b
helicopter that was being used in
logging operations during the flight he
was returning to uh base
and he experienced a loss of tail rotor
authority which basically means the tail
rotor stopped doing what it was supposed
to do
that gets you into an auto rotation
situation
luckily he was in
approximately the correct altitude to be
able to do a successful auto rotation
flare upon landing and
he wasn't killed but the the helicopter
rather was completely destroyed
this investigation focused around the
cause of that accident and
the insurance company
wanting to understand why the failure
occurred and see if it was possible to
get some money back for the loss they
had to pay out and that's a process
called segregation where one insurance
company goes after another insurance
company
[Music]
the wreckage was was shipped to a local
helicopter maintenance facility up north
the investigation
quickly squared in on the tail rotor
drive quill which was found to be
separated
and the tail road drive quill is
the component which pulls power from the
main gearbox and sends some of it to the
tail rotor that component was extracted
from the wreckage and
from the entire airplane we got a box
smaller than a cubic foot and that's
where the tail rotor drive kill was
housed and that's what we
focused our investigation on
[Music]
do
[Music]
summary of the case is that
due to a misplacement of the cork the
tail rotor drive quill was not being
optimally lubricated
this sub-optimal lubrication resulted in
overheating of the
many components that were in the quill
until those components finally
experienced a breakdown of
both the what little lubrication was
there and the metallurgical properties
of the material the softening the
breakdown
you know
ultimately resulted in more heat more
softening more breakdown until the quill
got so hot it failed
and
the accident occurred
[Music]
there was a firm that had done
maintenance on the tail rotor drive
quill quite close before the um
the accident occurred and so it was
decided that they were probably going to
be the primary target
because it was determined that there was
something suspect about the tail rotor
drive quill and how it was maintained
[Music]
well one of their defenses was that if
the helicopter were able to fly for as
long as it did prior to the accident it
proves that where we put the cork was
just fine and there was no issue with it
uh they said it was correct uh placed in
the correct spot but then that the
accident moved the cork to the incorrect
spot it's the typical
sort of um we can't tell what happened
because the
damage due to the accident is so great
that there's no way that this reflects
the status of the evidence before the
accident
my client was awarded
everything they were asking for they got
they got helicopter
replacement costs they got loss of like
business interruption cost
all of our expert fees were paid for
everybody
including
interest on top of
lost income due to the delay in settling
this case in the beginning of a case
every lawyer asks for the kitchen sink
and hopes to get you know maybe half of
that this is one of the few times i've
seen where
literally every single line item that
the lawyer asked for he got because
the judge ultimately uh
rendered a verdict that this thing never
should have gotten this far
that our
examination the first week after we got
this essentially said the exact same
thing we said after three years of trial
and that the
the other side was doing a lot of this
unnecessarily
[Music]
the case study we were discussing um
it was relatively clear-cut and normally
wouldn't be a case because it was so
clear-cut um for the most part the
reason these things are being litigated
or investigated is because
there is some gray
which makes it difficult to
say definitively what the cause of the
failure actually was in a lab you can
you can repeat an experiment a thousand
times you can do your research over and
over and over again until you're really
certain as to why something is is
happening
we don't have that luxury we had we have
an accident something broke and that's
it we don't get to break that over and
over again we don't get to crash that
plane over and over and over again we
get the one pile of evidence and based
on what we're seeing and based on what
we have
we have to do the best we can with it
[Music]
for the most part if something is being
litigated there is a cloud of
uncertainty
and
our job is to then
illuminate the parts of the case that
will help our client while still
maintaining factual accuracy as best as
we
[Music]
can so the value of this work i think is
in providing answers
to people that have been
either you know personally or
financially affected by the failure of
something and ultimately if we
understand
why something failed
we could
take steps to prevent it from happening
uh policies can be changed manufacturing
processes could be changed inspection
criterias could be
improved material requirements could be
sort of strengthened and ultimately it
results in
fewer losses fewer injuries fewer deaths
and lower insurance costs
so i think that that's that's primarily
where the value is in this type of work
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