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Why does nobody talk about the drain masts on the Airbus A320 family collecting so much crud
I was doing a walkaround on an A320 at Ontario International last month and noticed the forward drain mast had a big blob of dark buildup right at the outlet. Went back through the log and found three write-ups in two months about water dripping near the forward door, all signed off as no defect found. Pulled the mast and the internal screen was half plugged with dried lav fluid and dust, cleaned it out and the drip complaints stopped. Has anyone else run into this on the A320 or is it just the dry air out here causing it?
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the_thomas6d ago
A buddy of mine ran into the same thing on a 321 out in Phoenix, three drip calls in a month and every one came back NFF. Turned out the screen in the forward mast was caked solid with that dried blue junk, and once he pulled it and cleaned it the drips stopped cold. Funny how all that buildup gets blamed on the dry air when it is really just a plugged screen that nobody wants to pull.
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henderson.kim6d ago
Dry air catching the blame again, poor guy never stood a chance. Man it's always the same story, NFF on the write-up and the real problem is a screen that looks like it hasn't seen daylight since the plane rolled off the line. Nobody wants to pull a drain mast when it's twenty degrees out on the ramp, so the drip gets signed off and the crud keeps stacking up until it clogs solid. Maybe the A320 should come with a little warning sticker: screen may contain mystery fluid, wear gloves.
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