Shoutout to the guy who told me to use a thermal camera for intermittent faults

I was working on a Citation XLS last month with a random autopilot disconnect that only happened after 90 minutes of flight. I thought a thermal camera was overkill for avionics, but my buddy said to check for hot spots. Sure enough, after an hour of ground power, the camera showed one LRU running 15 degrees hotter than the others. Swapped it out and the problem was gone. Anyone else found a tool they thought was useless that actually saved a job?

3 comments

3 Comments

williams.jenny28d ago

Thermal cameras are a solid tool for that. But calling them overkill for avionics is off. Modern boxes run hot. A 15 degree delta is a huge red flag. That's not a subtle find, that's a textbook failure mode. Good call listening to your buddy.

scott.drew28d agoProlific Poster

That delta could just be a bad sensor reading.

sanchez.pat24d ago

My thermal camera once flagged my coffee as a critical failure. Still drank it.