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Hi all.. So as the title says, the “u shaped” bracket that holds the entire rudder pedal assembly broke from the bottom.. Anyone ever had this happen? I gotta say, after taking this thing apart, this is not a very good piece of engineering.. The entire assembly (rudder/brakes) doesn’t have very much meat to it and is pretty weak and chincey.. This thing broke recovering from a spin by the way!

No issues with mine. There is a 10 year rudder cable replacement requirement that was done right before I purchased my bird. I've not had any issues (or heard of any) before today. So was there someone in the other seat to kick in the rudder and apply brakes? Interested to know how you dealt with the brakes on landing and taxi if you had no way of pressing the one brake pedal.

So the instructor took it up to practice spins alone, in the left seat and felt a pop when he recovered on the last one.. turns out, that was the bracket breaking.. The pedals still worked but they were rotated up and forward slightly and he only used very little breaking getting off the runway so it went un-noticed. Crazy thing is that the plane flew two more flights and almost a third until I caught the issue.. after talking to the other 2 instructors who were in the right seat on those flights, they just thought the students were having a tough time taxing.. That bracket is aluminum and is about $480..

Flight instruction is really hard on airplanes. Ham fisted students destroy radio buttons, headphone plugs, drain the batteries cranking like madmen on engine startup, and in the case of Piper airplanes crack the wing spars enough to get a wing separation mid air on a relatively young airframe. Not to mention the brake pads and tire wear.

My own 1999 DA20-C1 had a prop strike in 2001 following a botched landing in crosswinds by a student. Engine and propeller were subsequently replaced and the engine mount inspected for cracks.

On the DA20-C1, students manage to completely drain the small battery used for the shower of sparks upon startup so much so that the school keeps a bunch of them on battery tender.

My canopy was also cracked from students letting it be blown by the wind.

Now that most of the damage and wear and tear has been repaired, it's going to take me three lifetimes to inflict as much damage to my aircraft. So in a sense it's like a retired Lion that was rescued from a travelling circus.

Yeah this is my 3rd flight school airplane, warrior, sold, Duchess, still have, so I’ve seen a bunch of broken stuff but this one truly surprised me! Don’t get me wrong because I really like Diamond but this entire rudder pedal/brake assembly is not very sturdy and pretty cheesy..

YCCA wrote:Yeah this is my 3rd flight school airplane, warrior, sold, Duchess, still have, so I’ve seen a bunch of broken stuff but this one truly surprised me! Don’t get me wrong because I really like Diamond but this entire rudder pedal/brake assembly is not very sturdy and pretty cheesy..

Do you have a picture of the broken part?
Looks like all diamonds use the same system and I have not heard of any issues, maybe it is related to spin recovery as this would be why it doesn't show up on DA40/42.

I’ll get a picture today

Top of picture is where the two broken attachment points are

Pretty thin to be standing on

okent wrote:Pretty thin to be standing on

The broken part is actually the lower hinge/mount for the brake cylinder.
The rudder would still work normally assuming the broken part did not jam against anything.

I don't think standing on the brakes while doing spin recovery is going to help much anyway.

The part is visually similar (can't be certain about strength etc) to DA 40 and 42. I have DA 40 aircraft here that have been used solely for flight training and have over 6000 hrs with the same rudder parts fitted and non ever reported as failing like the one in the picture.

The main difference would be spin recovery.

Not sure what is taught in this aircraft but I was always taught to keep my feet off the brakes during take off and flight.