Life-limited parts are components with a mandatory maximum life in hours, cycles or calendar time — after which they must be replaced regardless of condition. Tracking accumulating life against limits per component, per aircraft, is a core continuing-airworthiness task.
Life-limited parts (LLPs) are components with a mandatory maximum service life — expressed in flight hours, cycles, landings or calendar time — after which they must be permanently retired regardless of apparent condition. The limits come from the type certificate's Airworthiness Limitations Section or ADs and are not extendable by inspection: when the life is consumed, the part comes out.
Compliance requires an unbroken accounting chain per serialised part: total life consumed across every installation, on every aircraft, since new. That makes LLP tracking a records discipline as much as a maintenance one — a part with an incomplete history is legally a part with unknown life, which in practice means scrap value.
Why it matters for flight schools
LLP records are where sloppy paperwork turns directly into money. A component missing part of its usage history cannot demonstrate remaining life and becomes unairworthy — the aircraft is grounded until replacement, and the part's residual value evaporates. Reviews and pre-purchase inspections drill into LLP status precisely because errors are common when parts move between airframes and the tracking lives in binders.
How FlightLogger handles it
FL Maintenance tracks each serialised life-limited part individually — accumulated hours, cycles and calendar against its limit, following the part across installations — with retirement dates surfacing on the due list automatically.
Frequently asked questions
Can a life-limited part be overhauled or inspected to extend its life?
No. Unlike on-condition or hard-time overhaul components, LLP limits are absolute: when the published life is consumed, the part must be retired and destroyed or marked unserviceable. Only the type certificate holder or authority can change the limit itself.
What happens if a part's usage history is incomplete?
Remaining life cannot be demonstrated, so the part is treated as unairworthy and must be removed. This is why component log cards and transfer records matter — the paperwork literally carries the part's value.