Narrative:

Out of service placard for 'altitude right brakes released' ECAM installed in aircraft. After crew inspected logbook it was noted that there were 12 prior resets by maintenance in the last 6 days for the same known issue. When maintenance showed up to the aircraft to address the write up they immediately started doing a random reset. We challenged them on this and said; 'there is a problem and the issue needs to be fixed rather than continual resets.' mechanics agreed and started doing more troubleshooting. It was revealed that a brake servo valve was failing when the landing gear was extended. Mechanics asked if we felt comfortable flying with this condition. We said; 'yes; but only if it could be MEL'd.' after further review it was determined this fault is not an item that can utilize the MEL. Under ECAM warnings in the A320 MEL book it specifically states that 'altn left(right) fault' is no dispatch.maintenance control was notified by crew stating we were uncomfortable taking this aircraft to a domestic airport. It was suggested that we call the chief pilot stating our case. We then called the chief pilot for guidance. He said; 'as long as maintenance signs it off it is a legal aircraft.'maintenance control was then called back with a suggestion from us to swap with another aircraft overnighting. They said; 'no; we can't do that because we wouldn't want to send the broken aircraft to ZZZZ. So apparently it was okay for us to take it to a domestic airport; but not ZZZZ?at this time the 3 mechanics in ZZZ consulted with each other and refused to sign off the aircraft with a computer reset; due to its past and ongoing history.maintenance control was notified and they now decided it was okay to swap aircraft as we had suggested earlier.due to the time frame; flight crew was now at the flight duty period limitation. Crew scheduling called both captain and first officer asking for an extension. Captain and first officer agreed to the extension.to the best of our knowledge there is no limitation for our airline's maintenance that limits the number of times a faulty system can be reset for the same ECAM in a given number of days. Our contract mechanics in ZZZ mentioned that they do work for another carrier also. At the other carrier a fault can only be reset X number of times in X number of days. This seems like a good policy that would apply to this given situation i.e. Continuous write ups with a reset to make the problem go away only temporarily when there is obviously an underlying problem causing the ECAM.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A320 Captain reported the ALT R BRAKES RELEASED ECAM alerted on twelve prior flights and was reset by maintenance after each alert. The Captain refused the aircraft; but would fly with the fault deferred. When they determined it could not be deferred; the aircraft was removed from service.

Narrative: Out of service placard for 'ALT R BRAKES RELEASED' ECAM installed in aircraft. After crew inspected logbook it was noted that there were 12 prior resets by maintenance in the last 6 days for the same known issue. When maintenance showed up to the aircraft to address the write up they immediately started doing a random reset. We challenged them on this and said; 'There is a problem and the issue needs to be fixed rather than continual resets.' Mechanics agreed and started doing more troubleshooting. It was revealed that a brake servo valve was failing when the landing gear was extended. Mechanics asked if we felt comfortable flying with this condition. We said; 'Yes; but only if it could be MEL'd.' After further review it was determined this fault is not an item that can utilize the MEL. Under ECAM warnings in the A320 MEL book it specifically states that 'ALTN L(R) FAULT' is no dispatch.Maintenance Control was notified by crew stating we were uncomfortable taking this aircraft to a domestic airport. It was suggested that we call the Chief Pilot stating our case. We then called the Chief Pilot for guidance. He said; 'As long as maintenance signs it off it is a legal aircraft.'Maintenance Control was then called back with a suggestion from us to swap with another aircraft overnighting. They said; 'No; we can't do that because we wouldn't want to send the broken aircraft to ZZZZ. So apparently it was okay for us to take it to a domestic airport; but not ZZZZ?At this time the 3 mechanics in ZZZ consulted with each other and refused to sign off the aircraft with a computer reset; due to its past and ongoing history.Maintenance Control was notified and they now decided it was okay to swap aircraft as we had suggested earlier.Due to the time frame; flight crew was now at the flight duty period limitation. Crew scheduling called both Captain and First Officer asking for an extension. Captain and First Officer agreed to the extension.To the best of our knowledge there is no limitation for our airline's maintenance that limits the number of times a faulty system can be reset for the same ECAM in a given number of days. Our contract mechanics in ZZZ mentioned that they do work for another carrier also. At the other carrier a fault can only be reset X number of times in X number of days. This seems like a good policy that would apply to this given situation i.e. continuous write ups with a reset to make the problem go away only temporarily when there is obviously an underlying problem causing the ECAM.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.