The Hi Lok Fastener (HL1013-6)
In late February, 2016, Seattle attorney Blaine Gibson found a piece of aircraft debris near a sand bar off the coast of Mozambique (East coast of Africa). Gibson had traveled there with the intention of simply being a tourist, but decided to rent a boat to do a little beach combing in the hope of finding debris from MH370. In the unlikely short time period of an hour or so the boat's skipper spotted something, and Gibson and crew pulled it from the water. It certainly looks like aircraft debris. It should be mentioned that the sand bar area the skipper "guided" Gibson to was known to be an area where debris of all sorts tended to congregate.
Gibson and the debris find are pictured below. The inset map shows that the new debris find is almost directly West of Reunion Island where the first piece of confirmed MH370 debris, a flaperon, was found earlier. Gibson's find is believed (by knowledgeable bloggers) to be from the area of the right hand side of the horizontal stabilizer. Neither this location on the aircraft nor the fact that Gibson's find came from a 777 aircraft have been officially confirmed (as of March 17, 2016).
http://qz.com/630093/how-a-piece-of-flight-mh370-may-have-washed-up-on-a-beach-in-mozambique/
Very close to (just below) the 'N' in 'NO STEP' a fastener head can be seen which did not become dislodged from the debris.
The HL1013 is a standard marking specification for a Hi Lok (trademark owned by Hi Shear) pin type fastener. As shown in the Hi Lok specification linked below, the fastener is a titanium pin type. The -6 is a diameter designator which refers to the pin diameter in increments of 1/32". In this case -6 => 6/32" = 3/16" diameter.
http://www.aviaquip.com.au/pdf/hiloc/hl1013.pdf
From another specification control drawing it can be inferred that the VS marking designates the manufacturer to be Voi Shan, a well known manufacturer of hardware of this type along with installation tools of various kinds.
Note the "Arrangement optional" annunciation at the bottom of the drawing above. The manufacturers designated in the drawing are:
"hs" - HI-SHEAR
"VS" - VOI SHAN
"SPS" - STANDARD PRESSED STEEL
The V after the trademark indicates titanium, but omission of the V after the trademark is optional. Likewise the first dash number (i.e. -6) is most often placed after the HL1013 part number.
Voi Shan is no longer an independent active entity in California, but fasteners are still sold under the Voi Shan brand (see change of ownership progression in the last paragraph below).
http://www.corporationwiki.com/p/ovmre/voi-shan-manufacturing-company-inc
The company made news in the late 1980's due to alleged quality control lapses (and fraud).
http://articles.latimes.com/keyword/voi-shan-company
1994 earthquake damage and subsequent closure.
https://www.dtsc.ca.gov/SiteCleanup/Projects/upload/Voi-Shan_FS_dRAW.pdf
Direct calls to the phone numbers provided in the Voi Shan documentation were greeted with courtesy and respect despite the unusual nature of my questions. The initial contact phone numbers, of course, lead to people in a sales role. They promptly directed me to a technical support engineer.
Despite several changes of ownership (Voi Shan -> Fairchild -> Banner -> Alcoa) I was told that the markings on Voi Shan manufactured fasteners have remained the same. Voi Shan simply became the Voi Shan Division of the new owning entity. I was asked not to publish contact names because this type of information needs to be cleared by the legal department in order to constitute an official release of information. I will abide by that. So while I believe this information is accurate, it is not official.
