I am going to guess it's a body filled seam between top and bottom skins. Not a structural issue. The advice to enlist Diamond is a good call but I think you are ok.

“What airline's operations center told a pilot to land over MGLW?“

None. The decision is the Captain’s alone. He is the final authority and solely responsible.

For a frame of reference. The 747-8 MGTOW IS 967,000# MLW is 763,000#. Burn the first hour is probably around 25,000#. You would have to jettison or burn over 200,000# of fuel. Not too hard to believe. You would have to fly 4-5 hours to get below landing weight or the fuel can be jettisoned in a rel...

My duke pump didn't make any noise. The Weldon does. I haven't torn things apart to investigate it. I think I will soon.

I think by it's nature of being an aerodynamic change it won't qualify for minor.

I also expect to hear about an "unapproved parts notification" regarding this at some point.

This would likely point to the indirect cause of the accident. What he exactly did wrong probably doesn't matter much. "The pilot held a private pilot certificate, and although he held type ratings for the Grumman G-111 Albatross and Learjet, FAA records did not indicate that he held a type rat...

What pump do you have? My new replacement pump makes horrible radio noise.

I think that this is a pretty clear case of an unapproved part being sold and installed. While your IA may not take issue with it, the owner does share responsibility for the airworthiness of an aircraft. It may be small enough to fly under the radar or it may be a problem in a post-crash investigat...

I may . I’ll look in my log

I believe I had to get an DER to sign it off.