A Maintenance Supervisor reports their Dispatch notified Maintenance Control of a suspected oil leak on #2 engine propeller of a DHC-8-100 that was reported by the FAA during a ramp check. The flight was canceled.

Narrative

Dispatch notified Maintenance Control of suspected oil leak on #2 propeller of a DHC-8-100; reported by FAA during ramp check. Maintenance Controller Mr. X took the call from the crew and made a write-up. Afterwards he contacted Contract Mechanic Mr. Y; who said he would go out to aircraft. While he was on the phone with him; I faxed a copy of our carrier's Maintenance Procedures and Special Procedures to use as a guide to identify what type of leak we had. If it was determined that it was a leak; we could write an Engineering Order (EO); based on that information. While Mr. Y went to the aircraft; I looked up the procedure in the Hamilton Standard Maintenance Manual (H.S.M.M.) 61-10-00 and faxed to our Contract Maintenance Provider; in case the leak required the HUB oil level checked. After dealing with other aircraft problems throughout our system; Mr. Y called back and reported that he had cleaned up the propeller assembly and crew had run the engine and that he couldn't find any evidence of the propeller leaking. He said he was comfortable signing off the write-up; but reported that he had removed the spinner for the inspection and needed the torque value for screws. At that point we told him of the H.S.M.M procedure we faxed to his office.When he returned; he reported to Maintenance Controller Mr. Z; that one spinner screw didn't have anything to hold it; the (nut plate) was gone. Mr. Z had the Mechanic make a write up for missing screw. He installed remaining screws and torqued them; we sent a ferry. Aircraft ferried for repairs. Maintenance repaired two nut plates and also inspected and found no evidence of propeller leaking.