Avionics News March 2014 - 48

CREATING THE PERFECT AVIONICS SUITE
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"No customer is going to want to look at his beautiful
new glass cockpit and see it surrounded by older, weathered
and faded control heads and instruments," Wilson said.
"Those little things can make a huge overall difference to
the final product. Now is the time to touch all the individual
items throughout the cockpit.
"We do a lot of glareshield updates when we do new
panels. They're usually sun damaged and get a going over,
and we also suggest replacing the old annunciator light set
with a new LED package. It's much cooler and has greater
reliability. That's very popular with King Air and Citation
owner/operators."
Another thing to examine is the aircraft's overall electrical system, including its battery and alternator in particular.
These new panels can be power-hungry beasts.
"Batteries are an important component for today's avionics," Jacobson said. "When the battery gets weak, all kinds
of strange things can happen to new avionics and displays."
Jacobson explained that he had a recent customer who
had a three comm installation. One of his radios was stuck
in the "transmit" mode, so he couldn't use any of them. "We
did all kinds of troubleshooting on the system," he said. "It
finally came down to the problem being a bad battery. Once
we replaced it, everything worked fine.
"No sense on spending $50,000 on new avionics only to
have the same background noise or weak radio output because of a bad battery or alternator. The customer will just
come back complaining sooner or later."
"Once we have the aircraft taken apart, we inspect every
bit of it - wiring, connectors - anything we find that we
don't like, we let the owner know," Peavley stated. "While
most owners don't like to replace things that are still working, sometimes it just makes sense to do it now. It will save
them money and stress in the long run."
Be careful what you wish for
Admittedly, what shop owner wouldn't like to see three
aircraft in need of panel upgrades parked on their ramp on
a Monday morning? But the hard fact is that would be a lot
more work than the typical shop would want to tackle at one
time.
"Typically, the installations we are doing today take a
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avionics news

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2014

lot longer than the radio swaps we did in the past," Peavley
said. "With the glass and everything that goes into the project, including making sure it's all going in the exact right
place, you just don't realize how much work it really is until
you do it a time or two."
Peavley said one part of the project that shops may not
anticipate is supplying the aircraft's owner with detailed
drawings of exactly what the new panel is going to look like
before you start cutting metal.
"We do detailed CAD layouts and send them to the
customer for approval," Peavley said. "We know we can't
recoup all of those costs on the project, but we have to do
it. That's the only time we can make any adjustments to the
layout. If the owner wants to do something that we legally
or mechanically can't do, we tell them no and look for a
compromise. It can take a lot of additional time."
And that additional downtime is not only keeping the
aircraft in the hangar longer, it's also keeping other potential
customers out.
"The fact is, some shops may not have the capabilities
and experience to cost-effectively do these types of installations," Wilson stated. "If you are a smaller shop and want
to take on installing glass cockpits, it is a major undertaking, especially the first two or three times you do it. There
are just so many variables that aren't always covered in the
avionics manufacturers' installation guidelines. Each aircraft
is so different.
"I've been doing this a long time, and these upgrades
can financially strain and technically challenge a small
shop. You must be careful. Even upgrading an aircraft like
a Baron is a major undertaking the first time you do it. The
project can literally absorb the resources of a small shop for
many weeks - can you afford to do that for one customer?"
While it's clear that extensive panel upgrades can be a
significant undertaking, you really don't have to feel like
you're alone on an island. There are plenty of AEA member
shops that are happy to give guidance and support. And if
you're lucky enough to be in a region where your FSDO
representative actually works with you as an industry partner, they can be a valuable resource.
Yes they are a challenge, but there are a host of new product solutions available. If you and your staff are up to it,
building a reputation of helping your customers create the
prefect panel upgrade could well be your ticket to a more
profitable and prosperous future. q

Avionics News March 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Avionics News March 2014