A key feature in the Japanese car manufacturers (Acura, Lexus, Infinity) late ‘80s second wave ’assault’ on the German and US manufacturers was making the dealer experience better, but unlike Mercedes and BMW their philosophy includes designing the vehicle so it rarely needs to be repaired or serviced. I buy their cars for that reason, plus planes that are easy to own by virtue of being designed for serviceability and infinite life. My car has been to the dealer only a couple of times in 225,000 km and is still on the original hoses and belts, along with almost everything else. It will likely never need a lot of dealer attention until the day I toss it.
The existence and requirement for a huge, well funded and well trained service department is not an asset in my mind, although by virtue of close association with a BMW bike dealer, I understand it’s where that dealer makes his money. In an odd turn of psychology, there’s a segment of the market that at least for now is willing to spend more to service and repair their expensive new vehicles, even when logic says its a flaw when compared with similar vehicles that require less attention.
Airplanes are anyway something completely different than either car philosophy, at least to me, and infinitely more satisfying: something you should be able to buy and maintain without too much trouble, without reliance on any dealer and without inevitably needing to throw it away some day.
You got away lightly with the shop I think you refer to
No, it was not RGV. I was very satisfied with RGV’s services.
As have I been. I know they get a lot of stick on here but I have found them to be very good. Every organisation has the odd bad job or problem. But judging on a single data point, either positive or nergative, is a mistake.
The training perception on this forum is that there is no training required for aircraft maintenance company’s, this is a bit wide of the mark.
You won’t get Diamond, Austro engine or Theilert service centre status without sending staff on a training course or buying the required service tools.
these courses are short and provide all the training to maintain the equipment but not enough to repair composite structures, if you get a hole punched in the wing of your Diamond or Cirrus by a passenger dropping baggage on the wing it won’t be the big maintenance shop with flash offices and potted plants that will repair the aircraft, they will quietly ship it out of the door to one of the few expert companies in the field…………. But they will try to pretend that they can do the job !
You won’t get Diamond, Austro engine or Theilert service centre status without sending staff on a training course or buying the required service tools.
But you get the right to service those aircraft without any manufacturer approval. Everything sub 2000kg can be had with a ballpark approval.
@achimha:
That is only true, if there are published and certified maintenance or repair procedures. If a repair includes procedures not covered by the manufacturers documentation, it has to be developed by a design organisation or the manufacturer and, for some cases, be approved by the agency.
Achimha.
If you are not a service center for these engines you can’t get the software to check the engines for faults, clear fault messages when you have fixed defects and send the downloaded data to the manufacturers that is required for factory support and warranty.
While yourstatement about aircraft below 2000Kg may be true in Leagal terms it is a non starter in the real world.
I hope it stays that way because I don’t want to see flight safety compromised just to advance the career of some EU political pigmy, the idiots have already done this in the car business, the data that the manufactures have been forced to release is now being used by criminals to disable the security systems of high end cars so they can be stolen. Yet another case of unforseen conciquense by the intellectually and reality challenged self appointed Brussels elite.
If you are not a service center for these engines you can’t get the software to check the engines for faults, clear fault messages when you have fixed defects and send the downloaded data to the manufacturers that is required for factory support and warranty.
That actually diminishes the value of aircraft equipped with such engines because you depend on certain maintenance organizations and their policies. What if the manufacturer issues a decree prohibiting its service centers from doing anything if the engine is past TBO/TBR? With a Lycoming/Conti I can get service everywhere and Lyco/Conti can’t do anything to prevent that. You don’t even need their parts or expertise. Of course what you get is a low tech product designed to be maintained by low qualified staff but it’s a major advantage in aviation, giving the long life of the average GA aircraft.
the idiots have already done this in the car business, the data that the manufactures have been forced to release is now being used by criminals to disable the security systems of high end cars so they can be stolen.
I completely disagree. That was one of the smartest regulations from Brussels as it has created real competition among the maintenance organizations. If I buy something, I own it and ownership includes being able to have it serviced the way I want and do with it whatever I like. The car manufacturers used the electronic interfaces to increase their profits from maintenance. Renault even went further and built a system into certain cars that allows them to remotely disable it should you fail to pay your lease.
One example that shows the idiocy of this orwellian dream of car manufacturers: the VW Passat needs a special programming to open the brake pads so that you can replace them. A VW dealer charges you several hundred Euros for that. I did it with a friend for just the parts cost and a Bluetooth OBD II. I’m really grateful that the EU stopped this oligarchy.
I am not sure how well the car v. plane comparison with the ODB2/Canbus stuff stands up.
On a plane, you have a simple (well, simple to anybody who has a brain) airframe which has nothing to fiddle with, and only the engine needs special expertise in the case of the diesels.
In a car, one rarely has to fiddle with the engine (except when reflashing the ECU to make it make more power etc, but all the recent ones are encrypted so all you can do is insert a “data modifier” dongle into the sensor connection) so most of the stuff one wants to fiddle with is connected with accessory behaviour i.e. the “airframe”. For example in my VW I reprogrammed the DRLs, the lock/unlock beep, the passenger door auto unlock, etc – using an old and probably bootleg copy of VAG-COM and a 20 quid Canbus cable, all from Ebay.
From what I see here in the UK, almost everybody with a Diamond takes it to a Diamond dealer for anything to do with the engine, because some of the standard shops don’t even know where the dipstick is. Whether that is a good thing depends on whether you are based near a Diamond dealer and whether you ever fly very far away.
It’s pretty similar with glass cockpits actually! A G500/G1000 cannot be touched by anybody but a Garmin dealer (except most superficially) so again the Big Q is whether you ever fly very far away. On my long trips I keep seeing a very strong correlation between how far somebody has come and how non-glass their cockpit is. Of course a correlation does not prove a causal relationshop, but…. 
I would never install any avionics which I could not 100% configure myself. Too much being bent over a barrel…
If I buy something, I own it
I agree but I think most software companies would disagree I had the dongle on a $20k FPGA software package break and they washed their hands of it. I got a Russian programmer to crack it and carried on using it for a few more years…
This is getting to be a bit of a circular argument, on one hand people want to be able to bypass the service centre network of places that have the factory tools, support & training…………….. And on the other hand people are always slagging the quality of GA maintenance.
The reality of the situation is that companies have to invest in traning of staff and equipment to provide a quality service and they must see a return on this investment or they will turn to other income sources forcing you to an ever decreasing number of providers.
It’s pretty similar with glass cockpits actually! A G500/G1000 cannot be touched by anybody but a Garmin dealer (except most superficially) so again the Big Q is whether you ever fly very far away. On my long trips I keep seeing a very strong correlation between how far somebody has come and how non-glass their cockpit is. Of course a correlation does not prove a causal relationshop, but….
Interesting argument. I would propose the opposite. Garmin avionics do need a dealer but I think these are now available almost anywhere in the developed world. Whether jet or GA given the predominance of Garmin now. I think your observation is more likely just a reflection of how old the European GA fleet is. It is not the case in the US for example.
