I have never used Autopilots Central myself, but many have and found them OK. If Straubing are good, that’s great news. There is no “fight to death” of any kind. Some people here get traditionally agitated about some topics and make it look like something huge… yeah. Posts by an admin/mod are always a big target. Not much I can do about that… many previous threads on that topic and there is no real solution.
If AC say they have not seen your communications, that would suggest very bad organisation at their end. In this case, don’t shoot the messenger. I posted only what they told me.
I don’t think you are fibbing (why should I?) but your earlier posts did not contain the substance required to see the problem adequately.
IMHO, " they seem to have crashed and burned in the last few months" is pretty clearly saying a company has gone bust, which is why I have phoned them.
The autopilot repair scene is absolutely dire, even more dire than the “non trivial avionics” scene in general, which is why I was concerned about AC having gone out of business. Well, whatever is going on there, they haven’t.
Oh, and by the way, on the question of language issues at Straubing, raised by Peter.
There are none.
The head of engineering, Josef, the chief engineer, Stefan, the a/p man, Martin, and the lovely lady in the office who does the accounts, but whose name I don’t know, all have excellent, idiomatic English. There is absolutely no problem either in communicating in English or being non-German (British, in my case.)
Again, why is the “autopilot repair scene absolutely dire”? Why this badmouthing all the time on this forum?
I think we should value the resources and companies we have in GA and not diss them all the time. This is really a low light of this forum in my view.
achimha wrote:
why is the “autopilot repair scene absolutely dire”?
In what way is sending a servo to the preeminent company in the US in July and getting a quote in November for most of $2000 not dire?
But the service from Straubing was impeccable and cheap.
why is the “autopilot repair scene absolutely dire”?
Because there is so little expertise around in this area. This is because to install mainstream avionics you need to merely understand the interconnections. To repair avionics, you need to understand electronics.
And since most of the autopilot products in question are no longer made, you do need to understand electronics to repair them.
Another factor is that to repair an autopilot you need a bench setup which exercises the unit. There can be a large number of inputs and outputs. One cannot just power it up and probe it (unless the problem is obvious like a blown up electrolytic capacitor). So a large investment is needed in equipment in order to do anything.
And analog expertise is rare these days. One UK company which was a popular choice for repairs lost its servicing capability when the sole man retired. And with HBK’s latest crazy initiative, the options are narrowing.
Anyway, you know all this, so I am just replying to your wind-up question!
There are good companies, there are bad companies and there also good companies that sometimes have a bad day.
I just don’t like these generic statements. They don’t do us any favors.
achimha wrote:
There are good companies, there are bad companies and there also good companies that sometimes have a bad day.
I guess that was my point. Up to recently, the “good company” was Autopilots Central. That was almost universally agreed.
June to November can scarcely be defined as a “bad day”, or at least, it would have to be 134 consecutive bad days (or 93 consecutive bad working days if you prefer).
Which leaves us contemplating whether they have gone from the best to a “bad company”, which was really what this thread was musing on.
Where I completely agree with you is that the “all avionics companies are crap” dog whistle is clearly rubbish. Bournemouth Avionics in Lee on Solent, do superb work to time and budget, and now I have nothing but good words for Straubing.
This thread is about one supplier.
jwoolard wrote:
You may be right, but shouldn’t we also celebrate the rise of Martin’s team at Straubing? They do really good work at reasonable prices, are much closer to home for most of us, and take real pride in solving tricky issues.I’m just a satisfied customer…
I will have to side with Peter on this one, having been left to pay €2000 for totally unnecessary work from Straubing after they received my 3308 which had no display. They claimed to have identified the error as in the lighting control system and recommended it be overhauled at Sandel as this was beyond their capabilities. Sandel were bemused at why such a ‘specialist Avionics shop’ would return an SN 3308 to them for overhaul for $2000 when the actual defect could have fixed themselves within 20 seconds at a cost of max €60 – yes, the bulb was burnt out but unfortunately Sandel charge a $2000 flat rate for overhauls, even for something like a burnt out bulb.
I was naturally unimpressed and discussed it directly with Straubing, even had the work report from Sandel explaining the issue emailed to them directly to prove that the issue was something that even the most junior of technicians should have been able to repair. At first they tried to claim that ‘there was obviously another issue involved’ – which is a load of BS because Sandel never did any repairs apart from changing out the bulb; then they claimed it was a loose connection – which is surprising because we never lost the display before and it’s worked since; with a loose connection I would have expected to see flickering before (and possibly after). I pointed this out at which point – probably in order to shut me up – I was told that ‘they would discuss with Sandel to see if they could at least get some of the bill refunded’ but nada, no feedback, requests for an update went unanswered.
So for me, if they can’t even identify a burnt out bulb, then sorry, they have at least one technician whose skills are sorely lacking.
achimha wrote:
There are good companies, there are bad companies and there also good companies that sometimes have a bad day.I just don’t like these generic statements. They don’t do us any favors.
But if they have a bad day, they should at least put their hands up and not leave a customer having to pay a $2000 bill unnecessarily because they had a bad day, won’t you agree?
Some local info from Tulsa is: “Disorganized. Lots of retirements in the company (and some that should). No clear future leadership last I heard.” FWIW…
Timothy – the firms you find good (and I don’t disagree at all) are pure installers. Autopilot (or any avionics) repair is a totally completely different game. The field is so poorly addressed that a lot of it is done off the books, by “electronics boffins” which the former communist bloc has no shortage of.
The ones I work with in Zurich are both, good installers and repair guys as well. And what I hear from Straubing, they have people with a lot of experience in sorting out old AP’s as well as new ones.
