Avionics News August 2014 - 15

"Let me be very clear.
The 2020 deadline is not going to change."
Michael G. Whitaker,
deputy administrator and chief NextGen officer for the Federal Aviation Administration

These 222,300 aircraft represent the total registered fleet
including non-operational aircraft. The turboprop, jet and rotorcraft numbers are likely accurate and should carry forward as a
percentage of the total fleet.
Consider the 186,000 operational aircraft, and we currently
need to be upgrading more than 130 aircraft per workday. The
FAA uses a number of approximately 140,000 transponderequipped aircraft for its ADS-B calculations. For the sake of
argument and a conservative approach, I will use its estimate:
We need to be upgrading more than 102 aircraft per workday.
Either way, we are woefully short; currently, we are barely
upgrading 100 aircraft a month.
As presented by the FAA during the 2014 AEA International
Convention & Trade Show, there currently are a little more than
2,000 ADS-B Out systems installed that comply with DO-260B
(1090 MHz) as well as approximately 1,100 DO-282B (UAT)
aircraft. So after five years since the ADS-B Out rule became
final, of the 140,000 aircraft requiring upgrades, less than 2.5
percent of the fleet has been configured.
But why not wait to upgrade until the price comes down?
Again, look at the numbers. There are two things that affect
cost: equipment and installation. Last month's AEA-member
survey results addressed the issue of installations. For the piston
GA community, the labor averages about four workdays (32
hours), with the simplest of systems (stand-alone UAT installations) in as few as eight hours, according to the equipment
manufacturers. I simply don't see these numbers being reduced.
For the turbine community, the average time is 80 hours or
two staff-weeks. Again, when considering the physical upgrades
necessary for GPS and transponder upgrades, I cannot see these
labor numbers being reduced. I do hope labor rates will increase
at least with inflation during the next five years. So assuming
the installation times are consistent, the installation cost will
increase over time. If we assume some efficiency gained by
experience, the increased labor rate should, at best, keep installation costs constant.
The argument that equipment costs will decrease is not logical. If all 140,000 aircraft could use the same single product, the
total sales would be less than 20 percent of Apple's first-day
sales of the iPad II. And compared to televisions, a market
of 140,000 aircraft represents about a quarter of 1 percent of
Samsung's total Smart TV sales for 2012 - not a huge market

when compared to the consumer-electronics industry. Using the
argument that television costs come down after the introduction
of big screens isn't comparing apples to apples. And understand
there are close to a dozen product options for the piston fleet,
which represent three-quarters of the total equipage needs and
allows for a modest, competitive pricing structure.
For the rotorcraft community, the lower-end Part 27 helicopters can easily utilize the Part 23 products with additional oversight and scrutiny for installation data. The Part 29 rotorcraft
tend to use turboprop/turbine category systems; again, leveraging a larger distribution product with aircraft-specific installation criterion. So pricing pressure isn't likely for these aircraft.
The turbine and turboprop fleet have significantly fewer
options and significantly more limitations. Among other reasons
for the limited availability of upgrade options for this family of
aircraft are the unique configuration of most of these aircraft,
which ultimately results in aircraft make/model specific ADS-B
solutions. Again, it's difficult to see any competitive pressure on
pricing through volume sales.
Unfortunately for the 20,000 or so turbine-powered aircraft,
these cannot be simply categorized together. Many of the current-production aircraft solutions are being managed by aircraft
OEM (original equipment manufacturer) service bulletins so
configuration control and service bulletin control can be maintained. Even though we are five years into this upgrade process,
many of these aircraft don't yet have solutions. The estimated
availability date for their solutions range from fourth-quarter
2014 to late 2015, leaving barely 1,000 workdays left to service
20,000 aircraft.
As a result, the pressure to get those aircraft managed in the
remaining time means, at the very least, aircraft owners need
to reserve an upgrade position before scheduling pressure
starts to push aircraft past the Dec. 31, 2019, final equipage
date. This means the shops will need to embrace long-term
planning and scheduling as we get closer to the deadline and
scheduling pressure continues.
As we said, the industry is ready, willing and able to meet
the mandate. But we must communicate to aircraft owners that
scheduling pressure will increase the closer we get to the deadline; the equipment and installation costs are about as good as
can reasonably be expected. And in the FAA's own words, "Let
me be very clear. The 2020 deadline is not going to change." q
avionics news

august

2014

Avionics News August 2014

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