Avionics engineers seem rarer than plumbers...
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: Midlands
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airpolice, no system is perfect. The CAA approved a report which lead to the removal of overflight restrictions for permit aircraft. The report covered 20 years of accidents and showed that LAA permit machines were marginally better than CofA.
I am currently working on a permit 4 seater which only recently transferred from cofa to permit. Some of the systems have not bean looked at for 10 years plus. I guess the man in a rush was under too much commercial pressure to do a full job. It took us 4.5 man days to sort the port brake out
. We have now installed mode s, 8.33, an EFIS, upgraded the dynamo to an alternator, sorted out a lot of bad wiaring. Still have to put in a USB charging port and an engine monitor but that can be done when the weather is bad. The spats are currently in my workshop. The previous "engineer" had used self tapers 
- will take several days to sort them out to a good standard. None of this work would have been economic under certified rules. The type (DR1050) is currently being tested for its suitability for IFR. I plan to fly her round Europe next year.
Rod1
I am currently working on a permit 4 seater which only recently transferred from cofa to permit. Some of the systems have not bean looked at for 10 years plus. I guess the man in a rush was under too much commercial pressure to do a full job. It took us 4.5 man days to sort the port brake out
. We have now installed mode s, 8.33, an EFIS, upgraded the dynamo to an alternator, sorted out a lot of bad wiaring. Still have to put in a USB charging port and an engine monitor but that can be done when the weather is bad. The spats are currently in my workshop. The previous "engineer" had used self tapers - will take several days to sort them out to a good standard. None of this work would have been economic under certified rules. The type (DR1050) is currently being tested for its suitability for IFR. I plan to fly her round Europe next year.Rod1
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Back in the UK again.
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Stevlup
I think that’s a bit harsh on the first 3 UK companies.
What you have to remember is that this is a 2-way arrangement. From your POV, you want the work carried out. From the avionic company’s POV, they have to be willing to carry out the work for you as they want to make a profit and are probably concentrating on fitting up to date avionics into modern aircraft. They make money on supplying new equipment as well as installing it. You might ask someone to quote, they might not wish to quote as they know they won’t get the business
I can see immediately that you are looking for a cheap fit. I don’t know what you fly but you are asking someone to swap out an old redundant nav/com for a not so old superseded GPS/nav/com (which, at a guess, you will supply yourself?). For some companies, they know, without asking you for more info, that there won’t be any profit in doing that so why waste the money replying? OK, not replying is bad customer relations but maybe they really don’t care what people with small cheap aircraft think about their company. Maybe if you had a King Air it would be a different story but if you had a King Air, you would probably be installing a Garmin 1000 system.
That said, I hear good things about both the companies you have named.
I think that’s a bit harsh on the first 3 UK companies.
What you have to remember is that this is a 2-way arrangement. From your POV, you want the work carried out. From the avionic company’s POV, they have to be willing to carry out the work for you as they want to make a profit and are probably concentrating on fitting up to date avionics into modern aircraft. They make money on supplying new equipment as well as installing it. You might ask someone to quote, they might not wish to quote as they know they won’t get the business
I can see immediately that you are looking for a cheap fit. I don’t know what you fly but you are asking someone to swap out an old redundant nav/com for a not so old superseded GPS/nav/com (which, at a guess, you will supply yourself?). For some companies, they know, without asking you for more info, that there won’t be any profit in doing that so why waste the money replying? OK, not replying is bad customer relations but maybe they really don’t care what people with small cheap aircraft think about their company. Maybe if you had a King Air it would be a different story but if you had a King Air, you would probably be installing a Garmin 1000 system.
That said, I hear good things about both the companies you have named.
Join Date: Apr 2010
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Having spent over £22k with Brian at Bournemouth Avionics - I would be most happy to recommend him. And as you found out - he replies to emails outside of business hours and almost right away.
Join Date: Aug 2005
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No point in naming/shaming UK1-3, but UK4 was Bournemouth Avionics at Lee-on-Solent, and NL was JP Avionics at EHMZ (Zeeland).
