After being tasked with hydrodipping all the interior components for a Citation XLS refurbishment in just 10 days, Duncan Aviation shared that the company’s finish experts have delivered on their promise.
The fleet operator and first-time Duncan Aviation customer knew that the aircraft couldn’t be down for more than 10 days, yet they wanted a completely new look.
“With any of our customers, the challenge is always downtime,” says finish shop team leader Chris Nelson.
“When their plane is down, their fllght schedules can be impacted greatly, and in this case, they simply couldn’t be down for more than 10 days.
“That was the challenge put before us. We accepted and knocked it out of the park.”
Nelson and his team hydrodipped the lavatory cabinet, vanity, aft dividers, pocket doors, drink rails, tables, left-hand forward galley, and right-hand forward entertainment cabinet with a design that was similar to a flat-cut walnut veneer with a grey background.
“We had all of the tools and experience we needed to complete the job, just not quite what we needed to get it done in such an incredible downtime,” says Nelson.
“To make sure we met our clients expectations and to ensure the project ran smoothly, we ended up making a few changes to the layout of our shop and added some specialized tooling.”
Project Manager Steve Devitt said there was some uncertainty at first when the idea came to life.
“Once we started planning and laid out a detailed schedule for every shift of every day, we all saw that we could be successful and produce the Duncan Aviation quality standard that is expected,” says Devitt.
“The teams did a fantastic job communicating and working together. The end product reflected the effort.”
The president of the aircraft management company said that the final product exceeded their expectations, and looks better than new.
“The final product was nothing short of amazing,” he says.
“The communication was excellent all the way through the project. In fact, it was so good I will be bringing more business to Duncan Aviation in Lincoln.”
Although the Duncan Aviation Cabinet Shop is among the best in the world, Nelson estimates that this project would have taken more than double the time had it been completed using traditional methods to apply all new veneer to the cabinets.
“There were so many different team members and departments that got involved to make this project come together, it was amazing,” says Nelson.
“That’s probably the most exciting thing, knowing that there is such a talented group of individuals at Duncan Aviation creating solutions to meet the expectations of our clients.”
Hydrographics have taken leaps and bounds since they were first introduced at Duncan Aviation.