Does US GA need more "legacy" (especially tube and fabric) A&Ps?

Bell206 said:
Supply and demand at its finest considering some owners seek out these type mechanics.
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You bring up a VERY VALID point! I used to reply, frequently, when people complained about crappy airline service….

You asked for cheap tickets, you got them!! Be careful what you ask for.

Unfortunately, dealing with that is part of the skill set required these days.

Not sure the lack of replacements is unique. Hell, industry isn’t even making fixable products! So the replacement generation has to figure out how to fix that stuff, and sell a skill the public doesn’t even consider. Yikes.
 
There are small cover shops in different areas of the country. It's probably not a lucrative area to focus on exclusively, because it is so labor intensive. Nobody wants to pay a shop rate of 100 bucks an hour for the hundreds of hours it can take to cover and paint an aircraft. In some cases that could exceed the value of a Cub or Champ.

That said, if you establish a reputation for good work, you'll probably never be bored.

Fabric work is pretty simple. Scissors, glue, rivet, iron, tape. Follow the process. If you mess up, no big deal: cut it off and start again. IMO it is a good DIY opportunity for owners working under supervision. Very easy for the A&P to check progress.

The challenging part is the paint. That is also where most of the labor comes in. Multiple fill coats are required to fill the weave, with sanding between each coat. Many tedious hours of that. I think a cover shop would be a good side gig for a paint shop.
 
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Tools said:
Not sure the lack of replacements is unique.
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From a historical point it is. For the 1st time there are less than 100,000 active A&P in the US. And steadily declining

Tools said:
So the replacement generation has to figure out how to fix that stuff, and sell a skill the public doesn’t even consider.
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The capability to fix things is still there. What I found lacking is the desire to fix things on mostly the owner side for various reasons. And if a mechanic spends most of his time replacing parts instead of fixing them they lose their incentive to fix as well.
 
“How to run a business” is not a topic in a Part 147 curriculum.
Adult Ed. and Comm Colleges are options.Many years ago I found SCORE
( Service Corp Of Retired Executives) with the Small Business Administration very helpful . Not sure they are still around.
 
skyking3286 said:
Yes.

BTW you don’t fill the weave for a light weight cover. You saturate the first coat without dripping through but the weave is still visible.
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Sure you do, how else do you make that light-weight cover just as heavy as a heavy-weight cover? /s
 
Bell206 said:
Its not. There are still many mechanics out there that still offer that and more. But people dont post or talk about those guys.
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Gee whiz, if you have a great A&P that you can get in to see in the next 90-days why wouldn't you publicize it so you could wait 180 days? /s
 
Magman said:
“How to run a business” is not a topic in a Part 147 curriculum.
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True. But neither is it a topic in diesel or electrician curriculums. However, aviation maintenance businesses also do not exactly follow the same processes as those other trades either. And thats where some go astray on the money management side and end up with an operation that resembles more a professional hobby than a viable business. Regardless, there is assistance out there specific to aviation that can make a difference to include some people associated with SCORE which I had used.
 
I know a guy who had a business covering and painting planes. He's not an A&P but has a relationship with an A&P who "supervises" and signs off the work. I put "supervises" in quotes because this guy, though unlicensed, probably knows more about old planes and fabric work than the A&P will ever know.
 
Glad to hear they’re still around.

They were very helpful

IMHO there are many mechanics and CFI’s lacking a business background.

Ok if they realize they need assistance.
 
Bell206 said:
Except the handbooks are written to provide the knowledge requirements per the Airmen Certification Standards (ACS) in order to take and pass the mechanic tests. And you'll find transistors and magnets are part of those standards so hardly a wild tangent.

So if a person is not attending a Part 147 school and pursuing the Part 65.77 route toward their obtaining their A&P certificates using and studying those handbooks will give them the best foundation to pass those tests.

And for those interested there is an ACS Companion Guide to go with the ACS link above.
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The AnP ACS asks you to know the symbol and BASIC operation of a transistor (it can be a switch or an amplifier). There is about 10 pages of trivia on transistors. It also wastes about half a page talking about transistor leads, but then says that you can never be sure by looking at them so consult the manufacturer. lol good stuff, so moar knowledge, much useful.

Knowing anything about P and N doping or junction bias might be a kewl party trick, but not very useful.

At least you put in some links to actual information, they are useful. The rest of the post? Not so much.
 
pfarber said:
There is about 10 pages of trivia on transistors. It also wastes about half a page talking about transistor leads, but then says that you can never be sure by looking at them so consult the manufacturer. lol good stuff, so moar knowledge, much useful.
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Must be upsetting to start an aviation career late in life and have to struggle through such basic knowledge. I suppose you also think that college students should be able to bypass all those useless courses at the freshman/sophomore levels? Regardless, they don’t call an A&P certificate a “license” to learn for nothing. And based on your answers here and previously, you still seem to be struggling with the learning part just as younger new mechanics do. But it gets better, provided you want to learn....;)
 
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