The world's largest general aviation maintenance facility will
be opened with fanfare by Cessna in early December. The 450,000-square-foot
complex in Wichita will hangar 100 Citations as well as house the
company's entire Citation customer support operation.
"We can expand easily in the future as we have taken a 124-acre
site," Cessna's svp for customer support Ron Chapman told Show News.
The complex boasts some 250,000 square feet of hangar space and
200,000 square feet of offices that will also offer pilot lounges
and a restaurant.
Cessna has invested heavily in service centers to keep up with
the needs of its growing fleet. "Through 1998 we had 2,700 aircraft
in service. Now it is over 4,000," Chapman explained, "so we went
on a major capital investment program."
His goals are to provide enough maintenance capacity for the fleet
and enough excess capacity to allow unscheduled maintenance. "The
keys to service are sufficient parts availability and having a geographically
diverse network of service centers that operate when the customers
want maintenance," he said.
The Wichita opening will follow the launch in June of a new Citation
service center in Orlando, Fla. Cessna replaced a 40,000-square-foot
facility there with 159,000 square feet of hangars and workshops
at the north end of Orlando International airport. An additional
27,000-square-foot paint shop will open there next month. Co-located
just across the street is FlightSafety's Citation simulator center,
giving customers the opportunity to combine training and maintenance
in one trip.
—John Morris
Cessna's New CES Products
Cessna will announce a new line of CES products here at NBAA
that bring Web-based convenience to managing maintenance.
CESPLAN, to be introduced first on the CitationJet line,
allows operators to tailor Maintenance Manual Chapter 4
and 5 inspections to their individual requirements while
retaining Cessna's stamp of approval for a Manufacturer's
Recommended Inspection program. "Say an operator flies heavily
at the front of the month but not at the back, with CESPLAN
he can make up his own program to meet his utilization profile,"
explained Ron Chapman, svp for customer support. This has
been too difficult and time consuming for Cessna to do with
paper manuals, he added, but now it can be done quickly
and cost effectively.
CESCOM is a computerized aircraft maintenance tracking
service available in several formats that produces status
reports, history reports and projected due reports. Cessna
made it available on the Internet at the beginning of this
year and has so far converted 65% of its Citation customers
from paper to Web-based. "Now an operator can make an entry
and get instantaneous feedback. This dramatically reduces
the time to get reports," said Chapman. "With the new format
we will be adding additional features and benefits in coming
months as it is now much easier to make the changes." CESCOM's
Maintenance Transaction Report form has become the standard
for Citation maintenance logbook entries and Return to Service
statements.
CESVIEW II is Cessna's next generation electronic technical
manuals, usable on PC computers with Internet browser capabilities.
It contains manuals for maintenance, wiring, component maintenance,
structural repairs, tools and equipment, non-destructive
testing and an illustrated parts catalog, as well as active
service bulletins and service letters.
