Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

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Davestation
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Re: Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

Post by Davestation »

Deanrobert wrote: Mon Apr 20, 2020 5:23 pm I’m a new contributor.. been a da42NG owner for 6 years, fly approx 100 hrs / year. We used A&M out of Bolingbrook for 4 years until they folded . Last two annuals with Symetry in Bloomington (BMI). Nice guys, but our annuals went from an average of 8k to over 17k the last two years.. we have 1700 TT and 925 hrs on engines/ props since the 2010 NG conversion .
The last annual included the 4 year bonding check which cost $3200 in labor to address 25 failed points...
Are these numbers reasonable ?
Impossible to say on the annual cost without seeing the specific discrepancies or what was due.

Unless your plane has severe corrosion I'd be pretty surprised by a bunch of bonding failures - the bonding check is actually kind of silly in my opinion. I was once told by tech support that if you have everything failing on one wing, you can usually just wiggle the wing a bit and then get them to pass... If all the bonding connections look corrosion-free and are tight, they're going to pass. And it's not like the tires get checked at each change, so... The static wicks fail pretty often, especially the ones at grabbing/bumping spots, but they aren't that expensive.
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ememic99
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Re: Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

Post by ememic99 »

Deanrobert wrote: Mon Apr 20, 2020 5:23 pm Are these numbers reasonable ?
It’s not easy to say because of the difference in labor cost and it’s hard to know what parts were replaced. But generally speaking, 17k$ is too much for annual. Mine are usually around 6k$.
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Deanrobert
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Re: Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

Post by Deanrobert »

Thanks for the input- labor cost was $95.. nothing major done.. anyone have good recommendation for a Mx shop in Midwest area- we are in Springfield , IL : no problem going 300 miles or so.
Could also do southern Florida as we have a place in Bonita springs ..
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Davestation
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Re: Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

Post by Davestation »

Deanrobert wrote: Tue Apr 21, 2020 12:51 am Thanks for the input- labor cost was $95.. nothing major done.. anyone have good recommendation for a Mx shop in Midwest area- we are in Springfield , IL : no problem going 300 miles or so.
Could also do southern Florida as we have a place in Bonita springs ..
I’m sorry but that’s still too vague and I don’t want to slam a shop if it’s not warranted.

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neema
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Re: Diamond Owners Being Taken Advantage Of - Maintenance

Post by neema »

ememic99 wrote: Mon Apr 20, 2020 9:22 pm
Deanrobert wrote: Mon Apr 20, 2020 5:23 pm Are these numbers reasonable ?
It’s not easy to say because of the difference in labor cost and it’s hard to know what parts were replaced. But generally speaking, 17k$ is too much for annual. Mine are usually around 6k$.
Maybe we need to stop stacking 300/600 hour intervals on our annuals, but I don't think we've hit sub $10k in our 4 years of ownership.

I can't easily dig up the first annual, but the last three have been 38k (19k was warranty items, 18k on our dime), 17k, and most recently 39k.
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