Hawker Beechcraft to charge for service inquiries

Hawker Beechcraft Corporation (HBC) has a new service policy that affects owners and operators of a huge range of older Beechcraft and Hawker airplanes. Called the Classic Legacy Aircraft Service and Support (CLASS) program, it charges for research, serial number requests, publications, troubleshooting assistance, drawings, diagrams, technical and field service support, and other service requests. The charges range from $125 per hour for most types of assistance, to $75 per wiring diagram, to $800 per day (plus expenses) for on-site technical support.

HBC said that it currently averages 12,000 technical inquiries per month, involving airplanes delivered as long as 40 years in the past. “We receive inquiries regularly for services and information such as: researching original configurations of very old aircraft, looking up parts numbers or technical information already in our publications, searching for material specifications, and sending out maintenance manual pages that are missing, or sections of manuals for airplanes AOG at a non-HBC-rated facility,” an HBC statement said.

Citing the workloads of servicing HBC’s growing fleet of newer airplanes, the company said it would begin charging for services on a fee basis. A pay-per-view technical publications Web tool was also announced. HBC says to contact the HBC Technical Support hotline at 800/429-5372 or 316/676-3140 for further assistance.

See the list of affected airplanes:

• Musketeer, Sundowner, Skipper, Duchess, Duke, Debonair, Twin Beech, Queen Air, Twin Bonanza and all model 35 series
• Model 36 series prior to serial number prefix E-2600
• Model A36TC and B36TC all serials
• Model 55, 56, 58P and 58TC all serials
• Model 58 series prior to serial number prefix TH-1600
• King Air 90 model series prior to serial number prefix LJ-1300
• King Air E-90 all serials
• King Air F-90 all serials
• King Air 100 model series all serial numbers prefixes
• King Air 200 model series prior to serial number prefix BB-1400
• King Air 200C / B200C prior to serial number BL-138
• King Air 200T / B200T prior to serial number BT-39
• King Air 300 model series, all FA and FF serial number prefixes
• All MU-300 models and straight model 400s, RJ serial number prefix
• All 125 series airplanes from model 1/1A through model 800A/B and 1000