If I’m not at work you will usually find me on the water. Far from an occasional hobby or a way to pass the time, fishing is my passion, and I’ve been doing it most of my life.
To me there is nothing better than the first cast of an early morning. Seeing the steam slowly rise as the sun begins to warm the water, and sitting still in silent anticipation of a good bite are the makings of a great morning. Over the years I’ve gone from haphazardly casting my line hoping to get lucky to strategically seeking out the best spots. I’ve learned that a temperature difference on the fish-finder screen means there are fish, and that certain colors of water relate to certain depths. I know which type of fish I can expect in which areas and why.
They say that experience leads to knowledge, and that is certainly true in fishing. It’s true in a lot of things, including intricate mechanical devices like boats and airplanes. I was thinking about this the other day as I was talking to one of our Twin Commander Authorized Service Centers. The strength of Twin Commander’s extensive service network is due to the experience and knowledge of the people who work at these independently owned facilities.
Like my ability to scope out the best fishing spots, the professionals who sell, upgrade, and maintain Twin Commanders in the network are highly skilled at seeing things that others can’t. A technician at your home airport may be capable of reading the maintenance manual and applying what it says to your airplane, but their knowledge of Twin Commanders stops where the manual stops. They don’t have the experience and the knowledge to see, understand, and do what the technicians at a Twin Commander Service Center can do. In the pages of this magazine are many examples of what I mean. Take, for example, Mike Grabbe’s story on checking hydraulic fluid in this month’s Commander Tips. A technician outside of the Twin Commander Service Center network may know how to properly check the hydraulic fluid, or why different models of Twin Commanders use different types of fluid—but it’s more likely they do not.
Twin Commander Authorized Service Center network technicians have spent years in, on, and under Twin Commanders. The technicians are obligated to attend type-specific authorized factory training, they sell factory parts, and follow factory approved procedures.
The network also benefits from regular communication with the factory. When something is discovered on an inspection at one location that might be important to other operators, the factory communicates that to the network. When new or upgraded parts are available, we communicate it. And when the service centers find repeated issues that need to be addressed, we all share that information. Your local mechanic may or may not have that information.
When you take your airplane to a Twin Commander Authorized Service Center you are guaranteeing that you are working with the most experienced, most knowledgeable people in the fleet. You don’t need to cast your line and hope for the best. By choosing to go to a Twin Commander Authorized Service Center, you are going straight to the big fish.
