From the cost-saving development, production and installation of over 1,000 new LED flashlight holders, to the conversion of 1,000 Economy seats from analog to the latest digital technologies in record time or the complete redesign of the present cabins using the existing furnishings - the interior shops of Lufthansa Technik Base Maintenance in Hamburg are a talking point these days.
The over 200-person strong team is relaunching its services at the Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg. The base maintenance workshops, which up to now primarily offered backbone support to Aircraft Base Maintenance, will in future offer full-scale modification services for commercial airlines directly from a single source. Headed up by Arne Bruhn, the workshops are working in close collaboration with the company's Engineering department, the Original Equipment Innovation division and Lufthansa Technik's VIP workshops.
For example, instead of having to buy expensive new seats, thanks to this in-house capacity, Lufthansa Technik's Hamburg shops can provide commercial airlines with low-cost, ultra-flexible, fast solutions that involve modifying existing parts of the cabin. Thanks to the separate wiring workshop, it is even possible to undertake complete electrical and electronic upgrades of existing configurations within next to no time. All electrical cabling can be fabricated complete.
Specialists in another discipline can adapt the cabin design to the airline's new look using foils or paintwork.
Discussing the new capability, Arne Bruhn, head of the interior shops of Lufthansa Technik Base Maintenance, says: "Thanks to many years'
experience as an aircraft overhaul service provider, we have an expertise in the modification of existing aircraft cabin that is unique in the market. Against the background of ever faster innovation cycles and growing passenger expectations, commercial airlines are confronted with the task of finding cost-effective solutions for the long-term development of their cabin product. In this area we see ourselves as the ideal partner. Together with our colleagues from Engineering, Innovation and VIP Completion we can manufacture the components for a modified cabin within the shortest time. We are just as successful in the development services we offer for individual components as we are in manufacturing prototypes in our workshops."
For Lufthansa German Airlines the workshops recently designed and manufactured over 1,000 new LED flashlight holders that can simply click into place in the same holders that previously held more traditional lamps, thus saving the airline enormous re-equipment costs. At the moment the teams are building components in large volumes for economy cabins that are to be upgraded from centrally supplied entertainment systems to stand-alone computing power directly in the seat. This modification entails extensive structural work plus complete rewiring.
Arne Bruhn will be attending Aircraft Interiors Expo at 8 April, where he can be found on the Lufthansa Technik stand in Hall 6, stand 6B60.
Lufthansa Technik:
The Lufthansa Technik Group, with more than 30 subsidiaries and associates and over 26,000 employees worldwide, is one of the leading manufacturer-independent providers of technical services for the aviation industry. Its portfolio encompasses the entire spectrum of services for commercial aircraft: maintenance, repair, overhaul, modification and conversion, engines and components.
