Have you ever forgotten or lost your keys and found yourself locked out of a building? Probably just about everyone has. Last year Schweiss Doors introduced a smartphone app that allows hangar doors to be opened remotely. Schweiss specializes in Lift-Strap Bifold, “one-piece” hydraulic and architectural designer doors and has been in the door business since the 1980s.
Mike Schweiss, owner of Schweiss Doors, said customers were asking for an app to control their hangar doors, and Schweiss, working with Lynk Remote Technologies and its founder and CEO Morgan Walker, delivered. Walker is a pilot who flies an SR22T and says he is “absolutely passionate about flying.” He was inspired to create a hangar app after he and a friend were locked outside a hangar.
In 2021 Lynk Remote Technologies partnered with Schweiss Doors. The Schweiss Doors app works with new doors, can be retrofitted to existing doors, and used with one or multiple doors. While the Lynk System works with most doors, Walker said Schweiss Doors were found to be the most consistent and reliable.
Schweiss himself uses the app and demonstrated its ability from a trade show in Las Vegas by opening a door at the Schweiss manufacturing facility in Minnesota. “You can control the door from any place in the world,” he said.
Customers also can use the app to see if they left a hangar door open, but Schweiss said, “You don’t want to run the door unless you have a camera tied to it.”
When a hydraulic door opens, it swings out. Interior and exterior cameras and livestreaming allow customers to make sure nothing is in front of the door, before it swings out to open, as hydraulic doors do.
“It’s as if you were there,” Walker said, “and in some cases it’s a little bit better than if you were there because say you’re opening the door from inside the hangar, you can’t see what’s going on outside the hangar.”
Some Schweiss Doors customers may be looking only for a door opener, but the Lynk Remote system is expandable.
A starting point for people in colder climates is definitely the engine preheating, Walker said. Once they become familiar with the product, he said they might wonder what else they can do with the app and find significant value, especially if they use propane heat, leaving the hangar itself at maybe 34 degrees F, then warming the hangar up before they arrive.
Use of the app does not require internet, just a cellular or Wi-Fi network, and, Walker added, “our product actually provides internet, if needed.”
At EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2022, Lynk Remote Technologies introduced the next generation HangarBot Hub, which is the Link Aviation Base Station. It offers faster internet speed, is waterproof, which means it can go outdoors; and has GPS, which could be used on the aircraft. If the system is connected to the internet and if the internet goes down, the system switches instantly to cellular. The new app has a modern interface design and new features and accessories. They include light switches, large industrial fans, tug battery monitors, golf cart battery monitors, an upgraded thermostat with touchscreen digital display, motion sensors, and humidity sensors with the ability to turn dehumidifiers on or off.
Lynk Remote Technologies’ main business moving forward is working with manufacturers to create co-branded apps. Schweiss is one example. Others might include fan or HVAC companies or companies that help with ground support (lav cart or fuel cart).
“Where we come in is the missing puzzle piece to connect that physical asset to the internet and put the control in the hands of the consumer end user,” Walker said, adding that includes not only the general aviation market but anything at the airport to help ground operations, hangar leasing companies, FBOs and pilots.
“It’s about convenience,” he concluded. And, he said, “there’s very few instances where you forgot your phone at home.”
