With less than three months remaining before the FAA’s deadline for ADS-B Out equipage, business aircraft operators are now finding they will likely have to schedule into 2020 for installations, MRO provider Duncan Aviation reported. Duncan Aviation’s satellite avionics shop in Sacramento, California, has bookings for ADS-B upgrades through March 2020, according to Bob Hazy, manager of that facility.

In June, the Sacramento shop moved into a new, more spacious hangar at Mather Airport and since filled all the remaining slots upgrade installations this year. “Other than some time in the schedule in February 2020, we’re booked from now through March 2020,” Hazy said.

The first quarter of 2020 is continuing to fill at the location, the company added, noting Hazy has quoted several additional aircraft for ADS-B upgrades, including a Learjet 45. “Before the FAA’s deadline, we have scheduled ADS-B upgrades on two King Air B300s, a King Air B200, three Pilatus aircraft, a Cessna 500, a Cessna 560, and a Premier,” he said. “We’ve found a nice little niche out here; nearly all of our ADS-B upgrades have been on either turboprops or small jets.”

Many of the aircraft traveling through the Sacramento are equipped with Collins Pro Line avionics and are opting for the CMD Flight Solutions supplemental type certificate (STC) to upgrade. The Sacramento facility sends the transponders to Duncan’s flagship facility in Lincoln, Nebraska, for the upgrade. “Because we’ve done so many of them, we’re turning these aircraft around in as little as a week and a half,” he said.