New Surplus VS Certifications: Certificate of Conformity and ATA106
When dealing with very old, hard to find or expensive items, a valid purchase option is to search in the vast availability of New Surplus parts on the Aviation Market.
At the beginning, it is quite difficult to understand the nature of these parts, so let’s try to clarify.
NS (New Surplus) parts are produced on conformity, with approved data, and released as stock surplus by the Military, Operators, or even the OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) itself, and sold then by a third-party Company.
NS parts are New, so will carry no operating time or cycles; the original Owner had the potential to install these parts, so some may also name this special parts category as New-Unused.
NS parts are sometimes provided with an OEM CofC (Certificate of Conformity); most of the time, NS parts are sold with a reseller CofC, or an ATA Spec. 106 form.
What about the airworthiness of NS parts? Trying to simplify as much as possible:
In the FAA world, the airworthiness of such parts is evaluated by the installer, can be a 145 or a 121 for example; one important requirement is a trace to the OEM, like the OEM CofC or at least the original package with an OEM label showing P/N, S/N (when applicable), Cure Date (when applicable), Lot or Batch, Manufacturing date, name and Cage Code of the OEM. This is very important to exclude Suspected Unapproved Parts.
In the EASA world, a label or original package with above information may not be sufficient, as the OEM CofC is the minimum requirement in terms of traceability for expendable parts.
Due to the above considerations, NS parts are more popular in the FAA world, even though a minimal trace must always be provided.
Let’s assume now, that we have a large stock of expensive bearings in their original package; we have all information to trace the OEM, but we want to do more for our Customer.
The ATA Spec. 106 could be a good solution: it is not a regulatory document of course, it is a commercial document used to further certify the traceability of the item, from where it has been sourced and, last but not least, it includes a non-incident statement for a trusted origin of the material.
Horix Aerospace proudly owns the largest Sikorsky S61 spare parts warehouse in Europe: we always ensure full trace to the OEM, also on NS items, and always provide our ATA Spec. 106 form, so that you can trust us, once more.
Horix Aerospace: Easy, trusted process.