Manufacturing and Quality Standards

Throughout our history, Applied Avionics focus has been on providing the highest quality components and subassemblies to support the military and commercial aviation markets, as well as land and sea military applications. With the vertical integration of design, testing, and manufacturing in a single facility, our products are designed for life- of-the-platform reliability and compliance with the industry’s highest qualification standards. Click the link to view our company Quality Policy commitment.

Manufacturing and Engineering

DATRON

Dave Brillhart

As a vertically integrated manufacturer – we are in control of many of the sub-components and sub-assemblies used to produce the final product. We continually upgrade our manufacturing equipment to take advantage of new technology to support our best-in-class products. Solder operators are trained to the latest IPC standards. Our manufacturing operations are run by seasoned managers, supervisors, and assembly personnel with decades of industry experience.

The following is an example of our manufacturing equipment:

  • 2 DATRON high speed milling machines
  • Laser marking equipment
  • Environmental Stress Screening Thermal Shock chambers
  • Automated lighting inspection system

We have full electrical, mechanical and optical engineering capabilities, with US patents on a variety of unique electrical circuits and configurations. Applied Avionics was one of the first manufacturers to introduce Night Vision Imaging System (NVIS) compliant switches into the market, and it remains a substantial portion of our business today.

Quality Management System (AS9100)

Applied Avionics’ Quality Management System has been certified for over 17 years to meet the requirements of ISO 9001:2015 and AS9100.

Our products have been listed on the Defense Logistics Agency’s (DLA) Qualified Product List (QPL) since 1977. Applied Avionics has more products listed on the MIL-PRF-22885 QPL than any other switch manufacturer. Each active QPL product line must meet Group B qualification retention requirements every 36 months. Current QPL listings are covered by:

In addition to military qualification, our products undergo complete DO-160 testing for environmental and electrical compliance. See Qualification Summary for additional information.

In addition to in-line quality checking on the production line, every single part on every single shipment product undergoes a thorough visual and functional inspection before being granted a Certificate of Compliance.

ISO-9100

Testing

Lighting Lab

Burn in

Applied Avionics has extensive in-house testing capabilities. The US Government has certified our lab to allow for Department of Defense testing of QPL products on-site. Some of the testing equipment and facilities we employ include:

  • 6 individual lighting labs on-site, employing a variety of photometers and spectroradiometers to ensure compliance with the rigorous requirements of military lighting specification.
  • EMC reverb chamber
  • G-tem cell
  • Environmental (Temp / Humidity) Chambers
  • Liquid Thermal Shock

In addition to sourcing the highest quality subcomponents on the market, Applied Avionics puts the majority of its electronic assemblies through Environmental Stress Screening (ESS) after assembly to ensure that both the components and the manufacturing steps are tested to further increase product reliability.

Systems and Facilities

Applied Avionics employs a proprietary ERP system that provides full component lot traceability and workflow routing for each individual work order. This automated system seamlessly links the bill-of-material and bill-of-route for each of the over 1,000,000 permutations of our products while supporting the industry’s shortest lead times.

The existing manufacturing facility is sited on 15 acres owned by Applied Avionics. This property offers an abundance of room for future expansion opportunities, with an excellent supply of trained personnel in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Our current facility has additional capacity available as well, leaving the company in an excellent position to expand to meet our future needs.