Manitoba Aerospace Week

Local aviation and aerospace entrepreneurs thriving B By Holli Moncrieff For the Free Press usiness is booming for local aerospace entrepreneurs. Just ask the owners of three companies that have grown far beyond their expectations: Advanced Composite Structures Inc., Cadorath and Gregorash Aviation. Alvin Gregorash started his company almost by accident. A long-time employee of StandardAero, Gregorash left to become an independent parts broker shortly before the aviation giant decided to close its piston engine division. When StandardAero employees were unable to raise the capital required to save the business, Gregorash decided to risk it all.  "At the 11th hour, I thought there was an opportunity there. I'd worked with all the guys in the piston shop," he said. "When StandardAero's president asked how I would finance the venture, I told him that I would mortgage the house, the wife and the kids.  I made him an offer he couldn't refuse." Today, Gregorash Aviation is a family-owned company specializing in engines, parts and supplies. One of their businesses, Aero Recip, is the largest piston engine overhaul shop in Canada. They maintain an excess of 200 engine cores, with a minimum of 115 engines in process at any one time. Their Dyno Test Cell is the only test cell in North America that tests radial and opposed piston engines ranging from 65 to 1,200 horsepower. "In the beginning it was tough. We'd taken over something StandardAero had been phasing out," said Gregorash. Photo by Darcy Finley for the Winnipeg Free Press Above: Employees work on the floor at Cadorath Aerospace. Below: An engine at Gregorash Aviation. Submitted photo Cadorath also had humble origins. It started out as a plating company over 55 years ago. Now Rolls Royce and Bell Helicopter are two of the company's major clients. "We have a level of professionalism and skill that are unmatched in the industry – decades of experience. There is a tremendous amount of passion and integrity at Cadorath," said Johnny Sutherland, Director of Marketing. Cadorath launched their AeroParts website at Heli-Expo 2012. "AeroParts is an online resource for the buying and selling of helicopter parts. It's currently the fastest-growing website for helicopter parts in the world," Sutherland said. "It is basically a request-for-quote website where people have the option of building a shopping cart full of quotes." The company is currently developing other repair lines in addition to the one they run for Bell Helicopter, and is looking at expanding their client base in South America. "We seek out the parts our customers are looking for. We can buy and sell parts all over the world," said Sutherland. "It's cheaper and faster to recondition the original parts than to have the manufacturer do a run of new ones. When we're done with them, they look better than new." When James Anning and his brother Bruce started Advanced Composite Structures Inc. (ACS) back in 1988, they had one main goal – to trounce the competition. For over 20 years, ACS has been providing Main/Tail Rotor Blade and Composite Component repair services to the helicopter industry. With in-house repair design capability, the company can repair any make and model of aircraft. "My brother was working for our competition back in the '80s when composites were a new thing. We decided this was something we wanted to do," Anning said. "Bruce could see ways of improving the processes – of giving the user a better product at a better price. We spent a lot of money on research and development." A recent breakthrough for the company was achieving the moment balancing of rotor blades. "We were able to take a set of rotor blades that were a constant problem for the customer and adjust the blades to the point that they were perfect. The customer couldn't believe it," said Anning. "We're consistently hearing our customers really love our products and our pricing structure. We've evolved to the point where we are extremely efficient. Our competition doesn't like us very much." Use this QR code to link to Cadorath's recently-produced corporate video. 8 Manitoba Aerospace Week September 9 - 13, 2013

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