Mooney Parts Rumor

[Pinecone]

I was at my airport today and was talking to the owner (A&P/IA) and he mentioned he had just ordered a part that is produced by Mooney.  The person he ordered from mentioned he just got in under the wire.  He was told that at the end of this month (Aug 25) LASAR would be the sole source for all Mooney parts.

As the title states, this is totally a rumor at this point, but I did want to share.

[toto]

There was a thread about this earlier in the summer - sounds like there have been some official confirmations.

https://mooneyspace.com/topic/51648-lasar-mooney/

 

[Pinecone]

Maybe that is the basis.

It may be mis communication

[Ragsf15e]

4 hours ago, Pinecone said:

Maybe that is the basis.

It may be mis communication

Yeah it’s definitely true!  I had an order in for a 252 intake boot with Top Gun and they (mooney) wouldn’t fill it, but I was able to get lasar to pick it up and it’s supposedly drop shipping now.  Price increased.

[GeeBee]

Darth Vader is Luke's father too.

[Tom F]

Brett the owner of Lasar spoke yesterday, 9/12/25 at the summit and said they are taking over parts manufacturing at Kerrville and they have taken over the factory lease there.  They’re implementing updated manufacturing processes and will be manufacturing parts in earnest going forward.  I know there has been some negative comments about this deal but they are the only ones that stepped forward and put the money in the game.  While some may interpret an increase in parts costs negatively, consider no parts availability.  He also mentioned Lasar, as a Mooney parts dealer purchased close to 80% of all the parts Mooney sold into distribution.  He also mentioned they would have direct and distributor sales channels.  

After listening to his presentation and engaging him afterwards my thoughts are a lot more positive.

They also presented a concept called Mooney Phoenix they are working on where they’ll be taking trades and purchasing airframes and totally refurbishing them with all the latest technologies, interiors, paint and engines and offering them as an option for a “like new” aircraft purchase. It’s an interesting concept it will be interesting to see how it catches on. 
They are definitely investing in the continued life of our aircraft in a way nobody else is and the fleet will hopefully live on much longer with their investment.

[1980Mooney]

4 hours ago, Tom F said:

Brett the owner of Lasar spoke yesterday, 8/12/25 at the summit and said they are taking over parts manufacturing at Kerrville and they have taken over the factory lease there.  They’re implementing updated manufacturing processes and will be manufacturing parts in earnest going forward.  I know there has been some negative comments about this deal but they are the only ones that stepped forward and put the money in the game.  While some may interpret an increase in parts costs negatively, consider no parts availability.  He also mentioned Lasar, as a Mooney parts dealer purchased close to 80% of all the parts Mooney sold into distribution.  He also mentioned they would have direct and distributor sales channels.  

After listening to his presentation and engaging him afterwards my thoughts are a lot more positive.

They also presented a concept called Mooney Phoenix they are working on where they’ll be taking trades and purchasing airframes and totally refurbishing them with all the latest technologies, interiors, paint and engines and offering them as an option for a “like new” aircraft purchase. It’s an interesting concept it will be interesting to see how it catches on. 
They are definitely investing in the continued life of our aircraft in a way nobody else is and the fleet will hopefully live on much longer with their investment.

Interesting. "taking over parts manufacturing at Kerrville and they have taken over the factory lease there.  They’re implementing updated manufacturing processes". 

Didn't countless prior new owners and the Chinese previously tout that they were implementing updated manufacturing processes? 

• November 2019 AOPA Magazine said "The Chinese owners invested heavily in modernizing production with new equipment and materials, "
• 2020 Aviation Consumer Magazine said
  • If there’s a bright spot in any of this it’s that the Kerrville plant got a significant makeover on Meijing’s dime. When I last visited there in 2018, the old sheds had been reorganized, the parts manufacturing and tracking system had been upgraded, new production machinery had been installed and significant composite capability had been added. That alone puts Mooney in a good position to achieve its primary goal.

LASAR "They’re implementing updated manufacturing processes" - Does that mean that they will no longer making hand made parts for our handmade aircraft?

Don't forget that Don Maxwell posted on Facebook " I've seen the books, with the Kerrville overhead it cant make it making parts. Hard to say but its the truth. Hopefully Lasar's hat has a big rabbit in it. I wish them well as we all should."  

And "Mooney Phoenix" - trades and refurbishing old aircraft?  Chinese news sources and the Kerrville Times reported back in 2013 that Meijing planned to "refurbish used aircraft for sale to other markets" and "carry out second-hand aircraft trading and renovation, focusing on Asian markets."

The Chinese came with bags of money.  I seriously doubt LASAR has any significant capital.  They can't seem to replicate the manufacturing that LASAR did in California before their move.

 

[Hank]

15 minutes ago, 1980Mooney said:

... LASAR ... can't seem to replicate the manufacturing that LASAR did in California before their move.

 

My understanding of the situation is that it's tied up with the FAA PMA approval, and getting the location changed from one FSDO to another, for each individual PMA part. Not related to LASAR'a abilities, processes or people, but caused by FAA red tape.

[Tom F]

Valid points.  Do you have anything helpful  to the fleet to add? The Chinese did contribute.  They also spent a substantial portion of the cash on the composite trainer only to drop it at the 11th hour.  Long and short of it; what are your options.  I will embrace the Lasar group and support their efforts until they give me a reason not to.  

[1980Mooney]

2 hours ago, Tom F said:

Valid points.  Do you have anything helpful  to the fleet to add? The Chinese did contribute.  They also spent a substantial portion of the cash on the composite trainer only to drop it at the 11th hour.  Long and short of it; what are your options.  I will embrace the Lasar group and support their efforts until they give me a reason not to.  

The point is - be realistic.  And they should be too.  They are not going to institute "new manufacturing".  More investment?  Ridiculous.

They should focus on cutting cost and getting it in line with inflow.  They can supply parts using much less infrastructure.  And this dream of taking planes in trade and refurbishing is a whole different business model.  They are going to drown in negative cash flow.  This is why companies restructure, some potentially successfully, in bankruptcy.

[Pinecone]

To be clear, Lasar is not directly planning on refurbishing aircraft.

That is a company called AEROCOR, which has been doing a similar thing with Eclipse jets.  They will rely heavily on Lasar for the parts support.

[Pinecone]

The question I have is, are things structured so that Lasar can use the Mooney PMA for making parts?

[N201MKTurbo]

1 hour ago, Pinecone said:

The question I have is, are things structured so that Lasar can use the Mooney PMA for making parts?

Mooney probably doesn’t make parts under PMA. They will make parts under a production certificate.

I would think Mooney will give authorization to Laser to order parts from Mooney’s vendors. I’m not exactly sure how that works from a regulatory standpoint. If the vendor’s parts are PMA, then there is no issue. 

[Schllc]

The Chinese didn’t buy in the same duress, I mean Mooney was desperate but the climate was different. 
the city of kerville does not want the liability and maintenance expense that manufacturing facility will cost simply for the bare minimum when empty. 
I would bet it’s close to a million a year in insurance, water electricity, fire currency etc.    

also, I don’t recall the FAR that covers a manufacturing license, that would take years and millions to acquire.

my guess is that Laser will be bought out within five years by textron or that vc firm that bought hartzel.
The market is small but it is easily to monopolize. 
what are our options but to sell?  

 

[Fritz1]

to my best recollection factory parts biz used to be $5-6M per year, everything revolves around that number, a lot of the know how resides with the few people left in Kerrville, hope Lasar makes a go of it

[Pinecone]

19 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Mooney probably doesn’t make parts under PMA. They will make parts under a production certificate.

I would think Mooney will give authorization to Laser to order parts from Mooney’s vendors. I’m not exactly sure how that works from a regulatory standpoint. If the vendor’s parts are PMA, then there is no issue. 

OK, but they are saying Lasar will take over making the parts that Mooney makes.  So will they be able to do it under the Mooney Production Cert???

[N201MKTurbo]

1 minute ago, Pinecone said:

OK, but they are saying Lasar will take over making the parts that Mooney makes.  So will they be able to do it under the Mooney Production Cert???

As I said above. I don’t think Laser will be making parts that are produced by Mooney. They will be ordering parts produced by Mooney’s vendors. Like wing fuel dials, actuator gears and no back springs. 
 

If you want a new wing spar or wing skin, Mooney will still make them and Laser would be the distributor.

I believe Laser will be no different than Aircraft Spruce. They don’t make anything, or have any PMAs. They just sell stuff.

[Pinecone]

That is what I thought, but that is not what they seem to be saying now.

[Matthew P]

LASAR will be the ones that deal directly with Mooney's (former) vendors for parts and in the example you gave,  Mooney would be considered a vendor and LASAR would go to them for the parts they still produce.

[Paul Thomas]

I thought I heard in the past week that LASAR was going to lease some ground in Kerrville...

[Ryan ORL]

My recollection of what the LASAR rep said at Mooney Summit last weekend suggested that they would at least be heavily involved in replacement parts manufacturing in Kerrville.

His specific example was the nose gear trusses... right now apparently the tubular segments are hand-cut and ground to the proper length.  He said they were working on setting that up to be laser cut so they could produce "1000" in the same time as one currently takes.

So that sounds to me like they think they'll be producing parts at the Mooney factory and presumably under the Mooney certificate.  He mentioned that they were very careful to structure the deal to be able to be under their certificate somehow.

[N201MKTurbo]

6 minutes ago, Ryan ORL said:

My recollection of what the LASAR rep said at Mooney Summit last weekend suggested that they would at least be heavily involved in replacement parts manufacturing in Kerrville.

His specific example was the nose gear trusses... right now apparently the tubular segments are hand-cut and ground to the proper length.  He said they were working on setting that up to be laser cut so they could produce "1000" in the same time as one currently takes.

So that sounds to me like they think they'll be producing parts at the Mooney factory and presumably under the Mooney certificate.  He mentioned that they were very careful to structure the deal to be able to be under their certificate somehow.

There is nothing saying that Mooney can’t improve their production process. I’m glad Laser is helping them out with this. 

[Paul Thomas]

30 minutes ago, Ryan ORL said:

My recollection of what the LASAR rep said at Mooney Summit last weekend suggested that they would at least be heavily involved in replacement parts manufacturing in Kerrville.

His specific example was the nose gear trusses... right now apparently the tubular segments are hand-cut and ground to the proper length.  He said they were working on setting that up to be laser cut so they could produce "1000" in the same time as one currently takes.

So that sounds to me like they think they'll be producing parts at the Mooney factory and presumably under the Mooney certificate.  He mentioned that they were very careful to structure the deal to be able to be under their certificate somehow.

Their as in Mooney or LASAR? I'd imagine Mooney otherwise it's going to take a while.

[MikeOH]

42 minutes ago, Ryan ORL said:

So that sounds to me like they think they'll be producing parts at the Mooney factory and presumably under the Mooney certificate.  He mentioned that they were very careful to structure the deal to be able to be under their certificate somehow.

Interesting how that might work...do the 'workers' actually making the parts have to be Mooney employees, or can they be Laser employees physically in the Mooney factory using Mooney factory equipment/processes, and still be able to use the Mooney production certificate?

[Ryan ORL]

29 minutes ago, Paul Thomas said:

Their as in Mooney or LASAR? I'd imagine Mooney otherwise it's going to take a while.

The Mooney certificate.  There was some discussion of how to specifically structure the deal so as not to invalidate the certificate.  I didn't understand (and so don't remember) the specifics of how that works, but they were pretty clear that being able to do stuff under that certificate was the whole goal.