What it costs
How much does it cost to detail a midsize jet?
Four things set the cost of detailing a midsize jet, and the model name is the smallest of them. Condition comes first — what the finish and the cabin have been through since the last proper visit. Access comes second: hangar or open ramp, and how much floor you have around a tail that most midsize types carry well above ladder height. Your deadline comes third, because a compressed window buys crew rather than shortcuts. Scope comes fourth: a wash, a detail and a correction are three different jobs. Here is what moves each one.
Why there is no number on this page
A published number for a midsize jet is either wrong for most of them or it becomes a ceiling. Wrong, because two airframes of the same type and the same year can be a full day apart in work depending on what has been done to them. A ceiling, because once a figure is in print it has to be defended, and the way it gets defended is by quietly trimming the job — skipping the belly, leaving the brightwork, calling the headliner clean. What you get instead is a scope written against the aircraft in front of us, with the exclusions listed rather than buried. Any vendor who gives you a firm number before seeing photographs or the aircraft itself is guessing, and you meet the difference later.
What actually moves the number
The tail is where the hours go
Almost every jet in this class carries its engines on the aft fuselage and its stabiliser at the top of the fin, and that is the one place your type genuinely sets the hours — by shape, not by name. Engine and APU deposits collect on the aft fuselage and tailcone, where heat bakes them into the paint rather than leaving them sitting on top of it. The upper surfaces of the stabiliser sit well above ladder height, so reaching them properly means a lift or tall stands, a second pair of eyes, and a slower pace than the same area of wing.
Paint scheme and what the finish has been through
Surface area sets the floor. Everything above it comes from condition. Oxidation and exhaust etching do not wash off — they come out under a machine, at a pace set by how far in they have gone, and that is what moves a fuselage from a wash item to a correction item. A dark or metallic scheme shows every defect and every towel mark. A livery with multiple break lines and striping adds masking and slows the machine work at every edge.
What the last vendor left behind
A large share of the work on a midsize cabin is undoing somebody else's. Leather over-conditioned until the bolsters are greasy and hold soil. Conditioner used on an Alcantara headliner, which mats the pile and does not come back. Catalysed lacquer over veneer wiped with something solvent-bearing and gone cloudy. A radome machine-polished as though it were paint, when what goes on a radome, and how thick, is set by the maintenance manual rather than by preference. Remediation is its own job, and it happens before the job you asked for starts.
How many different materials are in your cabin
A midsize cabin is rarely one problem. Leather seating, Alcantara headliner and upper sidewalls, lacquered veneer on tables and cabinetry, stone or composite in the galley, plated metal on rails, latches and cupholders, acrylic windows with their shade mechanisms. Six materials, six methods, six products, and the fastest route to a repair bill is treating them as one. Seat pockets, cupholders, airstair treads and seat tracks are where the hours actually disappear.
Hangar, open ramp, and a Georgia summer
Hangar work beats ramp work on both finish and hours, because sun and wind dry product and water on the surface before they can be removed, and that is what leaves streaking and spotting. On an open ramp in July the skin is hot enough to flash product off before it can be worked properly, which means a dawn start or a night shift. From February through April, pine pollen re-deposits on a clean aircraft within hours. Some ramps also restrict water use under storm-drain rules, which decides the wash method for you.
Floor space around the aircraft
A crew needs room to work: a lift that can travel the length of the fuselage, stands that can be repositioned, extraction gear, hoses and a clean laydown area for towels and removed panels. A tight hangar corner with a wingtip a few feet from another aircraft turns every pass into a reposition. At a field like PDK — the second-busiest general aviation airport in the United States — that space is scheduled rather than assumed. If the aircraft has to be moved mid-job, that is a tug movement somebody has to authorise, and it lands in the timeline.
The deadline you are working to
A compressed window does not reduce the work. It buys crew. The same scope spread across two nights and the same scope squeezed into one are two different quotes, because the second needs more people on the aircraft at once and more supervision to keep them out of each other's way. Tell us the gap in your schedule before you tell us what you want done, and the scope can be shaped to fit the gap.
Cleaning, correcting, or protecting
Three different jobs with three different costs. Cleaning removes what is sitting on the surface. Correction machines away a controlled amount of the topcoat to remove what is in it — finite work on a finite layer, and it needs somebody who knows when to stop. Protection, sealant or ceramic coating, goes on afterwards and needs the aircraft to stay still while it cures. Coating over uncorrected paint locks the defects in, so the sequence is not negotiable, and a quote that prices protection without saying what happens before it is not describing the same work.
What the work actually consists of
A full interior and exterior on a midsize jet is measured in crew-days. A crew arrives, not one technician, with a lift or tall stands, extraction gear, and separate chemistry for every material in the cabin. Exterior first: static ports, pitot probes, vents and drains masked, then a wash in whichever method the ramp permits, then correction where the finish warrants it, then brightwork on polished leading edges and nacelle lips, then protection if the paint has been corrected to take it. Interior runs alongside or overnight — headliner and upper sidewalls, seats stripped and treated by material, veneer lacquer cleaned rather than solvent-wiped, carpet extracted under controlled moisture, galley and lavatory last. It closes with masking removed and counted off, a walk-round with you, and a written note of anything found.
Questions to put to any vendor
Including us. If a vendor cannot answer these plainly, that tells you more than the number at the bottom of their quote.
- Are the belly, the gear bays and the wheel wells in scope, or excluded? It is the most common exclusion in the trade and it covers the dirtiest part of the aircraft. A quote without it is not comparable to a quote with it, and the difference is usually where the gap between two quotes came from.
- How will you reach the top of the fin and the upper stabiliser surfaces? Most midsize types carry the stabiliser at the top of the fin, well above ladder height. If the answer is a ladder, those surfaces will not be touched, and you will see exactly where the work stopped on the first sunny day.
- Which wash method are you proposing, and does my ramp permit it? Water use at many fields is a storm-drain compliance matter rather than a preference. A vendor who only wet washes will discover the restriction on the day, with your window burning.
- Name the product you will use on Alcantara, on veneer lacquer, and on the cabin windows. Three materials, three answers. One answer covering all three means one product, and that product is wrong for at least two of them. This question separates a detailer from a cleaner faster than any other.
- What happens if the aircraft is in worse condition than I described? The right answer is a call to you and a revised scope in writing before work continues. The wrong answer is a line item that appears at invoicing for work you never approved.
- What are your insurance limits, and will you issue a COI naming my FBO and the hangar owner? No certificate, no ramp access — the commonest reason a booked visit does not happen. The limits also decide who carries the risk if a stand touches a winglet or a static wick gets snapped.
- Who is actually on the stand, and have they worked this type before? Static wicks, radome coatings and polished nacelle lips all punish a general-purpose detailer. Ask whether the crew is the vendor's own or subcontracted for the day, because the answer tells you who is accountable afterwards.
Questions we get
- Why will you not give me a price over the phone?
- Because the honest version needs photographs. Two aircraft of the same type and the same year can be a full day apart in work depending on condition, access and deadline. Send pictures of the cabin, the belly and the leading edges and you will have a real number quickly, not a placeholder that changes.
- Two quotes, and a wide gap between them. What explains it?
- Almost always scope rather than rate. Put them side by side and check four things: belly and gear bays in or out, how the tail gets reached, whether correction is included or only washing, and what happens if the aircraft is worse than described. Quotes that look a long way apart usually turn out to describe two different jobs.
- Is a midsize jet more expensive to detail than a light jet?
- Usually, though not by as much as the size difference suggests. Extra surface area matters less than tail height, the number of separate cabin materials and the state the aircraft has been left in. A neglected light jet can take longer on the stand than a well-kept midsize.
- Can it be done overnight between trips?
- Often, yes. A cabin reset or a wash fits a night comfortably. A full interior and exterior with correction does not compress into one night without adding crew, and adding crew changes the number. Tell us the gap in the schedule and we will tell you what genuinely fits it.
- Does hangar access really change the cost?
- It changes the result first and the cost second. Sun and wind dry product on a hot fuselage and leave streaking, so open-ramp work runs slower and gets scheduled around weather. In a Georgia summer that usually means a dawn start or a night shift. If a hangar slot is available, say so when you ask for the quote, because it changes both the method and the window.
- How often should a midsize jet be detailed?
- Exterior washing on a set interval, with brightwork and correction on a longer cycle decided by how the aircraft is flown and whether it lives inside. The interval matters more than any single visit. Exhaust deposits removed routinely stay a wash item; left for a year they become a correction job, and correction spends paint you do not get back.
- Do you charge more for AOG or after-hours work?
- Yes, and it is quoted before the crew rolls rather than added afterwards. Calling a crew in outside normal scheduling carries a real cost and we will say so up front. What should never happen is a surcharge appearing on an invoice that was not on the quote you approved.
Send the tail number, the type, the home field and the date you need it ready. Add photographs — the cabin looking aft, the belly, a leading edge and the aft fuselage — and say whether the hangar is available. That is enough for a written scope with exclusions listed plainly, and a number you can hold us to. PDK, RYY, ATL, FTY, LZU and eighty-nine more Georgia fields.
Request service
Get a number against your actual aircraft
Tail, airport, aircraft type and your deadline. That is enough for a written quote against a written scope.
Urgent or AOG? Call dispatch on (770) 999-9740 — faster than any form.
Other cost questions