Complete Detail at Nürnberg (EDDN)

What changes at Nürnberg for a multi-day detail?

Nuremberg airport sits at 1044 feet elevation five kilometres north of the city centre, with a single 2700-metre runway and a General Aviation Terminal at Flughafenstr. 100 run by AirPart GmbH, the airport's handling subsidiary. Unlike most German airports, Nuremberg is licensed for 24/7 operations; AirPart is staffed around the clock, so overnight ramp work and hangar moves are operationally possible. The GAT desk is open Monday to Friday 06:00–21:30 and weekends 08:30–18:00 Central European Time, though the handling agent remains on duty outside those hours for arrivals and departures.

Nuremberg is a Level 2 'schedules facilitated' airport—not fully slot-coordinated—and Universal Weather lists no slot requirement for business aviation, which simplifies planning for a multi-day visit. A Prior Permission Request form is published by the airport, and AirPart holds IATA AHM 804 and ISAGO certification. The combination of 24-hour licensing, a dedicated GA terminal and no hard slot constraint means you can bring the aircraft in late, park it in the hangar for the duration of the detail, and collect it on a schedule that fits the rest of the trip rather than a curfew window.

How does the Complete Detail booking work at the General Aviation Terminal?

You notify AirPart of the arrival and the fact that a third-party appearance crew will be working on the aircraft for two to five days. The handler expects an airside-pass application for our team—typically submitted forty-eight hours before the first shift—and confirmation that the aircraft will remain on stand or move to a hangar they nominate. If the work is inside, AirPart coordinates hangar access and GPU; if any of it happens on the apron, they note the stand reservation in their system so operations knows the aircraft is not available for an immediate departure.

We bring our own water, chemicals, lighting and vacuum kit. The handler does not need to supply anything beyond the usual ramp services—GPU if you want the cabin powered, a tow if the aircraft moves between the apron and the hangar, and an escort if our team crosses an uncontrolled airside boundary. The PPR form and any handling requests go to the GAT team at +49 911 937 1576 or gat-team@airpart.de; we copy ourselves on those messages so everyone knows the parking duration and the nature of the work.

What happens during the exterior stages of a Complete Detail?

The exterior begins with a dry wash or rinseless wash of the entire airframe—fuselage, wings, nacelles, tail, belly and gear bays—to lift operational grime without flooding the ramp. Once the paint is clean we decontaminate every panel with a clay bar or chemical decon to pull embedded metal dust, exhaust residue and industrial fallout out of the clear coat, then follow with a single-stage machine polish to restore gloss and eliminate light oxidation, swirl marks and the flat haze that builds up over a season of line washes.

Brightwork—windscreen surrounds, cheat-line trim, nacelle lips, any polished leading edges—is polished separately with a dedicated metal compound. The final step is a spray sealant or hydrophobic coating over the paint and glass, which extends the life of the polish and makes the next turnaround wash faster. All no-touch rules around pitot probes, static ports, antennas and the avionics bay are observed; if a panel needs to come off for access we note it in the tech log and photograph the work. The exterior alone usually takes one to two days, depending on aircraft size and the condition of the paint when we start.

What does the interior disinfection and detail include?

Inside, we vacuum and steam-clean all soft furnishings—seats, divans, carpets, curtains, headliners—using OEM-safe chemistry matched to the cabin materials. Hard surfaces—galleys, lavatories, cockpit panels, wood veneers, stone or metal inlays—are cleaned, polished where appropriate, and treated with a pH-neutral disinfectant that kills bacteria and viruses without damaging the finish. We pull seat cushions to reach the tracks and the structure underneath, clean the window reveals and bezels, and wipe down every switch, handle and stowage compartment in the flight deck.

Disinfection is the final interior pass: we fog or spray all touchpoints and soft goods with a hospital-grade agent, then ventilate the cabin so it is dry and odour-free when you collect the aircraft. The process adds half a day to the schedule but is standard in a Complete Detail, particularly before a sale or a charter series where the cabin history matters to the next customer. We photograph the cabin before we start and again at handover so the flight department has a dated record of the condition.

Why does a Complete Detail take two to five days?

Duration depends on three variables: aircraft size, paint condition and whether the work happens entirely in the hangar or partly on the ramp. A super-midsize jet with paint that was polished six months ago and only needs decon and a light correction will be done in two days; an ultra-long-range airframe that has not been polished in two years, with heavy oxidation on the belly and nacelles, will take four or five. Brightwork adds time if there are large polished leading edges or nacelle lips that need multiple passes with decreasing grades of compound.

Weather does not stop the work if we are in a hangar, but if part of the exterior has to happen outside and it rains, we pause the polish stages until the airframe is dry. The interior can proceed in parallel once the exterior team has finished around the doors and the cabin is accessible. We update the handling agent and the flight department daily with progress photographs so everyone knows where we are in the sequence and when the aircraft will be ready for the next leg.

When should an operator schedule a Complete Detail at Nürnberg?

The service makes sense once or twice a year, usually in the spring before the busy season or in the autumn before an annual inspection, a pre-buy survey or an aircraft sale. It is the reset you do when a weekly dry wash is no longer enough—when the paint looks dull under direct sun, when the cabin smells tired despite regular cleans, or when you need documented proof that the aircraft was brought to showroom condition on a specific date.

Nuremberg works well for positioning flights through southern Germany: the airport is five kilometres from the city centre, the handler is available around the clock, and there is no curfew or slot constraint to force an awkward departure time. If the aircraft is AOG elsewhere for maintenance and you have a three-day window before the next charter leg, the Complete Detail can happen in parallel so the cabin is ready when the tech work finishes. The photographic report we deliver at the end—before and after shots of every exterior panel and interior zone—goes into the aircraft file and travels with the logbooks if the aircraft changes hands.