On March 5, 2015, actor/pilot Harrison Ford crashed his vintage Ryan ST-3KR monoplane onto a Venice, California golf course following an engine failure. Eventually, the wreckage ended up in the boneyard at Dodson International in Rantoul, Kansas.
Dodson buys and sells used aircraft parts. That includes accident aircraft, those that are no longer airworthy, or others that are worth more parked and parted out. Most were owned by people or entities you’ve never heard of, but there are a few notable exceptions: the late actor John Wayne’s Jet Commander, a Jetstream 31 turboprop once owned by Nascar racing legend Richard Petty, a Gulfstream GIII formerly belonging to Ultimate Fighting Championship CEO Dana White, the Piper Meridian that disgraced financier Marcus Schrenker parachuted from in an attempt to fake his own death in 2009, four Piaggio Avantis from the defunct Avantair, and a Hawker 4000 from that aircraft’s flight test program.
Dodson began as an FBO operator’s side hustle of parting out old Cessna 172s and Piper Cherokees. Today, it is one of the world’s largest suppliers of business aircraft and turbine helicopter parts. Learjet 30 series and early Cessna Citations are particularly popular, as are vintage Bell JetRanger and model 212 helicopters.
But there are newer business jets on the lot as well, including a late-model Dassault Falcon 7X. Dodson also deals in commuter and some large transport category aircraft, as well as aircraft support vehicles including fuel trucks and tugs.
Drive through the rolling pastures just outside of town on Vermont Road and you’ll find the incongruous sight of a Lockheed JetStar mounted atop a pylon. Go through the adjacent gate and you will come to what was once a giant dirt-floor cow barn that formerly hosted rodeos.
It’s part of Dodson’s nearly 200-acre complex with more than 200,000 sq ft under the roof, home to 18 million aircraft parts including 2,000 fuselages. The latter are neatly placed in the surrounding fields and arranged in groupings by make and model. CEO J.R. Dodson estimates that the company has recycled 5,000 aircraft since its founding in 1984. J.R. Dodson runs the company with his sons Dilon and Nic and 65 other full-time employees.
Dodson obtains the aircraft and the parts from a well-established network of insurance and other companies. About 70% of its business is from North America. Occasionally, J.R. Dodson, a type-rated jet pilot and Embry-Riddle graduate who once aspired to fly for the airlines, will pilot his Falcon 10 to a site of a prospective acquisition to inspect it. He calls the Falcon a “Ferrari on steroids” and notes that the business he does on one trip often can pay the operating expenses on the 10 for the entire year. Dodson also has partial ownership of a Falcon 50 and 900. While photos and videos are nice, Dodson said there is no substitute for looking at an aircraft in person.
Some aircraft Dodson dismantles itself, and others are taken apart through contracted FAA Part 145 repair stations. Dodson does not hold a Part 145 certificate but does employ airframe and powerplant mechanics for quality and compliance reasons. The airplanes arrive on trucks or are flown in by contract pilots, either to a grass strip across the road or the airport in nearby Ottawa, Kansas (KOWI), home to sister company Dodson Aviation. Components that have been recently overhauled or have a good amount of remaining useful life are particularly prized. During AIN’s visit, Dodson technicians were in the process of tearing down a newer Cirrus SR22 piston single, a medevac Leonardo AW109 twin-turbine helicopter, and a fire-gutted TBM turboprop.
Inputting inventory involves a painstaking process of documentation, inspection, and evaluation, then data entry and bar-coding. The relevant data is stored on triple-redundant servers. The parts themselves are photographed and tagged and then either capped, bagged, caged, or sealed and then sent to warehouse for retrieval. Dodson uses a program that allows authorized users to access data and photos of any part of its inventory on a cell phone.
Engines, around 20% of Dodson’s business, are stored separately and maintained according to recommended schedules. Vintage avionics also are a hot item and “are very valuable,” said J.R. Dodson. The company’s customers are primarily MROs and individual flight departments, but the continuing Covid overhang supply-chain disruptions have created a new class of customers—the OEMs.
“The inability of manufacturers to provide certain parts has obviously helped us,” he said. “There are a lot of structural pieces and other things that manufacturers now have long lead times for, and sometimes the OEM just can’t tool up to produce in a timely manner. Not a month goes by that we don’t have an OEM buying a part they don’t have.” This is particularly true when it comes to engines, according to J.R. Dodson. “Typically, the engine MROs have escalated their pricing and increased their lead times, so there are opportunities there.”
But there is also risk. Dodson must hold onto wreckage in the event that any insurance or NTSB matters remain unsettled. Beyond that, there is no certainty as to when a particular component will find a buyer. While those timelines are not formally set, he said, “If we have a number of items that we know will never sell, we may purge the inventory of certain quantities.” Dodson prices parts using a formula that incorporates the purchase value of the aircraft. And while supply-chain issues present opportunity, he notes that it has also placed acquisition price pressure on the company. “It costs more to reload."
Fortunately, Dodson has strong ties with its creditors, according to Dilon Dodson, who serves as vice president. “Thankfully, we have creditors that we have long-term relationships with. They don't really micromanage too much; we have a decently long leash with a lot of them.” He adds that Dodson’s longevity attracts customers, particularly insurers. “They know we’re a good source for a quick transaction.”
Parts typically come from shelves stacked high inside the ”rodeo barn.” It now has a cement floor, and a quick tour reveals a plethora of parts any OEM would be hard-pressed to match: brakes in one row, axles in another. Dust caps, torque plates, flaps, trim tabs, spoilers, wing sets, landing gear assemblies are among others. “We try to keep the aisles clear, but increasingly we're running out of space. We’ll probably be expanding this building and maybe adding another warehouse,” Dilon Dodson said.
Windshields are a particularly hot item. He attributes it to difficulties that manufacturers are having onboarding trained workers post-Covid. “It’s something that’s way, way backed up now. They have to hire and train people to make them. Where pre-Covid you were seeing a fail rate of 5 to 10%, now they’re having a fail rate of 40 to 45%.”
The sheer volume of what Dodson does can be daunting, Dilon admits. “It can feel overwhelming. But on the flip side, you always get to be doing something new and that’s really exciting. I wake up on Monday doing one thing and by the time Friday rolls around, I’ll be doing something new. It’s always interesting.”
What interests him at this moment is shipping containers. “They’ve gotten very hard to find and become very expensive.” Dodson typically requires 15 to 20, but now it needs more.
Although it has a mounted JetStar at its entrance, J.R. Dodson said the company probably would not be interested in turbojet aircraft now. “I can't imagine going out of my way to get [a Gulfstream] G1 or a JetStar, anything of that nature, unless there was some sort of extenuating circumstance.”
But the JetStar on the pylon is staying. Putting it on the pole was the idea of J.R.’s father. Dodson acquired it for its four Pratt & Whitney JT12 engines in the 1980s when the JT12 “still had some viability,” according to J.R. Dodson. It was the fourth from the last JetStar Lockheed produced and belonged to a Mexican mining company. The mining company was not just retiring the aircraft—it was retiring its captain. He flew the plane into Ottawa and handed over the keys. “He had tears running down his eyes,” J.R.Dodson recalled.
Meeting that captain, and scores of others, is the best part of his job, he said. “The most unique thing about aviation is that it’s a crossroads of very interesting, successful, driven, and wonderful people who all come together and share their love of travel and airplanes. You meet people from all over the world. It’s just priceless and I’ve enjoyed every moment.”
And what became of Harrison Ford’s wrecked Ryan? Dodson sold it to the Airline History Museum at the Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport in Kansas City. Due to an ongoing lease dispute, the museum has been closed.