In 2005, Derk-Jan van Heerden was an aerospace engineering student at TU Delft. That year he wrote his Master’s thesis on the subject of “What happens to decommissioned airplanes?”
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After graduating, van Heerden got a job with KLM’s Engineering and Maintenance division, where he managed the disassembly of a Boeing 747. He didn’t last long; after just five months, van Heerden had learned enough to start his own company, Aircraft End-of-Life Solutions.
AELS has been going strong for 14 years now. They dismantle airplanes to recycle or resell parts, and they’re the company behind that hilarious video of the guy having to blow the emergency slide in the driveway outside of their facility.
While their main business is reselling operational parts to the aircraft industry, “We receive many requests from people who want to buy aircraft parts for decoration,” the company writes. As a result, they’ve begun holding periodic sales and auctions open to anyone. You can buy wheels, lights, landing gear, ovens, coffeemakers, business class seats, the bathrooms, you name it.
“We love to see how creative people can be with aircraft components,” they write. “Did you ever try to make a photo frame out of an airplane window? Or a bar from an engine inlet? What is the coolest thing you have ever made of aircraft parts? Ours is this coffee table.”
To stay abreast of the sales, you can sign up for their Alternative Re-use Mailing List. And if you’d just like to browse what parts they’ve got available to industry, they keep a downloadable stock sheet here [XLS download].
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Source: core77