Aviation ground power and secure entrances, trusted from terminal to plane.

We build, supply, install and look after the equipment that powers aircraft on stand, and the doors people walk through to reach them. One Sussex engineering team, at work from Heathrow and Gatwick to London City and Glasgow.

Request a quoteBook a free site survey

Or call 0800 170 1515, day or night.

  • Authorised UK partner to ITW GSE since 2017
  • UK airport partner for Manusa security entrances
  • Cable carriers, cables and airside kit built in Sussex
Stands
An Emirates A380 on stand at Glasgow Airport, nose to the camera, with JLC cable carriers in the foreground carrying 400Hz ground power to the aircraft
JLC cable carriers powering an Emirates A380 at Glasgow Airport

Trusted at

  • Heathrow
  • Gatwick
  • London City
  • Glasgow
  • Luton
  • British Airways
  • Network Rail
  • Warner Bros. Studios

Choose your route

Two specialist teams.
One number to call.

Most airports buy stand power from one supplier and secure entrances from another. With JLC, one company designs, installs and maintains both, from the terminal door to the aircraft stand.

Secure entrancesTerminal and landsideBlast-enhanced and burglar-resistant automatic doors, fire-rated doors and shutters, boarding gates and one-way security corridors.Blast doorsRC2 doorsFire doorsOne-way corridorsBoarding gatesExplore secure entrancesGround powerStand and airsideFixed 400Hz ground power, the Alligator cable carrier, cables, pits and ground power units, plus remote monitoring and airside kit built to order.Alligator carriers400Hz cablesPitsGPUs and PCAGPCSExplore ground power
Service and repairsPlanned maintenance and 24/7 reactive cover for doors, gates, shutters and ground power.How we keep you running

Terminal to plane

Nine places you’ll find our work on one stand.

Follow the line from the landside kerb to the aircraft. Tap a number to see what we supply, install and maintain at each stop.

Cutaway of an airport stand, from the terminal entrance to the aircraftA section through a terminal and stand. Landside: a blast-enhanced entrance and a one-way arrivals corridor on the ground floor, boarding gates on the departures floor. Airside: a glass jet bridge to a parked narrow-body aircraft, with a ground power unit, a pop-up pit, an Alligator cable carrier and 400Hz cables at the nose, a waste bowser under the rear fuselage and the airport fire station beyond.
Stop 1 of 9, Terminal

Blast-enhanced entrance

Automatic sliding doors that open like any other entrance, tested to resist a car bomb at 25 metres.

  • ISO 16933 EXV25
  • BS EN 16005
  • Openings to 8.4 m
See the detail

Ground power

Power on stand, every turnaround.

At the UK’s major airports, the rules are clear: aircraft must use fixed ground power whenever it’s available, and keep their noisy, fuel-hungry auxiliary power units switched off. When a stand loses power, the aircraft waits, burns fuel, or both. We make sure it doesn’t.

  • 7major UK airports require fixed ground power when it’s available: Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol and London City.
  • 15 minthe most a narrow-body may run its APU before departure at Heathrow, while ground power works.
  • 126 kgof jet fuel an hour: what an A320’s APU burns while the stand has no power.

Sources: UK AIP aerodrome entries, AIRAC 1 October 2026; IATA APU fuel flow figures.

Designed and built in Lower Dicker

The Alligator cable carrier

Designed and built by JLC as the second generation of the Crocodile. One person walks 400Hz power from the stand to the aircraft, with no cables dragged across the apron.

Reach
Up to 30 m, in 3 m stainless modules
Outputs
One or two 90 kVA, 400Hz
Options
28V DC output, basket steps, stamp lock brakes
Build
IP66 control box, Schneider Electric actuators, 300 mm puncture-proof wheels
Finish
Light grey RAL 7035 with reflective tape
A JLC Alligator cable carrier unfolded on a Heathrow stand, its basket and control box beside the stand sign

Configurator

Spec your Alligator

In 3 m stainless modules, from 6 m to 30 m.

400Hz outputs
Options

18 m carrier, six modules, two 90 kVA 400Hz outputs, stamp lock brakes.

Request a quote for this spec
JLC 400Hz output cables hanging from an aircraft nose gear on stand 30, with a cable carrier basket below

400Hz cables and lanyards

Made by our electrical engineers and tested before they leave the workshop. 6.5 m and 10 m 400Hz cables are held in stock, 28V DC and custom lengths are made to order, and every cable carries a 12-month warranty.

Cables and sockets leaflet PDF, 2.8 MB
A pop-up ground power pit open on the apron, its chequer-plate lid raised and cables connected

Pit systems

Pop-up, hatch and mini pits for 400Hz and 28V DC. Up to four outputs, room for pre-conditioned air hoses, built-in ventilation and drainage, and a lid that opens with less than 10 kg of effort.

Two ITW GSE 2400 ground power units on a stand beside an Emirates A380

Ground power units and PCA

As ITW GSE’s authorised UK partner since 2017, we supply, commission and service solid-state, battery and diesel units, from the 2400 and 7400 eGPU to the 28V DC 1400, plus pre-conditioned air and reconditioned AXA 2300 units for smaller airfields.

ITW GSE AXA 1400 datasheet PDF, 0.8 MB
A red JLC waste fuel bowser on stand in front of a British Airways A320

Airside kit, built to order

Waste fuel and oil bowsers (970 L), a lavatory waste bowser (1,050 L), aircraft wheel trolleys and extension cable reels, designed and built in Sussex, most of them with British Airways engineers at Heathrow.

Bowsers leaflet PDF, 3.1 MB

Remote monitoring

Ground Power Connectivity System

Our GPCS, built with Beam Connectivity, reads every ground power unit’s performance and fault data over 4G. Alarms reach your phone, so an engineer is on the way before an aircraft taxis on to a dead stand.

  • Live status for every stand
  • Alarms by app and email
  • Keeps logging if the signal drops
  • Reads Modbus TCP and RTU
GPCS leaflet PDF, 3.4 MB

Estimator

What does a stand without power cost?

When fixed ground power fails, the aircraft runs its APU for the whole turnaround. Put in your own numbers to see the fuel, carbon and money a dead stand burns.

Aircraft on the stand
Extra cost of the outage£3,120fuel burned, less the electricity ground power would have used
APU running47 h
Jet fuel burned5.9 t
CO2 emitted19 t

Estimate only. APU fuel flow: A320 126 kg/h, A330 210 kg/h, B777 312 kg/h (IATA). CO2: 3.16 kg per kg of jet fuel. Ground power electricity: 35, 60 and 80 kW average draw at £0.25 per kWh. Your airport’s APU rules, aircraft and contracts will change the real figures.

Talk to us about stand uptime

Secure entrances

Secure entrances that still feel like entrances.

Blast, break-in and fire protection that opens like any other automatic door, so people move freely right up to the moment it matters. We’re the UK airport partner for Manusa’s security entrances, and we program, install and maintain them ourselves.

A blast-enhanced sliding door standing in its test frame as the dust from a blast test clears

Our flagship entrance

Blast-enhanced sliding doors

Tested to ISO 16933 EXV25: the equivalent of 100 kg of TNT at 25 metres, roughly a car bomb. Yet day to day they are ordinary automatic doors, built to BS EN 16005, and they can still be opened by hand after a blast. Openings run up to 8.4 metres, the size of the one at Warner Bros. Studios.

EXV25ISO 16933 blast class
8.4 mwidest opening we’ve fitted
80 kPapeak reflected pressure
Blast doors brochure PDF, 1.6 MB

Burglar-resistant automatic doors

An automatic door that resists a break-in for at least three minutes, with multi-point automatic locking and access control built in. For jewellers, pharmacies, data rooms and anywhere stock is worth stealing.

Bronze-framed glazed fire-rated sliding doors closed between a restaurant and a kitchen

Fire-rated sliding doors

Glazed bi-parting or single-leaf sliding doors rated for 30 or 60 minutes. They slide open for people every day, and close to hold back fire and smoke when the alarm sounds.

Fire doors and shutters brochure PDF, 2.4 MB
Four red high-speed doors closed across the vehicle bays of the London City Airport fire station

Fire shutters and high-speed doors

Roller shutters, fire curtains and high-speed doors, including the four fire station doors at London City Airport that lift on the crash alarm from the terminal or airfield operations.

A one-way security corridor in a terminal, two glazed door sets lit with green light strips

One-way security corridors

Anti-walk-back corridors for arrivals, ports and rail. Two interlocked door sets detect anyone going the wrong way and close the entrance door, without a guard posted on it.

One-way corridors brochure PDF, 1.5 MB
Stainless steel boarding gates with glass panels at Lelystad Airport in the Netherlands

Boarding and access gates

Swing-panel gates that work with any access control system, with anti-trap sensing and break-out for evacuation. We program the controllers ourselves, so they do exactly what your operation needs.

Access and boarding gates brochure PDF, 2.9 MB
A row of automatic sliding doors under yellow wayfinding signs at Gatwick Airport

Automatic doors and entry systems

Sliding, swing and accessible doors, push pads and fail-safe operators, installed and maintained to BS EN 16005 and the Equality Act. We look after them at Gatwick, on police estates and on campuses.

Automatic doors brochure PDF, 3.5 MB

Service and repairs

Kept running, day and night.

From the first survey to the hundredth service visit, it’s the same company on the job. We act as principal contractor, and our own certified engineers do the work.

  1. Survey

    A free site survey and an honest view of what you need.

  2. Design

    Specified and drawn by our own engineers.

  3. Build

    Made in our Lower Dicker workshop, where it can be.

  4. Install

    Our teams, airside or landside, as principal contractor.

  5. Commission

    Tested, signed off and your people trained.

  6. Maintain

    Planned visits and 24/7 reactive cover.

  • 24/7 reactive cover

    Tiered response times agreed in your contract, day and night.

  • Planned maintenance

    Doors to BS EN 16005, ground power to the manufacturer’s schedule.

  • Spares on the shelf

    Cables, sockets and parts held in stock, plus PCB repair for older units.

  • Manufacturer-certified

    Our own certified technicians on every job, never subcontractors.

A JLC engineer in hi-vis servicing a yellow Houchin ground power unit on a wet apron
A JLC engineer servicing a Houchin ground power unit.
JLC engineers at the JLC Training Centre with a ground power unit, cable carrier and load bank

Training at our centre in Lower Dicker

Airport engineers come to us to learn ground power: operation, safety, preventive maintenance and fault finding, on real units, a load bank and an Alligator. We also train on site.

Service, maintenance and training leaflet PDF, 5.8 MB

Stand or door down now? Call our 24/7 breakdown line.

0800 170 1515

Projects

Where our work has gone.

From British Airways’ stands at Heathrow to a film studio lot, a sample of the jobs we’ve designed, installed and still look after. Open any row for the detail.

Departures
HeathrowBritish AirwaysCable carriers, bowsers, trolleys and cable reelsIn service
A JLC cable carrier and ground power pedestals on a Heathrow stand at sunset beside a British Airways 787

BA’s Heathrow engineers have worked with us for years. We have installed second-generation Alligator cable carriers on their stands, built waste fuel bowsers, an aircraft wheel trolley and 20 extension cable reels to their brief, relocated a ground power unit from a nose dock in one week instead of two, and installed an ITW GSE 3500 pre-conditioned air unit.

2021first second-generation Alligators
20cable reels redesigned and delivered
1 weeknose dock relocation, planned for 2
GlasgowGlasgow AirportGround power for a new A380 service, at short noticeDelivered
An Emirates A380 at a Glasgow Airport gate with ITW ground power units and a JLC cable carrier in the foreground

Glasgow needed ground power for a new A380 operation at short notice. We supplied four AXA 2400 ground power units and two 24 m dual-output cable carriers, which met the aircraft on stand.

4AXA 2400 units
2dual-output carriers
24 mreach each
London CityAirport fire stationFour high-speed fire station doorsMaintained
The London City Airport fire station with its red high-speed doors, a fire tender and a JLC service van

Four Turbo Fold high-speed doors, 4.3 m wide and 5.4 m high, rated to wind class 5. They lift on the crash alarm from the terminal or airfield operations, with a manual chain override. We managed the airside permits, added our own seals and brush strips, and still service them.

4high-speed doors
4.3 x 5.4 meach opening
Class 5wind rating
GatwickNetwork RailBlast-rated sliding door systemDelivered
Engineers in orange hi-vis behind a newly installed blast-rated glazed door system at Gatwick

A blast-rated automatic sliding door system for Network Rail at Gatwick, supplied and installed by our own engineers in October 2023.

2023installed
Blast-ratedsliding door system
Lelystad, NLFlight SolutionsBoarding gates and one-way corridorsOpened on time
Stainless steel boarding gates with glass panels inside the new terminal at Lelystad Airport

Three boarding gates and two one-way security corridors, installed and commissioned for Flight Solutions before Lelystad Airport opened, on time and on budget.

3boarding gates
2one-way corridors
Studio lotWarner Bros. StudiosNine blast-enhanced sliding doorsMaintained

Nine blast-enhanced sliding doors and one standard sliding door, including one with an 8.4 m clear opening, the widest blast-enhanced sliding door we know of. All ten are now on a JLC service contract.

9blast-enhanced doors
8.4 mwidest opening
CanterburyUniversity of KentFive-year asset replacement programmeSince 2021

A five-year programme, begun in 2021, to replace and maintain more than 600 automatic door and access control assets across three Canterbury sites.

600+assets
5 yearsprogramme
Lisbon, PTLisbon AirportNine cable carriers, our first export orderDelivered

After trials at Gatwick and Birmingham, Lisbon Airport ordered nine of our cable carriers: the first JLC equipment sold abroad.

9cable carriers
1stexport order
The JLC Group team, about thirty people, standing on the grass at Nabbscott Farm with their liveried vans behind
The JLC team at Nabbscott Farm, Lower Dicker, November 2025.

About JLC

Built in Sussex. Trusted at Heathrow.

JLC is a family-run engineering company in Lower Dicker, East Sussex, led by managing director Tony Hayes. Our workshop, stores and training centre sit together at Nabbscott Farm, and our engineers work from there across the UK and beyond.

We started in automatic doors and grew into aviation. Today the same company keeps terminal entrances secure and aircraft stands powered, so one call covers the door and the stand.

Talk to the teamWe’re hiring engineers

  1. 2017Authorised UK service partner to ITW GSE
  2. 2021Training, development and repair centre opened
  3. 2022ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certified
  4. 3countries with JLC kit: the UK, the Netherlands and Portugal

Accreditations and memberships

  • ITW GSE authorised partner
  • Manusa UK airport partner
  • ISO 9001
  • ISO 14001
  • NICEIC approved contractor
  • Constructionline
  • SafeContractor
  • JOSCAR
  • British Aviation Group
  • ADSA
  • Gate Safe
  • Made in Britain

Questions

The things people ask us first.

Something else on your mind? Call 0800 170 1515 and ask an engineer.

Do your engineers work airside?

Yes. We install and maintain equipment on live aprons, in terminals and in hangars, and we arrange the airside permits for the work. We can act as principal contractor, with full CDM capability.

Which ground power units do you service?

As ITW GSE’s authorised UK partner, we commission, install and service AXA Power, Hobart and Houchin units, alongside fixed ground power, pits and cable carriers. We also supply reconditioned AXA 2300 units for aerodromes and heliports.

Can you build a cable carrier to fit our stand?

Yes. The Alligator is built from 3 m stainless modules up to 30 m, with one or two 90 kVA outputs and an optional 28V DC output. Send us your stand layout and we will specify it, or use the configurator above to start the conversation.

Do you keep 400Hz cables in stock?

We hold 6.5 m and 10 m 400Hz output cables, test every cable before it leaves us and give each one a 12-month warranty. Custom lengths and 28V DC cables are made to order.

What does ISO 16933 EXV25 mean?

It is a blast test for glazing and doors. EXV25 means the door was tested against the equivalent of 100 kg of TNT at 25 metres, roughly a car bomb, with a peak reflected pressure of around 80 kPa.

Does Martyn’s Law mean we need blast doors?

No. The Act asks larger venues to take reasonably practicable steps, which can include controlling how people move into and through the building. Blast-enhanced doors are one option among many, and we will tell you honestly what your entrance needs.

Do you only work at airports?

No. We look after entrances for police forces, universities, film studios, retailers and rail, and ground power for military and helicopter bases.

Where are you based?

Our workshop and training centre are at Nabbscott Farm in Lower Dicker, East Sussex, about an hour from Gatwick. We work across the UK and have delivered projects in the Netherlands and Portugal.

Request a quote

Tell us about your site.

A door, a stand, a terminal or a whole estate: tell us what you need and a specialist will come back to you. Site surveys are free.

What do you need?

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Call0800 170 1515Request a quote