Air Travel with PLC and Tools

I flew pretty recently to a Caribbean island with a suitcase with a PLC control panel, a PLC control panel wrapped in a box, a suitcase with 5 vega level transmitters, another suitcase with 5 vega tuning fork switches, and some of my tools and laptop. that was an expensive baggage fee for the customer. Somehow someway it made it there. Customs just took my word for the value, which was kind of crazy. they did look at me funny.


I put notes for TSA letting them know what the items were and what they were for, along with my business card, etc.

Wow you guys are all awesome - thanks so much for all of the advice!

Not so much awesome as tired of being shaken down in airports, trying to take off and after landing.

+1 on shipping ahead, often the item will get there before you will. Items easily insured and tracking options now can pinpoint its exact location and who signed for it.

I have found it easier to just FedEx a box of needed stuff to the customer. Then FedEx it back to the office on the last day. Especially when I have a 6" stack of B size drawings.

Agreed on the Fedex tip. Ship the stuff ahead of time so you don't have the headaches.

Once at Chicago Midway I had a 15 minute ordeal because TSA thought my Wiha 27 piece precision micro screwdriver kit i had in my carry on was "drill bits". No worries about all the other weird looking tools i was carrying but oh my god, those "drill bits" were a real cause for concern. My IC extraction tool looks like it could be used for a lobotomy but that's ok. A bunch of tubes of Nyogel, no problem. But look out for those "drill bits".

Now i just ship everything in advance when possible and only carry on my laptops.