Snoopy wrote:
What is a non faired nose?
Nose gear without wheel fairing.
44USG is quite a lot and iirc similar to C208 turbine fuel burn. Well, CapeAir must have determined it would work for them.
I think Cape Air just wanted a modern successor to their aged Cessna 402’s. It seems they feared turbine overhauls so it had to be an Avgas plane. But it had to be a twin, so fewer questions are asked when going commercial with such a bird.
In Europe there is an increasing number of operators going officially commercial IFR with single pilot / single engine aircraft, most of them being PC-12’s. But you need a lot of ideas and procedures to fulfill the authorities’ requirements.
I heard it was basically Cape Air who “designed” the P2012. They went to the big manufacturers such as Cessna and asked them to build the airplane but were turned down. So they ended up with Tecnam. The P2012 seems to be an “American” airplane for multiple reasons. First it operates on Avgas 100 LL which will disappear from Europe’s gas stations and fuel trucks in the near future some people say…
Second an Italian company mass-produces an (almost) high-performance piston airplane with a non-pressurized cabin. Italy, one of the countries together with Austria, Switzerland, France and Germany sharing the Alps with MSA of 14000 ft and higher!
The second reason was the main concern why the investors in my company turned down the P2012.
When departing from Switzerland you’re unable to get an IFR routing at 3000 ft or 5000 ft. It often starts at 7000 ft. If only thinking about going a bit towards the south your IFR routing will be in the “supplemental oxygen flight levels”. From Autumn to Spring icing will mostly happen to be between 6000 ft and 12000 ft. So if you hit some mountains below the freezing level your only chance is to climb above the ice.
There’s nothing “wrong” with the TEO-540 other than it being a brand new engine with FADEC and some of the little child’s diseases still need to be figured out, as expected with any new product.
Why Tecnam went with the GTSIO for their STOL version (even though it has the exact same rated power and seems like a step down technology wise) can be explained by the fact that it is a geared engine. The STOL version uses a bigger three blade prop, while the geared Conti can reach a much higher rpm than the Lycoming. This allows the geared conti to drive a bigger prop, required for STOL performance, but the trade-off is that this combination will perform worse in cruise and have a higher fuel consumption.
I also heard a rumor that Tecnam’s relationship with Lycoming has been a bit troublesome, not entirely sure why, maybe Lycoming’s delivery schedules… and as a result, they went with their competitor (Conti) for the STOL version, or it had an influence on it… (I’m not sure, as I said; this is speculative).
Eagle20 might be right. Tecnam is offering the Conti option for the non-STOl variant as well.
I think the passengers will appreciate quieter cabin of the Conti Traveller.
