Apparently, there is an article in a French magazine “Aviation et Pilote” about this.
This was posted in the Socata owners’ site (from which I was banned in 2008 for disagreeing with the owner of the server 
) and in there is a post from an ex Socata guy saying there are at least two French teams trying to do this and this article is the result of one of these doing a press release on it.
I know of several such attempts in the past.
They are apparently aiming for a price of €200k which would be amazingly good value. The last price for a TB20GT (2002) was GBP 195k+VAT and that included
I recall the price was GBP 180k+VAT only a few months before I got mine. Then it went up to GBP 250k+VAT over the next 2 years before they finally admitted they stopped production a couple of years earlier 
If they build it in say Romania it’s not impossible. After all there’s no R&D involved. It cost Renault 3’800 EUR to build the Logan there by mixing and matching different existing parts from their inventory and I’m sure it’s more complicated to assemble than a TB20 :)
Is this an April Fool joke?
Is this an April Fool joke?
:) it must be. A good one too.
Yes I think it is possible. The point of difficulty which I believe has frustrated past attempts was the amount of money which Socata wanted for the parts business, without which any restart is a complete waste of time.
It’s not a 1st April joke. The magazine appears to be a Jan 2015 issue
They are apparently aiming for a price of €200k
I noticed Cessna’s going rate for a factory new C172 SP is USD 364k, so I’d have to concur w/Jason…
I would not take anything at face value, because there are so many factors involved, and the aircraft manufacturers are flat out on the PR case, feeding out a stream of bullsh1t about how many hundreds of millions they pay out on product liability, etc.
In reality all the US players are ancient companies, with ancient workforces, underfunded pension funds, overbloated with middle management, struggling to recruit people who can add 2+2 and write down the answer.
The TB production line had a lot of tooling made, plus Morroco has cheap labour (unlike the USA) which is ideal for bending up bits of metal.
Cessna heavily discount to schools etc. I recall one school at Shoreham, in 2003, was offered a C172 for GBP 140k for 1, 120k for 2 and 100k for 3. Obviously those prices were never advertised by Cessna. They were offered by Cessna via their UK dealer, CSE. So you can bet some US school is not paying anywhere remotely near $364k. Probably nearer to $250k if they buy a dozen.
But looking at the GBP 140k for 1, you can also see why Socata TB10 sales died around then. The list price was ~ GBP 150k! That’s why most TB10s on the market, even when I was looking at them in 2001, were 1980s specimens. The TB10 was overpriced for a decade before they pulled the plug.
But even if they can do a TB20 for $364k they will still have a very competitive product.
It would cost double that.
I understood there was a TB20 clone made in China at some stage. Other than that, I can’t imagine how anyone would manage to build an airframe like the TB20 for less than maybe 500k today, even if it were not to be for sale in the US. EASA certification alone would eat up a lot unless they would be able to ride on the grandfathered certification of the original TB20.
Socata would probably have the financial push to do this if they wanted to but there has not been a lot of indication from their side so far. On the other hand, seeing the very colourful history of French light airplane manufacturers, who knows if the TB series might be restarted by someone else, as it has happened with Robin. They might even bring Morane back at some stage :)
The Chinese clone was reportedly a real bodge job
which would never be certified in the West. It was aimed at China domestic plus friendly local nations who didn’t need certification, or for military training (value of a life is approx zero in many places).
I am sure any restart would be based on the existing aircraft, with aerodynamic and visual clean-ups. The technology is all current, apart from avionics which obviously would need updating. Of course you get Porsche to do the cockpit Then, if you avoid major POH changes, you can call it Mod 159 (the GT was Mod 151 ) Whoever does this would need to be FAA and EASA Part 145, and EASA Part 21, and would roll up the rest of the changes under the TC.
Regarding pricing, can anybody support their figures with costings? Start with an estimated OEM cost of an IO540-C4 and work backwards. Ignore the usual preconceptions coming out of the USA.
Socata’s accountants have no interest in restarting. In France, labour costs are crazily high, and need something like a TBM to soak them up without them bubbling up everywhere. Example: in the UK, if you pay somebody 50k gross, you pay 5k employer’s NIC (an employee tax, paid by the employer). In France you pay 25k employer’s NIC. And that is just the start. In a previous life (1980s) we had a French sales office and it was a p1sstake all the way down the road. I think the two guys down there were p1ssed half the time. I found a Linkedin page for one of them the other day… what an absolute scream his description was compared to the reality (well, no worse than any CV I suppose, but this one was something special). We got totally taken to the cleaners. I know a sales guy, UK, top US FPGA company, now based in France, major south coast city, who says a bottle of wine for lunch with a customer is standard protocol. In the UK he was a p1sshead but he says France is at another level, and hard to do real work. During my several visits to Tarbes there was little evidence of anybody working much, in a huge factory. Lots of laughter and a very slick subsidised canteen. It’s the way the French like it, which is fine, but it works only if (a) the French keep buying French regardless of price and (b) the product itself has gross margins so fat that any low productivity can be absorbed. It takes at least a turboprop, nowadays, to do that.
Also nearly everybody involved with the piston line is no longer working for Socata. But you would need people with suitable expertise to drive the project in say Morroco. You can’t just send a load of drawings down there and get a plane back – exactly as Apple will have hundreds of Americans at Foxconn kicking ass and keeping an eye on stuff.
I think the reason why nothing has got off the ground, of the several who tried, is that all of them were startups. The last one I heard about (not mentioned publicly so I won’t say anything) wasn’t even 145+21 so they had a long way to go even if they got the financial backing.
