This is a stupid discussion. The parachute clearly adds to safety. Whether an individual wants to use one is up to them. It is a piece of equipment not the existence of a deity was are talking about.
I am not sure why everyone is offended so much by Cirrus marketing. Cessna, Beech etc all used clever marketing when they were getting established to encourage new owners into aircraft ownership.
I personally don’t like Cirrus aircraft for me but they make good planes and are very successful. Along with the sports/ultralight manufacturers they have reinvigorated GA.
I am not sure why everyone is offended so much by Cirrus marketing.
I doubt anyone is offended by Cirrus marketing. Many think the “pull early pull often” slogan helps to achieve the high % of pulls which seem to be pointless and just trash the aircraft.
What really gets people going is the religion around it all, and the way every BRS discussion gets trashed. One could have valid discussions around it e.g. how would you modify your mission profile if you had it. Would you fly [more] at night? Etc. And we have had some here. But every such discussion is always trashed by the (small number of) “church members”. I am sure none of the other BRS equipped aircraft types (admittedly none are certified) draw such a fanatical following. The following is a damn good selling tool however, which could not have been bought at any price!
However, Justine informs me that nutrition forums are just the same…
For some reason there is almost no discussion or thread regarding the Cessnas with a BRS. Of which there are some. BRS is a brand in its own right and has an STC for specific Cessna models as well. I know for a fact that neither the Beech nor any other retractable (i.e. Mooney) will likely ever be certified for the BRS chute. When I spoke to them, they need a fixed gear to reduce the sink rate before impact. Certifying it for a retractable would mean the gear has to be deployed automatically when opening the chute, which opens a whole new can of worms.
But yes, a Beech with a chute, I guess would blow Cirrus out of the water.
“Religion”, “fanatical following”, “church members” …. that’s exactly the kind of wording that destroys every discussion about it.
I feel absolutely not “religious” about THINGS, and that’s all an airplane is, a stupid thing. I am also not in “love” with things, and I really don’t care if others like it or not. I just don’t like the prejudice and badmouthing.
Certifying it for a retractable would mean the gear has to be deployed automatically when opening the chute, which opens a whole new can of worms.
That’s really interesting. Does the Cirrus jet do that, or was it solved some other way?
The (fibre glass) landing gear has nothing to do with the “sink rate”. It is used to destroy the kinetic energy at impact.
Also the Cirrus Jet is an RG, and it is certified with the CAPS/BRS system, so I have no idea where that (new) tale is coming from.
Alex that’s not a tale. The original SR was designed around the chute. The gear is needed to destroy the kinetic energy before impact. The guy from BRS told me that’s the reason the Cirrus has a fixed gear. And when I was at aero some years ago, and asked the guy at the Cirrus booth why Cirrus doesn’t have a retractable gear, he basically told me the same – that they need the fixed gear to destroy the energy.
In the jet ? I don’t know… I guess Cirrus develops the whole airframe around the BRS. And I also guess that as soon as you deploy the chute the gear automatically drops. Which needs an extra battery, and a lot of certification, which costs a lot of Dollares. Which Cirrus was perfectly ready to accept for its brand new jet, but Beech refuses to spend on a not so sure business case. My two cents.
Think about it. A Cirrus SR22 with retractable gear would be a terrific airplane, very fast ? Why don’t they just build it ? There must be a reason, surely ? And don’t shoot me – I’m basically just telling here what the guys told me some time ago. Of course, it might be different today. Maybe BRS today has a way to certify it for retractable SEPs….
The only correct part is that Beech or Mooney would have to design the airplane from scratch to certify it with the BRS system. But that has nothing to do with the “sink rate”, AFAIK. I do not know if the Cirrus Jet lowers the landing gear automatically, have to check. Yes, of course the LG is used to destroy the kinetic energy, but the Jet shows it could be done with RG.
But all this has nothing to do with “sink rate”.
I will never understand why these companies left that whole market segment to Cirrus.
THe “SR22” with RG topic has been discussed many times. From the people who designed the airplane I know (first hand) that they figured out that the SR22 would be 10-15 knots faster with RG and that they simply thought it’s fast enough without it. As we know only some Mooneys are (a bit) faster in this class and those airplanes have a cabin that’s much smaller than the Cirrus cabin.
Just a little bit faster, heavier, more complicated, that’s the reasons.
