A modern turboprop, even with the 50 year old PT6 up front, would outclass the Cirrus jet on absolutely every measure except sex appeal.
It would today, hence my point about the original concept. If they had just delivered that at the time and price originally intended, it would be a different story.
The Kestrel is stuck, presumably due to a lack of funding, but Cirrus could have done it by now, easily. I am sure they have enough money even with today’s declining sales compared to 5-10 years ago.
I’m sure they could have given their current ownership. After all, they are close to finishing the jet and that must have cost a bundle.
I haven’t seen the latest sales numbers but I have the impression that sales of the SR2X are actually growing since the introduction of the G5. There does seem to be a waiting list for them now even at the rather silly price they now ask for them.
Some would argue that the originally promised price was only slightly less incredible than the originally promised price of the Eclipse.
As the famous Mac McLellan once put it: this thing [the Eclipse] has a couple of jet engines in it! [need an emoticon for being totally baffled]
So maybe the original price was never realistic, and I think that is probably correct.
I remember meeting the then chief pilot of Eclipse a few years ago – a highly credible chap I should add. The whole thing hung mostly on the volume resulting from the air taxi business model which was discredited soon enough even in the USA, and without that the engine price alone makes those early end user price figures unrealistic.
That may well be right and, moreover the Eclipse has only worked financially as a second generation business with the debts of the original entity written off. I suppose to some extent you could say that the situation with Cirrus and their current owners is comparable, given that the financial train wreck that Cirrus was in danger of becoming was presumably factored into the purchase price, at least to their satisfaction, when they bought the company from Arcapita its former VC owner.
That said, the couple of people I know from the COPA forum who have given up on the SF50 and bought an Eclipse are very pleased with it.
But that won’t matter at all in the end – it will sell like crazy
We’ll see. It’s a bit like Eclipse all over again, with the difference that Cirrus has a huge marketing potential just as a brand. The Cirrus Jet is a myth for people who dream of their own jet for years, certainly within the Cirrus crowd itself. It may well sell well just because it is a Cirrus and because it has the parashute, which for a single engine plane is not a bad thing anyway. And it will sell to those who believe the marketing strategy that it is a logical upgrade for the well to do SR22 owner.
The philosophy is the same: Cirrus tells folks that it is the ideal airplane for the experienced Cirrus pilot as it has an equal cockpit and flies at “manageable” speeds for the single private pilot with the necessary cash, much the same as what they tell their normal SR20/22 crowd with the result that the airplane has acquired a partly justified “doctor killer” reputation. Not because the plane is bad, far from it, but because Cirrus underestimated the egos of folks who will shell out this kind of money and their pride. Consequently, a lot of people whose only qualification was the cash to buy the plane killed themselfs because they were too proud to admit defeat and use the parashute which had been deviced extra for people like that.
So what impact will this have for the Cirrus Jet? Potentially quite a lot. There will be a lot of the people who are maybe in their 3rd new Cirrus (After the Original they had to have the G3 and now the G5 e.t.c.) who will be sorely tempted to get the jet because it is new and hip and because they want to belong to the select crowd which can afford their own jet. People like that buy emotionally, not rationally, it has to be hip, it has to be a head turner on the tarmac.
And then comes the Jet myth. Prop planes are “toys” “the ones which fall from the sky” “world war II designs” e.t.c. Doesn’t only apply to GA planes but to the most modern new designs likewise. How did the Bombardier stretched Challengers ever outsell a design like the Saab 2000, which had about half the fuel consumption with more passengers and irrelevantly slower speed? How will people choose to buy an Eclipse over a King Air? The same reason why they will fall for the Cirrus Jet in hundreds. And possibly regret it but will be to vain to admit it.
2 Million is a huge pile of money for a 4 seater which can do 300 kts. carry 1200 lb of load over 500 and 400 lb over 1100 NM. Or over 1200 NM at 210 kts economic speed.
Wait? A Mooney Acclaim can do 1400NM with 400 lb too, even FASTER than this jet at 234 kts cruise and at a fraction of the price. An SR22T can do 200 kts and 800 NM but with 650 lb payload. Not to speak of a Jetprop or TBM, which exceed both speed and range other than in the top margin where the Cirrus jet can pull away by a few knots.
Given those figures and the budget, I’d go for either a SR22T, an Acclaim or eif it HAS to be a Jet then buy an old Citation 501 SP for 250k and fly it for the other 1’850’000. Even with a Citation that should take a while and especcially the long wing version will outfly the Cirrus Jet by a margin. (Yes, dear, it does have a LOO!)
But other than the Citation they are not jets. They are prop driven brum-brum’s which fall out of the sky and scare the wifes while Jets never crash, do they? Oh, yea, and it has that parashute too, look mummy, so it’s tripple safe, so can I have one pretty please?
So Cirrus is likely to do it again. Like Apple does with it’s I-line. Technically not necessarily more advanced but with the look and feel which triggers the part of the human brain where the pocket-release sits :) I do hope we won’t see the same series of crashes we saw with the SR20/22 series which were attributable to unqualified piloting by people whose only qualification to buy these planes was their pocket book but not their flying skills.
I don’t think one can make a meaningful comparison between a SEP and a SET.
The SET is smoother and nicer beyond any comparison. Have a ride in a Jetprop and feel the smoothness of 750 HP pulling you down the runway and – a few seconds later – off the runway at 2000fpm.
An SEP – even a brand new SR22 – is just a noisy piece of junk. It rattles, shakes, vibrates, makes an unpleasant noise outside, and is so noisy inside that 800 quid headsets make it just bearable. One cannot describe sitting in a SEP as a pleasant environment. And it burns a fuel which is a hassle to get in so much of the world. Of course the fun aspect overrides the unpleasant aspects, which is why we do it, but…
There are other little aspects. A jet of any sort needs a mandatory Type Rating, which is another “little job” to get through (when you look at the entry requirements of schools that do jet TRs) and that extra work probably reduces the more frivolous market sectors (the proverbial bankers, etc). In bizjets this is irrelevant because ~99% are flown by a paid crew. But the market for owner-flown jets is something really untested and almost totally hypothetical.
People like that buy emotionally, not rationally …
ALL private aircraft are sold only emotionally, and you know it :-) And we all know it. There is really no “reason” to have a private aircraft, other than “I want it”.
Therefore I find “emotional marketing” for airplanes much more honest than the “business tool”-bla bla … Ok, i know two folks who have companies in Romania or Russia and they carry their employees back and forth in King Airs or TBMs … but those are really professional aircraft.
Other airplanes in the class of the SR22 were “doctor killers” at one point. Just look at the Malibu the first years after it came out. But today the Cirrus has a lower than average accident rate.
There’s this whole long 76 page thread on the Beech Talk forum for anyone who’s suicidally inclined about the SF50 where one notably informed player claims that there is no fuel disadvantage or weight penalty for carrying a second turbine, as opposed to in piston twins. He says it’s “piston think”. The SF50 would have had better fuel economy being a twin he claims, because of the inefficient way the engine is now mounted in a curved duct.
I don’t know.
But the numbers they’ve provided of the fuel burn are pretty bad and on par or even more than a twin, jet or turbine. Like 70gal/hr. My old Commander with the old Century engines burns 62gal/hr going 250kts. The newer ones with the Dash 10 engines do 300kts on 70gal/hr. I seem to recall the Mustang will burn something similar up high, but going around 340kts…
But the market for owner-flown jets is something really untested and almost totally hypothetical.
Not really in the US. Owner flown jets are untested in Europe. Mustang, Eclipse etc are all predominantly owner flown in the US based on my discussions with some brokers over there.
The Meridian does 270 knots on 40gph. I just don’t get the Cirrus Jet. Buy a Mustang and save money.
The Mustang is my favourite one of the small jets, … just what my family would like me to buy. But they will probably not agree with selling our flat and my wife’s apartment on Crete plus the Cirrus … and then have no money for fuel left ;-)
Looks like I’ll stay with the six pistons :-)
I must say though the the IO-550 (contrary to the Lycoming ;-)) runs very smooth, almost turbine like since my prop was dynamically balanced.
There is a market in the USA for owner-flown jets, but it is very small – of the order of 1-2% of all business jets sold.
The Eclipse is a new option and people speak well of them, though with some big caveats (discussed here in the past) e.g. the company which is refurbishing them has a monopoly on parts and is milking it. The numbers are very very small as far as Cirrus would be interested in.
There is no proven market for small 4-seater SE jets… well obviously since none exist in the civilian sphere. Achieving sales in the numbers they would be looking for is a purely hypothetical proposition.
