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Flight Design C4 & Tecnam P2010 & non TSO avionics in certified aircraft

This thread picks up from here

The Flight Design C4 will never succeed IMHO. It looks horrible.

Even the Tecnam P2010 doesn’t sell all that well (17 so far this year). But maybe they aren’t yet able to produce any more of them.

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

The aircraft comes with a standard two-year warranty that can be extended to five years for $7k at time of purchase.

You bet that I would buy that … would I ever buy a new SR22 (which I won’t)

boscomantico wrote:

The Flight Design C4 will never succeed IMHO. It looks horrible.

The Flight Design CT looks horrible, too – though it’s still a big success for various reasons. A Volkswagen Golf doesn’t look that sexy either, so that apparently isn’t the main reason for a big market share

EDLE

While I am really not a VW fan, the design of a GOLF is world class compared to those ugly planes. I am yet to understand why somebody would spend that much money for such an ungly airplane. Especially when there are nice ULs … A 1944 J3Cub is a an icon of beauty compared to that design.

The Flight Design C4 is an elegant advanced design at half the price point of the antiquated Cessnas it will be replacing. At $250k USD it provides a EASA and Part 23 certified strutless high wing achievement that flys right past anything in its class. Climb, range, useful load, avionics, fuel burn all exceeding the Cessna 172 and 182.

The C4 has an astounding 1320lb useful load, 62 inch wide cabin, dual touch G3x + touch GTN 750 dual-radio navcom + ADS-B + Garmin autopilot + fuel injected Contintental multi-fuel engine cruising at 150 ktas and a mere 6gph burn. And a BRS parachute to boot.

This plane will transform GA. Especially given the relatively cheap/used Cessnas are aging out of existence. Technam is chasing Flight Design, not Cessna. And they should be…but so far they are coming up short of the C4.

Last Edited by USFlyer at 08 Dec 20:20

Right out of the marketing brochure. None of these numbers have been proven.

Here it is:

Their ultralight is a real beauty in comparison.

Last Edited by boscomantico at 08 Dec 20:20
Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

You are looking at the prototype on flight trials – they are flying the actual plane with the production engine. And all their numbers have been verified. The wheel pants are missing for obvious reasons.

Note the elegant, smooth, clean lines of the strutless high wing provides the same astounding down-look that the CTLSi gives. The cabin in the 172 is 40 inches, compare to 62 inches for the C4. The useful load for the 172 is a 1000 lbs, the C4 1320lbs. Those two metrics alone make it a better buy than the Cessna, but the C4 is also $250k with the full glass panel and the $28k GTN 750. The Cessnas are $325,000 for the 172, $450,000 for the 182. The C4 beats them both.

The plane will start delivery mid next year, there are about 200 in the queue. They will only make 80 a year so get in line now.

Last Edited by USFlyer at 08 Dec 20:40

I think the biggest issue European manufacturers have is the tendency for expensive maintenance and repair, as either or both a result of design choices or expensive maintenance manual requirements. I don’t think they do this so much out of self interest, more so out of not understanding how (in particular) US GA works, and (to use an automotive term) the well developed ‘aftermarket’ infrastructure that’s in place.

I’m a bit of a Tecnam fan, both in relation to their products and the company itself. I think they probably stand a better chance of breaking into big sales numbers than some of the others, because I think they tend to look more openly at what the real market will buy, and why. Just my opinion.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 08 Dec 20:54

Even something as simple (and crude in construction, which it is) as an Extra aerobatic aircraft has its maintenance issues. The unnecessary MM constraints (e.g. ‘mandatory’ factory repair of things some US shops consider routine) have IMO resulted in a fair number of them being moved into FAA Experimental Exhibition. It’s an even greater problem when instead of zillionaire heart surgeons who will pay whatever it takes (either directly or as reflected in insurance cost) your customer is a living-on-pennies flight school. The issue is not the lack of local repair capability, its that the local unaffiliated repair capability is far better than the European manufacturer knows, or perhaps wants to admit.

The European (and other) LSA category aircraft have a similar issue in that many or most parts legally have to be sourced from the airframe manufacturer, not because of MM constraints but because of the certification regime. That’s a non-starter for educated US customers.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 08 Dec 21:53

europaxs wrote:

A Volkswagen Golf doesn’t look that sexy either, so that apparently isn’t the main reason for a big market share

Boy, did you pick a bad example.

USFlyer wrote:

The C4 has an astounding 1320lb useful load, 62 inch wide cabin, dual touch G3x + touch GTN 750 dual-radio navcom + ADS-B + Garmin autopilot + fuel injected Contintental multi-fuel engine cruising at 150 ktas and a mere 6gph burn.

I’m confused. How could it have a Garmin autopilot if it doesn’t have Gx000 suite and it’s (supposed to be) certified. Yes, Garmin makes an autopilot you can use with G3X, but that’s not for certified aeroplanes.

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