Mooney gives a major upgrade to the Acclaim and Ovation series with the “Ultra” models. Main features:
That hopefully opens this airplane to people who will only fly 2 door airplanes.
List price of the new Acclaim Ultra appears to be around $750k.
At last Mooney is listening to Peter and others who like two door planes 
Link
A mockup has been produced but not a real plane yet, as seems to be the pattern with Mooney under the Chinese. I notice that while sticking to the Mooney steel tube fuselage structure, which is I suppose is being redesigned to allow a hole for the door, they are making the non-structural skin composite.
(2 threads combined)
I think this is a hugely significant move for Mooney.
From my earliest exposure to the GA scene, 16 years ago, I did always think it very strange to have just the one door.
It’s so obviously a poor solution for getting out in a hurry. All you need is a less than fit and mobile person in the front RHS and nobody short of Harry Houdini is going to be getting out. I had a brief and fortunately uneventful exposure to that when one of the two door locks in a PA28 jammed, for a short while.
It’s also so obviously an own-goal on the PR side, and would have been blindingly obvious as such to everybody in GA when Cirrus started eating everybody’s lunch with a well marketed 2-door design. Of course Cirrus were not the first to have 2 doors but they did the biggest and the most successful bit of marketing on a modern design and from that point the writing was on the wall. And that was some 10-13 years ago.
If Mooney want to sell planes in any market where there is no decades-old brand loyalty they must have 2 doors.
The M10T is two door already so in no way a first. The roll cage will certainly have been redesigned as there are a bunch of tubes arranged in triangles where the left door appears now.
As to mockup, I agree it is dumb. They should build a fully functional model and then start cutting and filing here and there it would be a lot cheaper.
Shorrick_Mk2 wrote:
As to mockup, I agree it is dumb. They should build a fully functional model and then start cutting and filing here and there it would be a lot cheaper.
As is generally true Shorrick your comment here is non-productively snide to those with substantial understanding of the topic, who make meaningful posts.
I didn’t say it was dumb myself, at least not on a technical level. I was once involved in modifying the design of an existing non-CAD aircraft fuselage in a similar production aircraft situation. It is remarkably difficult to reverse engineer an existing design into 3-D CAD such that parts built to the model will fit. Some variation on that theme is likely what’s going on here, they have to build and modify a mock up then make airworthy parts on tooling pulled off the mockup.
Silvaire,
as far as I understood, N240CV is not a mock up but a fully functional airplane. The Ovation/Acclaim Cell has been modified with the 2nd door and the forward fusellage. Apparently they did have a mock up of the forward cabin in a “cutaway” form at the rollout so as to show how the new features have been implemented.
In the video linked, at several stages one of the new cells in production is shown and the mods to the steel cage is seen. Not a very earth shattering invention, simply mirroring the right side door. What is different is that the forward panelling is no longer Aluminium but composite, while the rest stays aluminium.
Shorrick_Mk2 wrote:
They should build a fully functional model and then start cutting and filing here and there it would be a lot cheaper.
I think that is what they did. I don’t know where the mock-up theory is coming from, as far as I was told today the plane rolled out is the first of the new series. Whether it has flown yet I don’t know. But I would not think it is a big deal to get it flying. It’s still a M20.
MD, I thought I read about a mock up in an article on the Subject, but if there was no mock up prior to an airworthy plane I stand corrected….
I think it would be interesting to reverse engineer the Mooney into CAD regardless.
Mirroring the other side would not necessarily work because the reason for having only one door is generally to make one side strong, one side weak. The only other reason is to save money and complexity in manufacture.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
Acclaim Ultra appears to be around $750k
The plane has not changed all that much, just a carbon fiber cabin, empenage and wings are still metal and still the same dimensions (very narrow and low head room)…and retains the same engine, the 280 hp Continental TSIO-550-G. Still no FIKI deicing and still has retractable gear (which cost more to insure).
It also doesn’t have a parachute, and uses Vernier instead of a throttle tree. Also has a manual prop control and standard G1000 panel (10 inch max). Has a mere 1000lb useful load which means trading off fuel for people.
And it does NOT have a top speed of 245ktas….no one has seen those speeds in real flight…More around 220ktas.
Mooney sells about 10 Acclaims per year. The price is $769k USD.
Great observations….much of which are irrelevant or plain wrong….but yes, a BRS option would certainly make it more attractive and marketable….and yes, a 1000lb useful load is not that good….and would be even worse with BRS….
