They did work with original owners, offering heavy discounts for the completion upgrades.

You gotta remember the current company bears no relation to the original manufacturer of those early planes. They didn't have to do anything for them. That's where the analogy with Socata breaks down. Socata made those early TBMs; Eclipse Aerospace had nothing to do with the creation of the early Eclipse 500's. It was just a company that came along and bought up some assets in Chapter 7.

But, founded by two Eclipse customers, the new company did indeed feel compassion for the owners' plight and worked to offer upgrades to them at reduced prices. They felt no such compassion for an opportunistic buyer on the secondary market snatching up an unupgraded plane on the cheap. Why would they offer him a cheap pathway to upgrade the plane, then turn around and sell it in competition to their own product (which was, after all, until the recent arrival of the new production Eclipse 550, solely Eclipse aircraft that the company purchased and upgraded)?

Ken

They also haven't gone broke in the interim.

To avoid bad press and a thread like this. Do the guys that bought the company have any background in sales and marketing? I wouldn't buy a company like that unless my purpose was to bring it to it's original glory. Turning your back on proprietary airframes is the kiss of death. Nobody will trust the company from here on.

I have an FAA approved "Eclipse Training Program" for sale! Interesting, unlike most other planes (King Air, Citation, etc.), you cannot just do training in your Eclipse. Listed in their aircraft manuals, you can only do training within the confines of an "approved training program". Definitely done to protect the company at the beginning, maybe they have changed this by now?

We jumped through the hoops with the FAA, as a customer and friend had a late serial number and wanted to do training under a company name for insurance approval. We had it in place for 2 years and didn't renew it.

I find it strange that Eclipse would care about who bought or sold an early model like TW had/has. That is extending their control a little much. Basically, if you bought one from an original owner, you got punished. Or should I say you got "normal pricing" while the original owner got a "discount"?

I find all of this a riot and think it's unprecedented. Like I said before, I wouldn't buy one with my enemies money...

Ken- Allow me to make the point one last time. I have never purchased an early Eclipse with the intention of upgrading then selling at a profit. That thought never even crossed my mind. I decided I did want to upgrade (on my own), so I purchased a 1.5 on the secondhand market. I did not want to deal with EAI whatsoever or give them any of my money, because I do not want to support any business I don't agree with. I use the same philosophy when shopping at stores in Texas who put up 'gun busters' signs. I will take my business elsewhere if these people do not believe in second amendment rights and I do.

Now, why did I get into the 1.0? I wanted to get my jet experience without a large risk. It worked out great for me. That plane did everything I expected it to do and much more. Would it have been for everyone? Absolutely not. But at this point if I could do it all over again, I don't think I would change anything. So, stop making me look like some opportunist with grand visions of becoming rich off a junk orphan jet. Mike Press is the guy who has the patent on that business model!

Nope. If you buy a citation, anyone can give you instruction then you go to an examiner and take the checkride. The Eclipse has to follow the FAA approved program which includes mentoring. I don't know if this was more of the whole 'control everything' vision Eclipse had/has. I heard that the FAA was afraid when these things were supposed to be $900k new that every lawyer and doctor in the country would buy them and start crashing them into peoples backyards. After all, their business model predicted sales of 2 million airplanes per month

The training program really is BS. I was ready for my type ride after 3 flights in the Eclipse, but had to go through and check all of the boxes on the syllabus. I can't say that is such a terrible thing though. There are quite a lot of fleet hours for only ~250 flying airplanes and there have only been a few hull losses, never an injury. Something to think about ....

The wrinkle, if I recall correctly, to Eclipse's compassion for the early owners was that the upgrade offer was a one-shot, time limited deal and required signing a two or three year non-resale clause. If you were an original owner, you either had to sink way over six figures into an upgrade (that you couldn't resell) on Eclipse's time schedule or be stuck with a very hard to sell airplane.

They're aggressively leveraging everything they have to convert the TCDS to cash. I don't fault them for that, but caveat emptor if you are going to depend on them for support of your million dollar airplane.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why the full training program and mentoring are requirements .

Ken

I don't understand what you mean by that. Care to explain?

Ted, should the Cirrus Jet get to market, what do you think it will do to the Eclipse and their business model?

I have no dog in this hunt but this is a bit extreme. Does the current company bear any relation to the original manufacturer of Beechcraft?
EAI bought more than a few assets. It bought a brand. Brands changing hands seems to be the norm in GA nowadays. It does not diminish the responsibilities towards owners/operators.

Are you implying that anyone who buys a used airplane "on the secondary market on the cheap" is some low life opportunist. That would include the vast majority of GA airplane owners and almost everyone on this forum.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why the full training program and mentoring are requirements .

Ken

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why the full training program and mentoring are requirements .

Right, when your buying a brand, you cant pick and choose. Its all or nothing.

Thats why im saying in the long term, thats a bad business decision.






[/quote]
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why the full training program and mentoring are requirements .[/quote]

Training and Mentoring requirements over orphaned airframes is just wrong.

If the NewCo has no responsibilities over these airframes, they don't get to dictate how they're used since they didn't build it. [/quote]