SF50 is damn close.

Cirrus has done a phenomenal job building a phenomenal product, and yet still nearly ran off a cliff into bankruptcy and had to sell themselves to the PRC a few years ago to stay afloat.

Certified piston is a really tough market. Can you imagine anyone seriously wanting to be #2 in it?

My buddy's son recently bought a Cirrus SR 22 turbo. Beautiful plane. Wish I could afford one.

Sadly on one of his early flights, he had another pilot along with him who was a self described expert on flying. They landed at Henderson airport but left the side of the runway and the nose gear collapsed. Prop strike occurred.

Mechanics tell him it may not be repairable and thus totaled. Told him Cirrus doesn't like to repair these planes when the nose gear collapses.

Any insights? (seems there are a bunch of Cirrus guys on here who may understand the issue) He is beside himself. On a $500k airplane that seems odd to me. Is that one of the draw backs to the composite structure?

(I was not there, have not seen the plane)

The Citation product managers have been doing this -- and doing it quite well -- for decades.

I just wonder why no one else is really making meaningful advances with their product line up? have they given up on GA?

I don't see any future in Pistons other than something to step up from. Somebody starts making a cheap turbine? Now there's innovation.

Here is a brand new in and out refurbed Meridian on Controller. Glass cockpit, synthetic vision, pressurized 260 KTAS, 6 seats, 1700 lb useful load. 875K Pretty cheap for a modern turbine.

Here is a brand new in and out refurbed Meridian on Controller. Glass cockpit, synthetic vision, pressurized 260 KTAS, 6 seats, 1700 lb useful load. 875K Pretty cheap for a modern turbine.

875k may be cheap for a turbine, but that kind of cheap won't bring the upper middle class back to aviation.

[quote="Chris DiPaola"[/quote]
Charles what does full fuel payload look like on that bird? How about the available payload if fueled for a 600mi trip?[/quote]

I guess the full fuel payload would be about 550 lbs on that bird. For a 600 nm no wind flight, might burn around 750 lbs of fuel, 200 lbs for IFR no alternate reserves, so could leave 190 lbs of fuel behind, giving you 740 lbs for the cabin. You can add an additional 43 lbs for start up and taxi on the ramp as well. The fuel gauges are very accurate so you could load pretty much to the pound, and if you are off a little, the plane won't turn into a pumpkin .

I went to lunch by myself at a mid range restaurant yesterday and it was $30 with tip.

I think a lot of folks don't realize how expensive everything is nowadays even compared to just 10 years ago.

If you could negotiate that plane down 10%, put 20% down, and get 4.5% interest rates on it, that is a $4000/month mortgage over 20 years. Kind of like a nice home, but you can't fly a home. Of course my wife likes to tell me that I can't sleep in a plane, however my hangar is fully plumbed and does have a sleep room

Of course one could argue the roadblocks to "cheap" are the overbearing government and our tort system. Innovate that.

She's never seen a twin bonanza.