You should be able to install the Genesis autopilot by year end.

If you assume what a Genesys sales person has said is true.

I wouldn't make hard plans based on that just yet.

I hear rumblings from Garmin about an autopilot, too, but nothing official. I think Garmin has been really stupid not making a legacy Citation autopilot a priority. There is a LOT of pent up demand for it, particularly for the Bravo, Ultra, and Encore line which are saddled with the heavy and expensive Primus 1000 system. Those screens can be removed until there is an autopilot available since the autopilot is integrated into the screen controllers.

There is literally $100M+ revenue tied to the legacy autopilot issue which far exceeds any other type they are currently working on. The sales of G700 TXi screens would jump enormously when it becomes available.

Mike C.

Cirrus pilots are proving this is not 100% protection from idiocy or incompetence

They still find ways to crash despite having all of this

Jet pilots have an initial type checkride and a yearly 61.58 checkride. This is done to ATP standards. Marginal pilots don't make it (or at least shouldn't).

M600 pilots are not required to do the same. They could get by with a BFR in a 172 every 2 years as far as the FAA is concerned.

Full motion jet sims do exist and allow for very intense and realistic training in marginal situations.

Is there a full motion M600 sim anywhere? There are just things you can't properly do in the airplane.

The twin jet is intrinsically safer than any prop plane, single or twin. The obvious advantage of near center line redundant thrust is there, but the advantage extends well beyond that such as having simply more power to climb faster and fly higher. The lack of a prop is higher reliability and lower vibration which reduces failures of other parts.

The pilot is always the biggest determinant of safety but the jet ecosystem and intrinsic properties make it overall safer than the turboprop. It does come at a cost, which this thread is all about.

Aviation is all about how much safety can you afford.

Mike C.

What was the ballpark cost on the 10k hr inspections? Who did you get to do them?

Full report coming soon.

Mike C.

You should be able to install the Genesis autopilot by year end.

He may know the schedule, but I doubt it matches the future.

Genesys told me the same thing. Claimed would be for numerous 500 series, too.

My credibility meter barely moved. I'll believe when I see it.

I hear rumors about Garmin having some sort of "announcement" by year end. But an announcement is obviously not readiness, either.

The revenue being held up by Garmin not having an autopilot is amazing. I don't understand why they are dragging their feet on this one. Meanwhile, just saw they got the King Air F90 approved for the GFC 600. That's tiny revenue compared to the legacy Citations.

Mike C.

When I bought my plane, it had about 9750 hours on it, so I knew I would be facing the 10,000 hour inspections. Is it a big deal or not?

Those inspections are:

Phase 15 - Vertical stabilizers spars and eddy current checks
Phase 16 - Door bearing plates and engine supports
Phase 17 - Cockpit and cabin structure
Phase 67 - Main wing spar lugs ultrasound

Of these, phase 16 and 17 don't require special equipment. When I had my phase 1-4 in Aug 2022, I did those since the plane was opened up and easy to at that time, though slightly premature. I don't have any pictures for this effort, but it was basic flashlight and mirror kind of thing. There were no findings. Phase 16 is now due in 5000 hours, phase 17 in 10,000 hours, so surely past my ownership of the airplane at my rate of flying.

The other two, phase 15 and 67, require NDT special tools and techniques. My options are to fly the plane to a shop that can do them, or to have a traveling technician come to my shop and do the tests there. Since I was early, I waited until the traveling technician was coming for other reasons (Cessna 210 carry through inspection, apparently an AD). This meant I was able to split the travel costs with another job. The travel technician came in May 2023 and performed the phase 15 and 67 inspections.

The phase 15 was eddy current checking for cracks in the vertical stabilizing spars and bolt holes. The first part is a surface eddy test to see if there are cracks in the spar or webbing. There is a surface probe and a meter used:

The second parts is to remove half the bolts and run a spinning eddy current probe in the hole to find cracks radiating from the bolt holes:

Once you have done half the holes, the missing bolts are replaced and torqued, then the other half is removed and checked. Sometimes taking the bolts out was a bit of a chore. Net result was no findings. Next phase 15 is due in 4000 hours, way far into the future.

Phase 67 involves an ultrasound of the main spar lower lugs. These hold the outer wing panel to the plane, so kind of important.

Textron sends the technician a calibration kit:

In this kit are pieces with carefully made defects that must fail. Here you can see the tiny slits in the parts:

Once the sensor is calibrated, then the technician reads the airplane's lugs and see if they pass:

Mine did pass, no findings. The next phase 67 is due in 1200 hours, so moderately frequent, but really not a big deal.

For phase 15 and 67, the whole process was about 5 hours start to finish, including the opening and closing of access (which did involve removing the baggage compartment walls for phase 15).

My total costs for all 10,000 hour inspections was $5273 of which $3109 was the special technician, travel, and calibration kit rental.

Part of what made this economical was doing phase 16 and 17 during phase 1-4, so planning ahead and doing it slightly early saved money. Also, having the technician come to the airplane did increase those costs, but flying the plane anywhere would have been much more expensive. I saved some cost by combining my slight early phase 15 and 67 with another job at the same shop. Having awareness of what is next can lead to cost optimizations.

All in all, spending just over $5K for all 10,000 hour inspections and having no findings seems completely tolerable and now I won't have to do anything for a very long time with those inspections. Net result, the 10,000 hour inspections on my plane were no big deal at all. I would expect any non abused legacy airplane to have a similar experience.

PS: In the last picture above, notice the plane doesn't leak fuel. Not a drop. It did leak badly soon after I bought it, but I fixed that with relatively little effort and money. The new triple sealed inspection panels and using proper torque are the keys to solving this problem.

Mike C.

Not a huge cost for inspection at all.

I used to think wet wings was the only way. But the reality, on a non-composite airframe, they will end up leaking eventually. Just one hard landing away. So there's something to be said for bladder tanks.

Thanks Mike for the detailed information!

And you got to hang out with Leslie to boot, she’s a hoot.

You should be able to install the Genesis autopilot by year end.

Unfortunately, for something like a Citation, that means a lot of bladders due to wing ribs and such. A lot of connections, increased weight, less usable fuel.

I had bladder tanks on my Comanche.

What a pain to change those out every 15-20 years (I had to do all four of mine on the Comanche). Extra weight, and all sorts of potential for insidious failure modes (like the 182 wing rock AD, and the potential to suck a bladder down and cause the fuel sender to read high). I don't like bladders.

I've had separate tanks (Cessna 170B, aux tanks on MU2). Had a crack in the aux tank of the MU2 that got repaired.

And I've had wet wings, T210, MU2 center tank, and now the Citation. Only issue was leaks at the inspection panels on my Citation, now solved. The leaks are people doing things wrong. mostly.

I prefer wet wings. Less to go wrong, less weight, less insidious failures.

Some jets have terrible designs. I forget which one it is (Falcon maybe?) where the entire lower skin is screwed onto the wing and it gets removed in some heavy check. They almost universally leak afterward and people just tolerate it.

Cessna does wet wings pretty well and I'm happy with mine.

No matter what tank system you have, there are issues that can crop up.

Mike C.