Not when providing half the range of a PC12.

Current estimate for SF50 weights are 3,750 empty, 6000 max takeoff, 1983 usable fuel, leaving 267 cabin load at full fuel.

Maybe I over estimated, let's reduce this to 2 people, half the range of the PC12, lower ceiling that the PC12. That is the "SF50 experience".

Would not surprise me if the SF50 is delivered such that useful load after full fuel is under 200 pounds. The history of composite airplanes hitting weight targets is really, really poor.

If someone has the ability to spend $2.5M (which is what it will take to really get an SF50), what are they doing putzing around in an SR22 right now? I have to think the number of pilots who can buy the $2.5M airplane but yet remain in an SR22 is very small.

Mike C.

Not when providing half the range of a PC12.

Current estimate for SF50 weights are 3,750 empty, 6000 max takeoff, 1983 usable fuel, leaving 267 cabin load at full fuel.

Maybe I over estimated, let's reduce this to 2 people, half the range of the PC12, lower ceiling that the PC12. That is the "SF50 experience".

Would not surprise me if the SF50 is delivered such that useful load after full fuel is under 200 pounds. The history of composite airplanes hitting weight targets is really, really poor.

If someone has the ability to spend $2.5M (which is what it will take to really get an SF50), what are they doing putzing around in an SR22 right now? I have to think the number of pilots who can buy the $2.5M airplane but yet remain in an SR22 is very small.

Mike C.

It likely will come in heavy, that's the reality.

Small useful load with full fuel is called flexibility in my book.

Provided the useful load is useful!

GA has largely failed to grow to include more and more private pilots - because of the hole that the SF50 is designed to fill. A truly personal jet - not a business jet, though it will be used that way also. It is a beginner jet - and that's exactly what's needed for the whole GA ecosystem to thrive - smaller planes and bigger planes will benefit.

It will make flying exciting for non-pilots - many of whom realize that pistons barely beat driving and jets are far out of reach financially, and who don't want to spend millions flying behind props.

Ask a non-pilot - who might become a pilot - what they would want - what is the fantasy?

affordable
jet
car-like
chute

The sf50 will make new pilots and owners, and that will be a huge benefit to GA - and Cirrus has pretty much carried the piston world in exactly that way for a decade - after dealing with all these same criticisms, and the same sneering condescension about the 20/22. It must be fun for them to watch the haters look like chumps.

This is my hope, too. I agree with the naysayers that it might not make the most sense for a jet etc. But you know what? If that brings in just one more new net pilot and aircraft owner, then that's great. We all benefit. We all bi*ch about GA dying, so why are we not embracing the things that might slow the decline?

Here is the one thing about the SF50 that should make EVERY GA pilot and owner hope and pray for its wild success.

At the point in time that we have a certified single pilot, single engine jet regardless of the exact performance numbers selling at a clip solid enough to be profitable, there will be competition to make it better both from inside Cirrus and outside Cirrus. With competition comes innovation. With innovation in GA we all benefit. There will be mistakes and issues with the SF50 but those will be opportunities for competitors to make it better through innovation. The fact that Cirrus is a profitable and successful aircraft production company already is a huge plus. They aren't cutting corners and hoping it works out like perhaps Eclipse was forced to do early on. They are also not building their plane around flawed avionics. The partnership with Garmin will sell planes that otherwise wouldn't. They aren't going under if this flops, but it won't and no one should want it to.

Obviously dependent on lots of things but where I live this is not even remotely true for a trip of significant distance. And that's in my lowly Cessna .

I do agree with you that any plane with the potential to attract new pilots to GA is a good thing though.

I've flown in the NE and Socal. If you are really honest about the whole thing - the whole ownership time and money suck - you're lucky if it's a wash.

I know this and fly anyway, because I love it. But when I try to proselytize, if I'm honest, it don't make sense to most people looking for added time or value. Not in piston land, unless you have a great mission.

I try to design my life around long drives that can be shortened by flying! But it takes devious ingenuity.

Pistons barely beat driving? WTF?

If that were true I'd have never gotten into flying. I've flown commercial maybe 3 times since 2007 and lot of that was because of my Bonanza.

I cant disagree with any of that. It is true that if you count the time I spend tinkering, staying proficient, reading beechtalk etc etc that my airplane is actually a time wasting machine, rather than the opposite.

BUT...

I enjoy that stuff. (Like most of us here I would guess...) In addition, I do most of it in the evenings after work or on lazy Sundays when I would just be watching football or otherwise wasting time anyways.

What my plane allows me to do is decide on a Friday morning that I would like to go visit some college buddies in San Luis for the weekend, or take some friends to Vegas or Laughlin or Catalina for the day/weekend. In any of those cases travel by 210 is less than half the time vs driving. If I had to spend most of the weekend driving I simply wouldn't go. I understand Southern Ca type traffic is not the norm in most of the country but here, IMHO, a piston single offers life changing time savings on the weekends, even for someone that just flies mostly "for fun".

The ramblings of an airport porch rat....

1. Chicks are picking the jet over anything with prop(s)

2. According to Flightaware most business jets average flights are less than an hour so fuel load versus people seems irrelevant for most missions. Controller and Trade-a-Plane jet ads seem to show this as well. Most listings have equal or greater landing cycles compared to total time. Have to read something on the porch at the local aerodrome.

3. Lots of Cessna jets running around, Pilatuses also. Suburbans of the airways. Cirrus, Eclipse are the Porsche, BMW for those who prefer different.

4. One engine to do maintenance on versus two, as the casual observer that seems significant.

On those longer trips I will just stop for fuel so I can show off my new jet.

Peace,
Don

1) Easy now, easy now.......chicks also like big Props
2) more people or other entertainment......fit in a turbo prop
3) Suburban's are where the action is
4) Yes, yes and yes.....so long as it ain't a frigging piston!!!

Don, you need to start burning JetA..........

Is Cirrus actually profitable? Do we know? They weren't a couple years ago. From a 2013 article: http://www.startribune.com/cirrus-aircr ... 199611371/

Now that they're a privately held sub it's unlikely we'll learn much about their standalone financials going forward. What we do know is things were quite bad a few years ago, $40MM of SF50 deposits wasn't enough to fund further SF50 development, and ultimately they sold the company to keep things going.

Selling piston planes is a really tough business. Using the profits to finance a new jet seems almost preposterous. Actually building a new jet has a non-zero chance of sinking a company, because a) future investments are tied to sales, not vision; and b) you are spending lots of money up front on parts and labor, long before you book the revenue.

If you add up all the training time, all the driving to the airport, pre-flight, keeping the plane in shape, all the mental time wasted here and in other aviation-related ways, and put that next to your hours saved on piston trips vs. driving? It's not gonna be a huge time savings for most. You may be different than most pilots.

You fly a Pilatus now - which changes the equation, but according to you it's still a clown plane - which speaks more to my point about many people not wanting to spend millions to fly behind props regardless of actual utility.

I love flying - my life is vastly improved by flying - but it's hard to argue for on a purely financial or practical basis. For my passengers on the other hand - it's awesome - though they never seem agree. I'd be better off chartering most likely - and that's egregious.

If you add up all the training time, all the driving to the airport, pre-flight, keeping the plane in shape, all the mental time wasted here and in other aviation-related ways, and put that next to your hours saved on piston trips vs. driving? It's not gonna be a huge time savings for most. You may be different than most pilots.

You fly a Pilatus now - which changes the equation, but according to you it's still a clown plane - which speaks more to my point about many people not wanting to spend millions to fly behind props regardless of actual utility.

I love flying - my life is vastly improved by flying - but it's hard to argue for on a purely financial or practical basis. For my passengers on the other hand - it's awesome - though they never seem agree. I'd be better off chartering most likely - and that's egregious.