BeechTalk - BT

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 12:42

Dave,

How would you compare the II and the V in terms of comfort and performance?

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 14:26

Username Protected wrote:

There is a reason the legacy citations are being sold cheap and the biggest one is the engines they run. I suppose one could offset the cost somewhat by leasing it out. :duck:

Let me know if you ever need any parts to keep that thing flying. The last two Merlins we ended up with, we scrapped. Very nice airplanes with recent paint and interior, it just didn't make sense to overhaul.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 15:32

Username Protected wrote:

It's not really about the speed difference. Flying the KA90 (or any turboprop) compared to a jet (even a legacy citation) is night and day. The turboprops are noisy, vibrate a lot, cruise where all the rough air, ice, and bad weather is. In the jet, I'm at 41,000 feet above all the weather, in calm air, and it's so quiet that I don't even need a headset. The difference in the vibration is huge.

I once flew a Citation for over 20 flight hours STRAIGHT (with a co-pilot), only making quick turn stops for fuel. (8 legs, from Los Angeles to the South of France). It was tiring, but had I been in any TP then I would have parked it on the ramp and got a hotel probably after 10 flight hours because I would have been so exhausted. The noise and vibration really get to you. In fact, a lot of the Northern portion of that route would not have been passable in any TP that day. We would have been sitting on the ground.

Passengers notice the difference in comfort even more than us pilots. Overwhelmingly, they choose the Citation over our very nice KA90 (which surprised me as the KA had brand new paint, a very luxurious interior and that particular Citation's interior and paint were pretty worn!)

Don't get me wrong, the Merlin (and MU2) are two of my favorite turboprops. But they aren't jets.

I have far more jet time than I do turbo-prop time. Quite often, the 20's is where the smoother air is at. When there is upper level turbulence, you sometimes need to go into the mid to upper 40's or down to the 20's to get out of it. Moderate turbulence in a straight wing Citation at FL410 is really uncomfortable.

The -10 MU2's and Merlins are not jets, but they are damn close. Everytime I think about upgrading to a jet, as I sit there at 300 kts. and look at my fuel burn, I decide not to double my ops cost unless I can gain 150 kts.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 16:01

Username Protected wrote:

There is a reason the legacy citations are being sold cheap and the biggest one is the engines they run. I suppose one could offset the cost somewhat by leasing it out. :duck:

Let me know if you ever need any parts to keep that thing flying. The last two Merlins we ended up with, we scrapped. Very nice airplanes with recent paint and interior, it just didn't make sense to overhaul.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 21:14

Username Protected wrote:

Dave,

How would you compare the II and the V in terms of comfort and performance?

Sorry, really swamped preparing for type ride. I'll post later.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 21:26

Good luck, I'm sure you'll ace it!

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 22:22

A lesson in humility.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 22:57

I'll ride in the back of your plane any day.
Especially those Bahamas trips! :thumbup:

Username Protected · **Posted:** 18 Dec 2014, 23:09

Username Protected wrote:

Dave,

How would you compare the II and the V in terms of comfort and performance?

Basics: V is a II stretched to include two more seats. Wing is improved. Engine 2,900 thrust v. 2,500. V ceiling is 450 v. 430. V I'm flying has ten (total) seats and a nice refreshment center. V has two C90 fuel tanks

That is 387 total fuel on the 90 and 431 per side on the V. The V climbs better and is faster. II seems to true around 350 in the upper 30s. Closer to 400 in the V. Both are straight wings.

Hope that provides some insight. V costs more to purchase, to fill, to maintain, to park (ad infinitum)

Username Protected · **Posted:** 19 Dec 2014, 22:46

Lots of air work today: stalls, steep turns etc. I need more work on this. The power in the plane has a lag compared to the KA. Need to work on power setting which adjust a lot as the plane's weight changes. Seem to have the approaches down, especially with AP on. The system is a bit more complicated than my KA but not too bad except for the old Globex GPS. I do a lot of trips and don't do a lot of air work like this; so, it's great training for me. We are going to knock off next week, then, go up a couple more times to fine tune things.

Best,

Dave

Username Protected · **Posted:** 19 Dec 2014, 23:27

Username Protected wrote:

Lots of air work today: stalls, steep turns etc. I need more work on this. The power in the plane has a lag compared to the KA. Need to work on power setting which adjust a lot as the plane's weight changes. Seem to have the approaches down, especially with AP on. The system is a bit more complicated than my KA but not too bad except for the old Globex GPS. I do a lot of trips and don't do a lot of air work like this; so, it's great training for me. We are going to knock off next week, then, go up a couple more times to fine tune things.

Best,

Dave

Stalls? Steep Turns in a jet? Wow the more I hang out here the more I learn. Figured those maneuvers were reserved for the SIM. That must be a rush. Glad you're making progress.

Peace,
Don

Username Protected · **Posted:** 19 Dec 2014, 23:32

Stalls are fine and really a non event in a straight wing Citation.

Swept wing airplanes are another story. You can safely do immenent stalls, but you don't want to do a full stall.

Steep turns are standard procedure for all type ratings and recurrent training. In airplane or sim.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 20 Dec 2014, 14:48

Stalls are usually done until the stick shaker. Really no excitement to it. Pull power back to flight idle. Increase back pressure to hold altitude as airspeed decays. Wait for stick shaker. Apply power and just release back pressue to stop stick shaker. Then pull BACK on yoke to maintain altitude and get climbing (pull back to counteract the pitch down moment from the rear mounted engines or you will lose lots of altitude in the recovery) flaps up and gear up as necessary. pull power back and level off at initial altitude. Procedure compete.

Steep turns are 45 degree bank 360 degree turns holding altitude within 100' typically at 200 kts under the hood or in the clouds. If you are really good at that in the sim you can feel the bump of hitting your wake on rollout.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 20 Dec 2014, 15:05

We're doing three different stalls: AP on w altitude hold stall with power back.
Approach stall with full flaps, gear down.
Turning approach stall with approach flaps, gear down and 20 degree turn.

Power is very different on this plane than the KA. There is a bit of a delay even though the engines spool up in a couple seconds. In the KA, when I add power, props produce thrust and add lift almost immediately and plane begins to accelerate. In the V: two issues, bringing throttles to TA or go-around power quickly and the delay from the time power is added to when the plane accelerates. The power levers on here are not equal when advanced: right needs to come up about a half knob more than left. Setting power is manual: so, if I need 94% I have to get it there quickly and not go over limits. I was having trouble finding over 90% without going over; so, I now advance the throttles very quickly to the stop and come back about an inch before the fans speeds up to where the stop is. This seems to work better than kind of advancing to a muscle memory point and adjusting with a lot of other things going on for me. FAA doesn't want to see a secondary stall: so, one has to be careful not to raise the nose too quickly after adding power.

Username Protected · **Posted:** 20 Dec 2014, 15:14

In the approach stall: I'm being coached to allow nose to drop slightly, add power and raise full flaps to TO flaps in one command: MAXIMUMPOWERFLAPSTOAPPROACH all in one word so when I put power up, co-pilot immediately raises flaps to approach. Accelerate a bit and gently bring nose up so there is no accelerated stall. Reasoning is it takes eight seconds or so on this plane for flaps to move from full to approach: so, one needs to get them moving as soon as possible.

Turning approach stall is interesting because one wants to roll wings level first; then, recover, or at least roll while adding power but not roll and raise nose simultaneously.

Partial flaps approach is interesting in that the plane is really slick and staying on speed is very important. We flew Vref plus 10 until just before the threshold, then V ref or a bit slow over numbers to touch down in the first 1,500 feet of the runway. Being just a bit faster would cause the plane to float and the most common accident seems to be runway overrun.

Flying the Citation II