Make sure and let Cirrus know.

http://cirrusaircraft.com/aircraft/vision-sf50/

The Personal Jet. Defined.

The Vision Jet is the realization of a vision to reimagine and reinvent the jet airplane in order to create a whole new category of aircraft —The Personal Jet. It’s a jet that’s designed to be flown by the owner. Not requiring a full-time professional pilot or a full-blown flight department, the Vision Jet fills the untapped void between high performance pistons and the Very Light Jet. Simpler to fly and easier to operate and own,the Vision Jet is truly a revolution in personal transportation. It makes jet performance accessible to pilots and aircraft owners who, up until now, could only dream.

Eclipse has also used the term "personal jet" many times.

Here's the best definition I can find:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_light_jet

A very light jet, entry-level jet or personal jet, previously known as a microjet, is a category of small jet aircraft approved for single-pilot operation, seating 4-8 people, with a maximum take-off weight of under 10,000 pounds (4,540 kg). They are lighter than what is commonly termed business jets and are designed to be flown by single pilot owners.

It appears the term "personal jet" is well established in the industry. Good luck purging it from usage.

Mike C.

I think it matters. When you buy a plane that is a known amount of money spent once or in regular recurrent monthly payments. That is easily put out of sight and out of mind. Every time you go out to fly though, no matter how much you try to put it out of mind, you will pull out that credit card and see the invoice to fill the tanks, cover landing ramp or hangar fees, and even at annual time costs of inspections etc. An efficient turbine like the Meridian costs in the ballpark of a high performance piston to operate. When you start bolting on more engines, engine plans, parts plans, higher costs of everything, makes you think twice about taking a trip that is non-essential. Personally, I don't want the cost of a trip to make me think about whether it is really worth it.

An example might be an Angelflight. If I do a 1000 nm round trip Angelflight in my M500 I am looking at about $500 in fuel. All the other costs are pretty well fixed, and tick on whether the plane flies or collects dust in the hangar. That same flight in a Mustang taking about 3 hours is about 6 times as much at around $3000. Maybe that doesn't matter to some, but does to me. The SF50 is going to be less expensive to operate and maintain than any other jet. More expensive than an M500 or M600, probably a little less expensive than a TBM, I would guess 30% less than an Eclipse and 40% less than a Mustang.

I still don't think it is only economics that are going to sell the SF50. The SF50 comes as a complete package. A great company, a great training network, a nice user interface, a comfortable cabin, that makes for a complete experience (the Cirrus life). Some of those SF50 pilots will fall in love with turbine capability and reliability, and then come to realize some of the shortcomings of the design limit them more than they would like. By then they will have complex turbine and flight level experience that makes them a candidate to move to something bigger, faster, or more efficient if they choose. I do think the SF50 will sell quite well. That is going to bring a bunch of new turbine pilots into the fold.

But you don' think the SF50 qualifies as a "personal jet". Nor do you think the Eclipse qualifies as a "personal jet".

So we used to have "light jets". Then we had "VLJ's". Since the term "VLJ" sorta died with the economy in 2008 the new word is "personal jet"?

like someone said, the sonex jet is the only thing I'd calla "personal jet". Personal as in, I'm the only one who will fit in it. Beyond that definition anything can be a personal jet.

The stuff you guys like to argue over...

How else are we going to make it to 300 pages while waiting on Cirrus to get the plane certified?

Tim

How else are we going to make it to 300 pages while waiting on Cirrus to get the plane certified?

Tim

If I were a betting man. we will blow past 300 pages before certification

In my mind the definition of a "personal jet" is, well, "personal" (i.e. different stokes for different folks).

In my mind the definition of a "personal jet" is, well, "personal" (i.e. different stokes for different folks).

I think a personal jet is one available for your personal use, or that you fly personally. Trump has he behemoth but who can argue its not for his exclusive personal use. John Travolta flies some massive, otherwise airliner, for his personal use. These are personal jets.

There are many others whose personal fortunes, needs or egos are much smaller and they fly CJ's of every number, Eclipse or other small jet. These are personal jets.

It's really a meaningless term. I like the Very Light Jet, Light Jet, Medium Jet and Heavy designations as I think they are more clear when discussing jets by size.

We should play odds on how many pages there will be on this thread at the time the SF50 hits the market. We could have multiple bets.
Number of pages until first delivery
Number of pages until certification
Number of pages until first chute pull
Number of pages until 100 delivered
Etc.
Could have parlays and everything!
At least then some of us wouldn't feel so bad about following this thread...

I have no idea why we are now debating what "Personal Jet" is, but to me, it means a jet that's about size of a car, i.e. 2 to 6 seats. We all think of our cars as personal transportation, even if it fits a few more folk. Anything bigger than a car is a "bus" and is not personal.

From that viewpoint, Eclipse, SF50, Mustang and CJ2 are personal jets, everything bigger than that are not. Likewise, Meridian and TBM are personal turboprops, while PC-12 isn't.

Well, apparently we have to debate something, and damned near everything else with respect to this airplane has at least 25-30 pages devoted to it...

I think Cirrus copyrighted the term.

But I do see it like you as well. There are a bunch of people that are comfortable with integrated avionics in modern low workload airframes that offer the non-pro pilots reasonable dispatch reliability and safety. As you mentioned those are the PA46, P46T, M600, SF50, TBM, Eclipse, Mustang. The P100 and PC12, seem to cross over into that commercial market, and are more airplane than most owner pilots need.

Anything non-integrated or bigger and faster just takes more infrastructure, training, and overall work to stay on top of the operation than guys like me are willing or able to put into it. A good SR22, PA32, X36, X58, C400, etc pilot can within reason easily step up into one of these aircraft in a structured environment. Stepping up into an aircraft that is non-integrated, has more complex systems, is bigger, faster, just takes more of something than most owner pilots are willing to bite off. Exceptions abound, but the SF50 is a much better single pilot IFR machine than say a CJ1 for most non-pro pilots. That is a personal jet. The others, well, I would call them Private jets/TP's. Optimized more for the types that like to sit in the back.