Corking fee ($15-20 at most places) is always preferred over 100% markup on wine book selections

I always bring my own when possible, something to try sometime if you haven’t

Highest corking fee I’ve ever seen was at French laundry, $200 a bottle, but probably still cheaper than wine list prices

There is an off market 501sp Eagle II that just came up for under $1m that’s super clean. Lot of plane for the money. On program and has GTN750.

Mike

I have the ultimate reason to buy a jet. Don't even bother thinking about this one, just get in line and give me your money.

Three words.

Carbon.
Fiber.
Toilet.

That is phenomenal.

That is phenomenal.

What does that beauty run?

So, why is it out of the plane and on a bench? How much is the oh/exch price?

I used to think I wanted one. That was before I started flying one. It was a maintenance nightmare, and left pax stranded on several occasions. The client finally sold it and is looking for an Ultra.

I used to think I wanted one. That was before I started flying one. It was a maintenance nightmare, and left pax stranded on several occasions. The client finally sold it and is looking for an Ultra.

Doug,

Our plane has been pretty good on maintenance. Most of our issues were maintenance induced. In other words when nobody works on it everything is good. LOL.

We have never stranded anyone. Have had a couple trips canceled in the two years I have had it. But most of the issues were solved before it messed up a trip. Parts are easy to get.

So I think your experience was abnormal. My 421 stranded is a few times.

Mike

I used to think I wanted one. That was before I started flying one. It was a maintenance nightmare, and left pax stranded on several occasions. The client finally sold it and is looking for an Ultra.

200 40 yr old actuators. What could go wrong?

PT-6 engine program up approx 10% for 2024. Given costs I've seen in our business...it's not horrible...

What are the costs on the programs for your PT6. When we were on ESP Gold, it was 105/hr iirc. We didn't continue it. In very few universes does that pay back on a PT6. The thing I liked most about the program was that it allowed for a rental PT6 any time the engine would require significant down time. Mainly OH or damage.

I have to say, though when we needed Pratt they came out guns blazing. We had some damage to our CT1 compressor. Seemed to be a manufacturing issue. We picked it up because the engine ran about 15 degrees warmer than the 3 PT6's we had before that. We were told it was within spec and not to worry about it. Well we did. after 400 hours, it was hard to find but the bore scope picked it up. Pratt sent a tech out, they pulled the engine, split it. Not sure if they replaced all ?120 blades or just put a new CT in there. Put it back together, mounted it, test runs, and done in about 72 hours. I was super impressed. That engine runs so sweet. Not sure if we have the fastest M600 out there, but it is probably pretty close. If you run it to temps, we can get TBM 700 speeds. But we run it per the very conservative POH and still see 7 +/- 2 knots faster than POH depending on weight.

Thought I would add some real world jet vs turboprop!

Not a Legacy Citation, but a late model King Air vs M2.

We have a client who hired us to purchase a King Air B200 / 250 / 260 (non Fusion) for him. We talked needs, missions, wants, etc.

We began our search, the 200 series King Air market is tight and in a week or so we had identified one or two airplanes that were ok, but nothing worth buying.

Our client calls me and says “why is the Citation M2 the same price as a King Air?”

I explained some of the realities of production cost, sales strategies of Textron, and that the King Air does have higher production cost with a lower perceived value.

Then I talked about the market, in the scope we established for his King Air, there were just 86 US based King Airs that met his criteria, when you apply similar requirements to the M2 market, there are over 350 M2’s! (I forget the exact number)

So the answer is supply and demand, even though the M2 has a higher perceived value, it’s actually less expensive to purchase than an apples to apples King Air 250 / 260.

He asked us to refocus on the Citation M2 market and check into contract pilot availability in his area. Within a week we had six excellent off market options, plus several on market airplanes that were reasonable deals.

On the operational side, the picture wasn’t as bright, we discovered there were only four M2’s based in his state and the number of pilots readily available for contract work who were current in the M2 promised to be a similar number.

We contacted a management company that could handle everything including the pilots, they were reasonable, and the cost to manage and crew a King Air or M2 were identical. Unfortunately, for multiple reasons it wasn’t a good solution.

My client also shared that one of the short trips on his profile, less than 200nm, not only occurred as often as once a week, but that they would often send the pilots back home with the aircraft, to pick them back up a couple of days later. So four very short hops, multiple times a month.

As we had these discussions and talked through the pros and cons of each airplane, digging deeper into the details, down to tire and brake wear, a new contender entered the conversation. A couple of short runways, hangar availability and an abundance of King Air pilots completed the circle, back to the King Air…

C90GTi/GTx

Our client is excited, my search team not as much… but we’re off to find a late model King Air 90 series, it does everything our client needs it to do, does it well, will be more economical from an operational standpoint, especially in regards to consumables and hangar expenses. And the acquisition cost is much lower!

It’s going to very difficult to find him an airplane, but that’s what we do and we only need one!