So what do you budget per year of maintenance (average of good years and bad)? I think that apple can be sliced a number of ways....

From my research end experience so far, for my Cheyenne II I can budget about half what you need to maintain PC12, but I am flying about 25% of your utilization. I may be more than you per hour, but if I only need a 100 hrs / year I can't buy PC12 maintenance in that low of quantities (zero first-hand PC12 experience, I could be full of crap ).

I used to run Falcons for less per mile than our Citations, but the Falcon didn't make sense unless you could run enough hours and long enough stage lengths to make the economic crossover point.

I keep coming back to the same conclusion - Cheyenne I/II best fit for low utilization owner-operator. I'd love to have any of the other machines discussed, they are all more airplane than the Cheyenne - but the Cheyenne does the job really well for our needs and fits our budget in ways I can't make the others do.

Here are my numbers:

Insurance (11,500)
Hangar (15600) [My residence at tRide is saving me money, FXE is expensive]
Annual (45,000) [Included a new AC unit and brakes, which I knew would come in my first annual)
Maintenance (2,800) [Replaced the inertial separator]
Fuel (95,000) [Actually came in a little lower than that but I have longer trips and am normally always above 25k]

So my operating cost last year was $377 an hour. Add another 140 per hour for engine reserve and I'm below the $600 mark. Throw in HAPP at 17k and I'm right around $550 per hour..........

Conklin D puts me at about $750, but they also have repainting, interior and depreciation.

Cheyenne, any of them, are around the $1200 an hour mark............. no chance that with two engines, complicated airframe, legacy bird that you're maintenance cost is half that of a PC12..........that's downright heresy

So if for 100 hours I am at:

Insurance 3,500
Maintenance 20,000 (all sched and unsched)
Hangar 15,600 (normalized hangar to match yours)
Fuel 26,500
Engine 7,000 (actual figures from forward costs calculation)

I am at $72,600 or $726 per hour including engine, and I am amortizing a $350k airplane. I am paying more per hour, but I can't buy PC12 hours in small enough chunks to get that rate, plus I'd have to carry 8 to 10 times the capital. You might be bigger and faster, but I have more heretic dollars left in my pockets to buy you beer with for airplane conversations....

Frankly that is all that matters.

Not as much as you might think.

The penalty for gear in transit is only 10 ft at the worst versus leaving it down. To put it another way, your flight path with be, at most, 10 ft lower at the worst point if you raise the gear versus leaving it down, but after than it will be FAR better.

A real test:


After 6 seconds, the drag is less than the gear down. After 8 seconds, the majority of the drag is gone. The gear doors are not very draggy, in actual fact, the main drag is the wheels themselves turning slightly non parallel as they retract. The Commander does basically the same thing, twist the wheel as it retracts.


Every airplane has to consider OEI climb performance even a Commander. There is a weight, altitude, and temperature the Commander will not climb on one engine.

If all you want from an airplane is OEI climb rate, you should buy a Commander.

If you want an airplane with more structural margin, you should buy an MU2.

I don't know of ANY MU2s who have had an engine failure between liftoff and gear up. I know of THREE King Airs that have done that in the last year or two, all three were fatal into buildings or structures (Wichita into FSI building, Tuscon into wall, Australia into shopping center).

Mike C.

Nothing was misrepresented.

It was a list of Commander that didn't hit the ground in one piece.

This came from the NTSB records.

There were more such cases than other planes.

Mike C.

Including being economical.

It has two PT6 and goes slow. That makes it a lot of $$$ per mile.

Mike C.

Here are my numbers:

Insurance (11,500)
Hangar (15600) [My residence at tRide is saving me money, FXE is expensive]
Annual (45,000) [Included a new AC unit and brakes, which I knew would come in my first annual)
Maintenance (2,800) [Replaced the inertial separator]
Fuel (95,000) [Actually came in a little lower than that but I have longer trips and am normally always above 25k]

So my operating cost last year was $377 an hour. Add another 140 per hour for engine reserve and I'm below the $600 mark. Throw in HAPP at 17k and I'm right around $550 per hour..........

Conklin D puts me at about $750, but they also have repainting, interior and depreciation.

Cheyenne, any of them, are around the $1200 an hour mark............. no chance that with two engines, complicated airframe, legacy bird that you're maintenance cost is half that of a PC12..........that's downright heresy

Including being economical.

It has two PT6 and goes slow. That makes it a lot of $$$ per mile.

Mike C.

Not as much as you might think.

The penalty for gear in transit is only 10 ft at the worst versus leaving it down. To put it another way, your flight path with be, at most, 10 ft lower at the worst point if you raise the gear versus leaving it down, but after than it will be FAR better.

A real test:


After 6 seconds, the drag is less than the gear down. After 8 seconds, the majority of the drag is gone. The gear doors are not very draggy, in actual fact, the main drag is the wheels themselves turning slightly non parallel as they retract. The Commander does basically the same thing, twist the wheel as it retracts.


Every airplane has to consider OEI climb performance even a Commander. There is a weight, altitude, and temperature the Commander will not climb on one engine.

If all you want from an airplane is OEI climb rate, you should buy a Commander.

If you want an airplane with more structural margin, you should buy an MU2.

I don't know of ANY MU2s who have had an engine failure between liftoff and gear up. I know of THREE King Airs that have done that in the last year or two, all three were fatal into buildings or structures (Wichita into FSI building, Tuscon into wall, Austalia into shopping center).

Mike C.

Here is one that popped up in a very simple google search.


https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news ... es-takeoff

Taken from the report.

Including being economical.

It has two PT6 and goes slow. That makes it a lot of $$$ per mile.

Mike C.

Engine failed prior to liftoff.

Doesn't fit the parameters of an engine failure between liftoff and gear retraction.

Note that the plane, after the engine failed prior to rotation, climbed to 200 ft AGL gear down, engine out. I thought you said that wasn't possible for an MU2?

Mike C.

It is possible if you want to VMC roll it!

Note gear was in transit. Thats when the drag increases instead of decreasing as in most airplanes.



Wrong! Engine was reported to be making noise prior to liftoff. He should have aborted right there but did not. He reached rotate speed then he had a loss of thrust.



Doesn’t fit your parameters.

Charles made a good point early in thread. It’s the second segment climb that is trickier than the intitial part of the take off. That’s also where much of the emphasis of the SFAR is placed.

The MU2 is a low cost turbine and a good option for some people it just wasn’t a good option for me.

The Commander works for me because it’s easier, making me more comfortable in it. I only fly it between 150 to 200hours a year.

You can't get an airplane to 200 ft AGL in a Vmc roll. That occurred only after the inexperienced pilot pulled up at 200 ft AGL trying to falsely increase climb rate.

The pilot had less than 5 hours in the plane and did not complete a course at FSI.


Most planes increase in drag with gear retraction. Commanders are among those that do (main wheels twist). The penalty is often a lot smaller than most realize.


An engine suffering compressor stalls is not making rated thrust. Any loud enough noise a witness far from the runway can hear indicates a seriously malfunctioning engine.

Replace the accident pilot with a properly trained MU2 pilot, I do not believe this accident occurs.

Keep the pilot and provide him a Commander with the same engine failure on takeoff roll, I believe this accident still occurs.

In other words, I do not believe type of plane was the issue here. A bone head pilot forcing a plane into the air with an engine failure on the takeoff roll is not the fault of the airplane.

I'd be happy, however, if you convince the bone head pilots to buy Commanders instead of MU2s. I never want to own a plane where others think they can be lesser pilots to fly it and be safe.

Mike C.