I get the allure of a new airplane, but for $4M bucks I’m getting a 3-4 year old TBM 930!

We just acquired a 930 for a client in Louisianna in December, man what a machine!

Not to mention a WIDE gap between the way the respective companies approach customer engagement.

Wouldn't the drag drop significantly regardless of the airframe? Given our mpg doesn't change, that would imply the BSFC drops significantly with lower power. My understanding is the advantage of the fixed shaft is that it is more efficient at the one speed it operates at, at the expense of operating efficiently at lower power. I don't know what happens to the extra air when power is pulled back, but the compressor is still pulling the same power out of the turbine section at lower power settings (again, someone correct me if I am wrong). The original design was out of an APU as Cliff Garrett was very concerned about the liability of an aircraft engine, and let P&W get a head start on the market which they never caught up to.

The stillborn Kestrel, which I believe is just a stretched Epic, was going to have a TPE331.

Not to mention a WIDE gap between the way the respective companies approach customer engagement.

You're right about both: low power BSFC and less drag going slower. My point was that you can still increase range pulling back a 331 (or PT6) because it's a sliding scale of increasing BSFC against increasing L/D. The PT6 suffers the same, but maybe less.

Look at the max range on a 441 with TPE331s and max range on a King Air 350 with PT6s. Not too different looking.

You're right about both: low power BSFC and less drag going slower. My point was that you can still increase range pulling back a 331 (or PT6) because it's a sliding scale of increasing BSFC against increasing L/D. The PT6 suffers the same, but maybe less.

Look at the max range on a 441 with TPE331s and max range on a King Air 350 with PT6s. Not too different looking.

Not sure where the 40% number comes from. Unless I misspoke somewhere. I have said that you can gain about 20% range by pulling the power back. I don't have a full POH, so not sure if there is a graph like above somewhere, but this table shows the difference in specific range at 3 different power settings. There are many different power settings that you can choose between max and LRC. Typically in cruise I see about 1 nm per lb of fuel which makes an eyeball of range easy as pounds in the tank equals mile until worst case fuel exhaustion. Of course I select fuel over destination as one of my windows on the MFD, but the math is easy. What is missing on this table are the normal cruise power settings, which is what I use. A little less than maximum cruise.

I get the allure of a new airplane, but for $4M bucks I’m getting a 3-4 year old TBM 930!

We just acquired a 930 for a client in Louisianna in December, man what a machine!

Not to mention a WIDE gap between the way the respective companies approach customer engagement.

The M700 is advertised as having a 1,852nm range, which is about 40% more than the range at high speed cruise.

The M700 is advertised as having a 1,852nm range, which is about 40% more than the range at high speed cruise.