<Thread drift alert>

Clint, I've heard that the Mustangs are super reliable. Kevin M at Aero Air and I are acquaintances and he said if I wanted a reliable airplane, buy a Mustang. Has that been your experience? What are the costs like? What would it cost in maintenance to run it 150 hours per year? Is the 1200 nm range realistic and including reserves? It seems like it would be a great plane for 2-4 people and some stuff.

Gerald the -135’s on the C90GT are derated to 550 shp, the same as the -21’s on the 90B. The difference is at altitude, the -135’s don’t temp out as low as the -21’s. Hence better hot and high performance.

Tim

Sorry for the thread drift, Scott. I was just amazed how similar the two are. They even weigh about the same. I've talked about it on some other threads, so you can do a search and find those. In a nutshell, my DOC this year is running right at $1,000/hr. My first year was 2015 and the DOC was $800/hr back then. It's gone up because of higher fuel prices and my engine and parts programs were renewed this year at a higher rate. Still, not too bad. Fixed costs run about $40,000/yr (insurance, training, hangar, subscriptions, etc.). The 1200nm range is VFR, and I've done it several times. You can do it with up to 770lbs of payload. My average flight is more like 600-700nm, and I can fill the seats then. For long flights, first hour is 600lbs, 500lbs every hour thereafter. The G1000 is a great panel, and the airplane is simple to fly.

Jack, someone recently posted about a former TAS employee -(think it was their head guy?) branching out on his own in OH and was purported to have 425 experience.... I’ll try to dig it up.

Very interesting thread. Not to hijack the discussion, but when considering a move from piston twin to TP, anyone have any experience with the turbo Commander (690B)? As I look at all the models that everyone considered in competition/consideration, I haven’t seen much discussion about Commander. I know many don’t like the Garrett engines, but anyone with comments about ownership?

Joshua

[/quote]
Steve Fortner. He’s at Williams County, 0G6 now. Great guy, does great work.

[/quote]

Steve has maintained Conquests and has been trained on the PT6.

FWIW, I like my Garrett engines just fine.

My opinion on the Commander from my perspective as a one time shopper (didn’t buy) is the 690s have ADs that are somewhat costly and inconvenient, and the plane is huge and harder to hangar in many places.

Got it. Thanks.

John:

I'm looking at buying a C425. Would you say the Blackhawk conversion is justified?

I have been flying the Blackhawk for five years. The developer states ithe C425 was the best conversion Blackhawk has ever done.

Thanks for your post, Kelly.

My 425 is headed in to the shop in 3 weeks for the Blackhawk upgrade. It’s been a long wait; P&WC has been selling those engines to the Turkish government, I’m told.

We’ll see how it turns out. I already get slightly better than book performance on my 40 year old -112s with ITTs under 700 — 255-265 KTAS depending on altitude and temperature. Jim Allmon writes that you have to run the max 805 ITT to get the advertised speed.

I’ll post.

For the most part, Commander folks just keep quiet and fly and don’t have a big self help group. The planes are great. So are Conquests and Mustangs, etc. There’s junk out there in every aging fleet of course.

How much does it cost to do the Blackhawk upgrade?

Don't know if things have changed, but PWC always said that power should be only set by book power/torque and not by ITT. An ITT higher than that associated with book power/torque will produce more power but faster deterioration.

You’re still limited to the same torque and rpm as stock engines. The 135A is approved for higher temps. Which helps at altitude.The 135A is a 750hp engine derated back to stock 450hp.The stock 112s are 550hp derated to 450. The Blackhawk Conquest is a different bird than a stock Conquest especially above 20k. I don’t push mine up to the 810 limit.I stay around 760 to 780. Last week at 25k with ISA +26 I still trued 270 with temps at 770 and fuel burn around 480. I have MT 5 bladed props.