Weirdly, the Mustang actually has a slightly swept wing. It is swept just enough to make assembly somewhat complex (spar is not straight, for example), but not enough to matter aerodynamically, particularly at Mustang speeds. It would have been better if it was straight.

It is not "animosity" to point out how poor a jet the SF50 is. If a company produced a piston twin that flew at 172 speeds, we'd criticize that as well, and the SF50 is a jet with turboprop performance. It lacks all the real benefits of a jet such as speed, altitude, and quiet cabin, and yet has all the disadvantages of a jet, type rating, fuel burn, and cost.

There's a reason all the other single engine jet programs didn't make it, the end result wasn't going to be very good.

The SF50 would have never sold well if it had a brand name other than Cirrus. The SF50 is successful primarily because of the SR pilot pool buying into the Cirrus brand name. Had the SF50 been some other brand, it would have been a market flop since the basic characteristics of the airplane are not compelling.

Mike C.

Like said before in this thread, the SF50 is a gateway drug. It may not have the best performance of a jet, and it has compromises (single engine, nose wheel steering is missing, and a couple other things), but any aircraft does. I have a friend who loves his Mustang, but the safety of a chute and auto land are appealing for him since he flies single pilot with his spouse or a couple people from work, including my non-pilot wife. If he became unconscious it wouldn’t end well for them. But the Mustang is a lot like the SF50 too. It’s very much like a 182 at a little over double the speed. It’s not an Ultra where it can fly full seats and fuel across the country, but it does his missions of Chicago to Detroit, VA, FL, or TX very well. The only time it really sucks is when you are climbing out and have a 50+ knot headwind. It’s too bad they aren’t priced like they were 5 years ago, I’d be very close to in market but they are way too high now.

What was interesting about the video is that it was not another hater bashing opinion. Austin showed why the performance is poor based on math.

The math was fine. It was his opinions that were idiotic. "All jets should have swept wings and fly over .6 Mach" belies the huge success of the Citation line over the decades. Plus the over the top ragging on Cirrus being a "Chinese" company. Sure, but AFAIK, all of the work still happens here in the US so there's that.

As I said in my earlier post, he has some insecurity/jealousy issues that he needs to work out.

OK, maybe I'm just not a savvy YouTuber. But I get "This video is private." When I login to YouTube, as it tells me I need to do, I still get the private video message.

How does one view the video?

Weirdly, the Mustang actually has a slightly swept wing. It is swept just enough to make assembly somewhat complex (spar is not straight, for example), but not enough to matter aerodynamically, particularly at Mustang speeds. It would have been better if it was straight.

It is not "animosity" to point out how poor a jet the SF50 is. If a company produced a piston twin that flew at 172 speeds, we'd criticize that as well, and the SF50 is a jet with turboprop performance. It lacks all the real benefits of a jet such as speed, altitude, and quiet cabin, and yet has all the disadvantages of a jet, type rating, fuel burn, and cost.

There's a reason all the other single engine jet programs didn't make it, the end result wasn't going to be very good.

The SF50 would have never sold well if it had a brand name other than Cirrus. The SF50 is successful primarily because of the SR pilot pool buying into the Cirrus brand name. Had the SF50 been some other brand, it would have been a market flop since the basic characteristics of the airplane are not compelling.

Mike C.

Two questions:

1. Then why doesn't the SR20 sell in equally impressive numbers? It says, "Cirrus" on it too.

2. When is your market changing jet design coming to market?

The math was fine. It was his opinions that were idiotic. "All jets should have swept wings and fly over .6 Mach" belies the huge success of the Citation line over the decades. Plus the over the top ragging on Cirrus being a "Chinese" company. Sure, but AFAIK, all of the work still happens here in the US so there's that.

As I said in my earlier post, he has some insecurity/jealousy issues that he needs to work out.

OK, maybe I'm just not a savvy YouTuber. But I get "This video is private." When I login to YouTube, as it tells me I need to do, I still get the private video message.

How does one view the video?

Thx. Jus’ checkin’.

Weirdly, the Mustang actually has a slightly swept wing. It is swept just enough to make assembly somewhat complex (spar is not straight, for example), but not enough to matter aerodynamically, particularly at Mustang speeds. It would have been better if it was straight.

It is not "animosity" to point out how poor a jet the SF50 is. If a company produced a piston twin that flew at 172 speeds, we'd criticize that as well, and the SF50 is a jet with turboprop performance. It lacks all the real benefits of a jet such as speed, altitude, and quiet cabin, and yet has all the disadvantages of a jet, type rating, fuel burn, and cost.

There's a reason all the other single engine jet programs didn't make it, the end result wasn't going to be very good.


The SF50 would have never sold well if it had a brand name other than Cirrus. The SF50 is successful primarily because of the SR pilot pool buying into the Cirrus brand name. Had the SF50 been some other brand, it would have been a market flop since the basic characteristics of the airplane are not compelling.

Mike C.

I said it earlier in this thread, but the SF-50 seems like a really good fit for me and my "mission".

Most of my flights are short; 150-300 NM. Really the Bonanza is good for those trips. It shrinks our territory so that it's all accessible for day trips. A deiced more weather-capable plane would certainly help with dispatch reliability, but for those trips driving is an option. Going faster is nice, but really it wouldn't show up on the clock very much.

I generally fly another 10-15 trips that are around 650NM. The Bonanza works for that, but it's pretty slow. Going from 170Kts to 300 knots would cut those trips from 3:45 down to a little over 2 hours. That's a big deal, makes weekends at the lake a lot more attractive.

Then I generally make one to three long trips to the coasts a year; around 1200NM. The Bonanza is not great for that, it's really too slow and takes too long. I do it because I love to fly, not because it makes sense.

Now, look at the SF-50. I could still pull it in and out of my T-Hanger if I just need to run down to Wichita for a couple of hours. Pretty much treat it like a Bonanza. On the 600 NM trips, I could get there in a little over 2 hours which would be a game changer for me. For the occasional longer trips, if I were taking a few people, maybe I'd have to stop for gas. But I don't do it all that often so no big deal. I could still get to the coast in 1/2 a day.

Add to that it's cheaper than the STEPs, and since I'm a big guy, a lot more comfortable. A TBM is a good fit for my mission, (although it won't fit in a T-Hanger) but I'm miserable in one.

I think I'd love to have and fly an SF-50. Maybe at some point, I would start to think it's too slow, but a lot of things would have to change in my life before that happened.

Could always get a "much better real jet"....

2 engines and everything...

Used to work on one of those and got a few flights too. Very cool plane. Range not very good

I rode in one once when I was a student pilot, long ago.

Very cool, but I think it burned over 100 gallons on that short flight! I'm not sure, but I was sure thinking how on earth could anyone ever afford that!