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#MAGA



Mike

So your point is that eclipse might not be allowed to modify a type certificate on the basis that other manufacturers have done exactly that, repeatedly ?

It is highly likely they can.

You can change quite a lot and still be under the same TC. Witness the Piper Malibu and M600 are on the same TC, A25SO.

From the promotional materials, it appears to have a significant retention of the basic structure of the EA500/550. While the changes look great on the surface, they are not underneath.


Yes, Beech can, and has, used the original TC from 1956, 3A15, for the 35, 33, and 36 varieties. That TCDS has had 98 revisions and was most recently revised in Oct 2016. If Beech wanted to build, say, a turbine 36, they could build and certify it on the 3A15 TC.


It may still be a big project, but it will depend on what the FAA deems needs to be rested and what can carry forward. For example, will the Canada need to do FIKI testing. That one is a toss up. If they don't change the deice systems too much, might get a pass on that, or at least, reduced effort concentrated on only the changes.

The Canada has some pluses. Good engines, PW615 like those on Mustang. Good avionics, Garmin. Lightweight aluminum airframe.

The two major negatives are the airframe design is too expensive to build in small numbers, and the company behind it. We shall see if those can be overcome.

Mike C.

I'm sure we say that every time one of those aviation companies promotes an onerous AD to generate some revenue, or, in the case of turbines, changes the inspection program to force gratuitous and costly inspections (for example, Conquest SIDs).

There are times where the manufacturer and the owners are on opposite sides of things.

Mike C.

Cessna definitely has promoted the M2 over the Mustang. The Mustang has become bait to get customers to switch to the M2. The M2 is really a much more capable machine and outsells the Mustang by 5 to 1.

Your statement is perhaps the greatest concern there is for the Canada project. The VLJ personal jet market is saturated at that capability and price point. The more expensive airplanes are still selling okay, the $3M class, not so much.


Except company reputation and service network.


Canada will likely be over $3.5M if the EA550 is $3M. At that price, it will be hard to generate sales with the competing products not costing that much more. You can bet Cessna will be aggressive with M2 pricing (which cost Cessna almost nothing to develop since it is really just a CJ, and less to make because it shares parts with the CJ line) and the M2 is faster and farther than the Canada brochure claims. I am certain the M2 costs Cessna less to make than the Canada will cost OneAv.

Mike C.

I'm sure we say that every time one of those aviation companies promotes an onerous AD to generate some revenue, or, in the case of turbines, changes the inspection program to force gratuitous and costly inspections (for example, Conquest SIDs).

There are times where the manufacturer and the owners are on opposite sides of things.

Mike C.

So, are there weight categories for certifying aircraft?

For example, if the EA550 gross weight is 6,000lbs and the Canada is 6,800, does that throw the certification into some arbitrarily more onerous certification category requiring more money and tests?

I think this could potentially be an issue with cheap Canada certification.

Yes, effectively.

There are rules that change at certain weight boundaries. 6000 lbs is one of them. This is why EA500/550 and SF50 stop there.


Possibly, but the whole part 23 certification thing has this new "performance" based rule now which means, well, no one is really sure. It might mean that arbitrary weight limits don't mean what they used to. Or it might mean the FAA can be even more arbitrary. We shall see.

Mike C.

i daresay that if you can recycle the TC of a 737 ad naseum for decades on the one hand, and a piper cub on the other hand, then it's probably not worth too much hand wringing over an eclipse

One really has to watch those escrow agreements. In the beginning, the Eclipse agreement wasn't too one-sided and one could sell their position to anyone. When I dug into it, it became a: we'll tell you when to send in your money with no real benchmarks and they had first right to re-purchase. That's when I went another direction. I'm amazed folks send in money with no recourse if things don't go as planned. Giving them a first right to re-purchase, can really dampen or takes away re-sale except on their terms.

I'm not sure what they do now, but the original Eclipse agreements had a very slick clause in them, they used "value adjusted dollars" and though the people who placed huge deposits for the original positions were told the airplane would be sub $1 Mil they ended up delivering at prices north of $1.2M

Brilliant... sneaky... or fraudulent?

Yes, I recall that now that you mention it. Once some big orders came in, they quit negotiating with individual purchasers. It was take it or leave it.

None of the above, standard industry practice to tie pricing to CPI or other index for deliveries years in the future.

Your contact says $X.XM in 20XX dollars. You then compute the CPI since then and that's what you pay.

For example, Cirrus SF50 contract says $1.96M in 2012 dollars, tied to CPI-U index. If you take delivery in 2018, you are likely to pay $2.3-2.4M but those are in 2018 dollars, not 2012 dollars.

CPI-U is consumer price index - urban consumers. More common is CPI-W, consumer price index - wholesale.

Mike C.

A detail that you would catch... unfortunately the average buyer didn't pay that much attention. Lots of hurt feelings... and wounded egos.

And Mike... I think everyone agrees with me when I say... we are truly glad you are back! You make Beechtalk fun.