I have a considerable amount of exposure to PT6 engine events, as well as borescopes and logbook reviews.

For clarity, are we talking cracks in the combustion liner or cracks in the CT vane ring?

I would say cracks in the combustion liner are not uncommon and cracks in the CT vane rings are common but aren’t an issue unless they are converging, but you do typically repair them at an engine event.

My advice is to stay as far away from any engine event as possible, the cost and hassle factor just keeps going up!

If my math is correct (I'm still on my first cup of coffee here) you've averaged $133/hr for fuel over 3 years. That's spectacular. It really highlights how efficient the Meridian is.

Block (average) fuel burn for a Meridian is around 39 gallons per hour. My average right now for jet fuel is around four dollars a gallon. That makes about $156/hr in fuel. You can find cheaper fuel, you can also find more expensive fuel so somewhat just depends on what your city pairs are. Interestingly, I think my fuel cost are lower in the M600, because the exceptional range I can typically tanker fuel into pricey, airports and show up ready to take a lot of fuel at cheap airports.

[/quote] A hot section crack would be very rare, like you needing two top overhauls on your engine. 3600 TBO on the PT6 versus 1800 on your TWO engines. Even with an HSI the turbine isn’t that much more as they commonly go far beyond TBO. No oil changes. No mag overhauls. One prop to overhaul, not two. No spark plug changes. Less cost per mile for fuel. I don’t think the difference is that big and using unlikely maintenance events as your example is not a good comparison.[/quote]

Again, I’m just reporting my experience with people around me over the years. I will say, there is a quite large database I am drawing from. I don’t have a spreadsheet or anything but several ‘damn, that’s a lot’ moments over the years from hangar neighbors plus mechanics in the shops that I frequent. I do remember the hot section crack required either a long down time to repair or a replacement unit. They went with the replacement unit which was around $130k if I remember correctly. There’s an engine and a half on my plane right there. To each his own. I think if you fly very frequently (which I don’t) the TP makes a lot more sense. If you are a casual traveler like we are, it doesn’t as much. The capex difference is prob 3x for a Meridian over what I own.

Yes, PT6A-42A. Very rare.

I don't know if you are quoting Pratt list prices or your actual costs. I too had a combustion liner that needed replaced at 1800 HSI. $111k, list. Pratt stepped in as this is supposed to last much longer. $17k. CT blades were 50% off, brand new from Pratt, as they have a 3600 life. The PT6 has hour and/or cycle limits on most parts. If they don't reach it, Pratt helps. In a big way as you can see on my combustion liner. Hopefully your shop had Pratt involved at your HSI.

You can find a later model G1000 Meridian that is somewhat fresh out of HSI, and have a very capable, inexpensive (to maintain) TP. Like said earlier, don’t take a gamble on a major event coming up. I would have taken that risk before, but not now with all of the inflated or out of stock parts. Same goes for any turbine aircraft right now.
Have no idea what a baron’s operating costs are, but back when I was operating my Meridians(s), I was consistently in the 100k range at around 125 hours. That was EVERYTHING including hangar, fuel, ins, subscriptions and training.

I was spending $20,000.00 more per year on fuel over flying the A36 fuel cost at only 70 hours per year versus 150 hours per year for the Meridian.

The TBM is another 20 gallons per hour on top of the Meridian fuel burn, but goes 50 knots faster. Now if only a PC12 could do that.

What Tony didn’t tell you is that Meridians are a gateway drug.

After a couple of years you’ll be strung out and headed to a Citation Mustang addiction!

I just went under contract on a 2012 Meridian after several years of great performance and reliabilty from my A36. Hoping to get it closed before year's end. This thread was very helpful. Thanks all.

Dirk, congrats!

I have also been looking for that past few months. Missed out on Brock's bird, and seems pretty much all the inventory is asking prices significantly over $1MM, which drives me back to the legacy citations. Of course those have gone in price too but not as much.

Still unsure if I would be money ahead to jump to twin turbo jet or stick with SETP. I'll tell you one thing though, flying at night dodging convective last weekend back into Dallas I was glad to be above most of it..I think we would have stayed the night and gone the next day in the meridian. But of course the fuel bill...

Don is one of my clients I helped transition to a Mustang from a Meridian as a buyers agent and mentor pilot. He did an interview here with Casey about his experience, the pros and cons:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNKViGmfU6E

Been gone from BT for awhile. But as a data point from this conversation.

Third HSI on my engine was done at 3550 hours. That was 1300 after the second HSI. This one cost $91k, $21k was "hot section parts" and $63k of that was a stator that was warped by "fuel sitting" after a failed start or something. Understand from Kevin it was known issue on early engines. Didn't know/ find that on pre-buy borescope.

I had the plane just shy of 4 years- 514 hours.
2022 annual $29,284
2023 annual $34,670
2024 annual $66,776 plus HSI above

That looks like a bad trend, but just had major issues handled on one year. Didn't have much in-between. Although a battery was $5300 and tires are expensive.

I tried to track most fuel purchased, I show over 514 hours I spent $75199.56 on 15,522 gallons for an average of $4.85. I believe I'm missing some purchased but mainly flew at a 1000 lbs torque or so which is 32 gph. Other times as low as 27gph, as my main complaint about the Meridian was lack of UL and range.

Was a wicked blast of a plane and not hard to move to from an A36 at all.

Maybe this is irrelevant but 1700hrs (x2 engines): Most expensive engine maintenance/repair item to date is a compressor seal ($8000). It dripped a small amount of oil over a period of days/weeks, well within limits but I didn’t like having a container under the plane, and I didn’t want to be the guy leaking oil on the ramp. The most expensive, strictly necessary, engine item was an oil scavenge pump (many years ago but I recall about $3000

On the airframe side of things, I replaced two heated glass windshields for $70k. The didn’t strictly need replacement but one was well on the way and the labor to replace two is substantially less than double the cost to do a single side

My experience is that the expense (per mile) is comparable between pressurized piston or turboprop aircraft. The systems on turbine aircraft break less, and are simpler but more expensive if they do fail

You replaced the pilot side heated and the copilot non-heated and that was 70k or you replaced both twice?