Cessna Mustang demo ride

Dave Siciliano said:
Whatever we do fly to Gastons, you will be welcome to fly in, but the plane may be outta Mountain Home. We'll see, but whatever, Tony is on my A list <g>

Best,

Dave
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well shucks i suppose i can hitch a ride to mountain home :D
 
Someone wise said that a personal airplane should be designed to carry the pilot and full fuel at max gross weight, preferably at high speed for a long distance. That gives maximum performance for single-pilot missions and allows you to trade fuel for people/stuff.

Transport airplanes are a whole different philosophy.
 
Dave Siciliano said:
I'm looking for six seats, but never carry more than four and stuff. I'm pretty under 160 and small; so, don't need the room of some bigger folks.

Planes are always a compromise. The Epic Dynasty looks great and they say full seats and full fuel, but they have extended range tanks that probably mean less than full seats and full fuel. One of the biggest issues is cutting through the hype and seeing what the plane will really do. I like the TBM site for that reason; full POH on there. I'm not seeing that on the Mustang or Epic web site. Ken and I have chatted 'bout that more than once <g>

Best,

Dave
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Dave,

I'm going out to Oregon next week to fly the Victory. I'll give you a report.
 
Dave Siciliano said:
I'm looking for six seats, but never carry more than four and stuff. I'm pretty under 160 and small; so, don't need the room of some bigger folks.

Planes are always a compromise. The Epic Dynasty looks great and they say full seats and full fuel, but they have extended range tanks that probably mean less than full seats and full fuel. One of the biggest issues is cutting through the hype and seeing what the plane will really do. I like the TBM site for that reason; full POH on there. I'm not seeing that on the Mustang or Epic web site. Ken and I have chatted 'bout that more than once <g>

Best,

Dave
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I got to look inside an Epic (the experimental version) last weekend that belongs to a guy I once flew with in a Malibu. It's smaller inside than I expected but comfy. Downsides are no windshield de-ice and no baggage compartments at all. He said he's not having any trouble with CG issues, but I'd sure miss my nose baggage compartment for balancing things. I was also surprised to learn that there's no downlocks on the gear, it uses hydraulic pressure to hold them down according to the owner, who should know since he had a hand in putting it all together. He climbs under the wings and inserts pins before the plane gets towed to the hangar just to make sure the legs don't fold. Still, I wouldn't mind having one, especially the certified Dynasty version. He also said it was easy to fly and quite stable unlike a turbine powered Lancair 4.
 
lancefisher said:
I got to look inside an Epic (the experimental version) last weekend that belongs to a guy I once flew with in a Malibu. It's smaller inside than I expected but comfy. Downsides are no windshield de-ice and no baggage compartments at all. He said he's not having any trouble with CG issues, but I'd sure miss my nose baggage compartment for balancing things. I was also surprised to learn that there's no downlocks on the gear, it uses hydraulic pressure to hold them down according to the owner, who should know since he had a hand in putting it all together. He climbs under the wings and inserts pins before the plane gets towed to the hangar just to make sure the legs don't fold. Still, I wouldn't mind having one, especially the certified Dynasty version. He also said it was easy to fly and quite stable unlike a turbine powered Lancair 4.
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Thanks Lance. I understand the certified version is full seats and full fuel. Didn't know about the lack of baggage room. Guess I'd look at it more like my
A-36 than the Baron as far as baggage. With the payload they profess to have, probably would work if I could get used to one fan; that would be my biggest deal. Didn't know about the lack of gear downlocks. I would imagine the de-ice stuff would be better on the certified version.

Any insight on the Eclipse? That's more affordable. Performance doesn't seem too bad, but there are still a lot of unknowns.

Best,

Dave
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Any insight on the Eclipse? That's more affordable. Performance doesn't seem too bad, but there are still a lot of unknowns.
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Dave, I'm sure you've visited the Eclipse Critic blog, wherein you will find many people who are extremely biased against the Eclipse and pessimistic of the future of the company. There's your disaster scenario, played out time and again in numbing detail. But you don't have to be a diehard skeptic to conclude there are a LOT of uncertainties about the Eclipse, and there are many more about the ramifications to owners about the way the company does business. Together, that means early adopters are taking a huge gamble on both practical usefulness and resale value.

Personally, I am disappointed with some of the decisions Eclipse has made on component part compromises (notably the landing gear) and I'm really curious about what dispatch reliability will turn out to be. That said, the owners I've talked to love flying the airplane, though they complain that so far it's spent far more time in the shop than in the air, which is to be expected of a program such as this. Eclipse is trying as hard as they can to keep the press from flying one, and I have not gotten one into the air yet.
 
Thanks Ken! Haven't gone on that blog, but will try. I'm hearing a lot of general stuff, but would like to quantify it and get reliable sorces of info.

Best,

Dave
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Thanks Lance. I understand the certified version is full seats and full fuel. Didn't know about the lack of baggage room. Guess I'd look at it more like my
A-36 than the Baron as far as baggage. With the payload they profess to have, probably would work if I could get used to one fan; that would be my biggest deal. Didn't know about the lack of gear downlocks. I would imagine the de-ice stuff would be better on the certified version.

Any insight on the Eclipse? That's more affordable. Performance doesn't seem too bad, but there are still a lot of unknowns.

Best,

Dave
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I have a very good friend who bought a fairly early position on the Eclipse but I haven't spoken with him for a couple months. I'll try to reach him and see how it's going. The biggest issue I've heard so far is that they ha a problem with windows blowing out and the "fix" requires replacing them fairly often. IIRC, there's not a lot of baggage room there either.
 
lancefisher said:
I have a very good friend who bought a fairly early position on the Eclipse but I haven't spoken with him for a couple months. I'll try to reach him and see how it's going. The biggest issue I've heard so far is that they ha a problem with windows blowing out and the "fix" requires replacing them fairly often. IIRC, there's not a lot of baggage room there either.
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That's some PM item and probably quite expensive. I've heard of PM for hardware fatigue but not the actual windows.
 
lancefisher said:
I have a very good friend who bought a fairly early position on the Eclipse but I haven't spoken with him for a couple months. I'll try to reach him and see how it's going. The biggest issue I've heard so far is that they ha a problem with windows blowing out and the "fix" requires replacing them fairly often. IIRC, there's not a lot of baggage room there either.
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The issue was cracking at the window fastening points, and an early AD called for window replacement at something like every 300 cycles for the side windows and every 500 cycles for the windshields. (I can't remember the specific numbers.) Eclipse engineered and certified an improvement, but the windows still require inspection every 300 flights and replacement every 600 flights for the side windows and 1500 flights for the windshield. For an airplane supposedly designed for high utilization, it's not exactly the kind of problem you want to find. Each replacement is well into the tens of thousands of dollars.
 
Ken Ibold said:
The issue was cracking at the window fastening points, and an early AD called for window replacement at something like every 300 cycles for the side windows and every 500 cycles for the windshields. (I can't remember the specific numbers.) Eclipse engineered and certified an improvement, but the windows still require inspection every 300 flights and replacement every 600 flights for the side windows and 1500 flights for the windshield. For an airplane supposedly designed for high utilization, it's not exactly the kind of problem you want to find. Each replacement is well into the tens of thousands of dollars.
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If this plane is being targeted by air taxi operators, they are facing some serious expense to keep that bird busy and airworthy.

When they changed the engine choices, many thought that was a bad sign for its engineering. And, the hits just keep on comin'.
 
Took a scheduled demo ride in the new Cessna Mustang today. It was so easy to fly, it was almost a non event! Lots of systems to simplify things like the Garmin 1000; FADEC; automatic warnings; instead of annunciators, almost 150 different warnings that can pop up.

It seems like a natural transition from a Baron. You kina set the throttle roll down the runway, rotate and it climbs about 3,000 FPM with four of us and 1/2 tanks on a pretty warm day. 180 knot climb speed. About all one does for engine management in the climb is pull the throttle back one click to the cruise climb setting. Cabin differential was automatically set: 7,500 at FL410 is what was stated. We pulled up at FL350. Toward the end of the climb, we were going up at 1,000 FPM.

Very quiet; very smooth. Figure if we sell the P-Baron, we'll only need another $2.3 million.

I took some movies of the pre-flight cockpit brief and during the takeoff roll and climb. (My partner took it off--we switched seats in the air, and I brought it back. Landed with over a 15 knot direct crosswind--piece of cake.

Very nice plane. The Cessna sales and flight demo people were excellent.

Best,

Dave
 
Thanks for the report, Dave. I remember the flight staff at my old company saying that glass cockpits and single lever thrust controls made the new jets much easier birds to fly than a piston or turboprop twin. (They're currently flying a Citation X and a Cheyenne)

A single pilot IFR approach to minimums w/icing in the Cheyenne kept the guys pretty busy, but they let me sit in the right seat, making it infinitely more enjoyable than riding in the X.
 
Couple of pics of my partner and I in front of the Mustang earlier today <g>

Best,

Dave
 

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Dave Siciliano said:
Couple of pics of my partner and I in front of the Mustang earlier today <g>

Best,

Dave
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You look like a natural, Dave!

If you don't mind me prying, what sort of prequalification did the sales team do? Just an academic curiosity really, I've always wondered how a sales guy tells the "never going to fly this" tire kickers apart from the "could fly this" tire kickers...

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
Sounds like fun, Dave! You definitely look like a Mustang pilot from those pictures. We have a Mustang based at Panorama and it is one sharp plane on the ramp.

I look forward to seeing those videos soon.

Regards,
 
astanley said:
You look like a natural, Dave!

If you don't mind me prying, what sort of prequalification did the sales team do? Just an academic curiosity really, I've always wondered how a sales guy tells the "never going to fly this" tire kickers apart from the "could fly this" tire kickers...

Cheers,

-Andrew
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Andrew, we had that discussion. They believe anyone in a pressurized twin is a good prospect. They like the Cirrus guys because they are familiar with the glass cockpit. May be more to it than that, but they do look at those folks. They say they never know who may become a client or refer them to someone else (which I did).

Best,

Dave
 
Geesh Troy!! What was I thinkin? Just gave them the name of a friend the recently sold his business and flies a 421. I guess I can e-mail them now that you reminded me <g>

Best,

Dave
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Geesh Troy!! What was I thinkin? Just gave them the name of a friend the recently sold his business and flies a 421. I guess I can e-mail them now that you reminded me <g>

Best,

Dave
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It sure sounds like your friend is both in a better position and better qualified.
 
Troy: the movie came out to be 250mg. Where would I post that? How can I upload something that large? I could send 9 separate files that could be joined at the other end if that's what I must do.

Best,

Dave
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Troy: the movie came out to be 250mg. Where would I post that? How can I upload something that large? I could send 9 separate files that could be joined at the other end if that's what I must do.

Best,

Dave
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Dave--I could give you a location to upload that to. But you really need to get the file size down to a more manageable size. It might just be easier to put it on a CD and mail it to me. From there I can make it into a video that'll stream.

PM me if interested.
 
If you have web space on a cable or DSL account, you may upload it to that and provide the link. But, I'm thinking it may need to be split into a couple sections at least since it has to download before playing. To watch, it would take high speed access.

My $0.02.
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Troy: the movie came out to be 250mg. Where would I post that? How can I upload something that large? I could send 9 separate files that could be joined at the other end if that's what I must do.

Best,

Dave
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You can put them on YouTube pretty easily... each one can be up to 10 minutes long and 100MB in size.

http://www.youtube.com/my_videos_upload

Or take Jesse up on his hosting offer...
 
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