Aircraft

Cirrus Aircraft today (Thursday, January 17, 2013) announced the launch of its latest SR22 models, the Generation 5 SR22 and SR22T. The new 22s features a host of quality-of-life improvements and one showstopper: a 200-pound increase in the airplanes’ maximum takeoff weight. As in past airframe updates, Cirrus calls a model a new generation only […]

Astronics Max-Viz infrared enhanced vision systems are now available for Cessna 172, 182 and 206 piston singles. Priced at just over $30,000 for a retrofit system ($22,145 as an option on a new aircraft), the system includes a wing-mounted infrared camera feeding a full- or split-screen black-and-white depiction on the Garmin G1000 multifunction display. The […]

The Astronics Max-Viz infrared enhanced vision system offers Cessna flyers a new level of situational awareness.

After a series of tantalizing Facebook posts Kermit Weeks announced yesterday that he has concluded a decade-long quest. The sole remaining flyable Sikorsky S-43 flying boat (of 53 built in the 1930s) is now his. Weeks also believes that the metaphysical spirit of the airplane’s former owner, Howard Hughes, himself, helped him acquire the aircraft. […]

Cessna has earned FAA approval for its Grand Caravan EX. The new model is outfitted with the Pratt & Whitney PT6A-140, which puts out 867 shp, a nearly 40 percent improvement in power and a roughly 20 percent improvement in its already good climb performance. Certain operators are excited about this fact, as the EX […]

Announced just last spring, the latest version of Cessna’s venerable 525 CitationJet lineup, the M2 model, is already making its way down the production line at the company’s Independence, Kansas, factory. The new model features Garmin G3000 avionics, a completely updated interior scheme and Williams FJ44 turbofan engines producing nearly 2,000 pounds of thrust apiece. […]

Austro Engines, a division of Diamond Aircraft, has capped two and a half years of developing its AE80R rotary aircraft engine with successful bench testing. The company announced the tests yesterday, saying the new engine is a higher-power derivative of its successful 55-hp AE50R rotary. Target weight of the AE80 is less than 60 pounds. […]

The wreckage of a Brewster F2A-3 Buffalo was recently found submerged beneath a mere 10 feet of water off the island of Midway Atoll, bringing attention to the stubby-looking airplane known as a “flying coffin” during World War II due to its notoriously poor combat record. Federal divers stumbled upon the find last summer while […]

Yesterday Pilatus launched an online configurator for the iPad that allows users to create their dream Pilatus PC-12 turboprop single. One of the hottest marketing tools for carmakers these last few years has been so-called “configurators,” digital utilities that let fans of the car (and potential customers) pick out colors, body mods, trim and interior […]

Eclipse Aerospace has submitted a proposal for a U.S. Air Force request to supply a “large fleet” of very light jets (VLJ) for use as basic trainers. The Air Force is seeking to replace its 20-year-old fleet of business jets to support its Specialized Undergraduate Pilot Training (SUPT) Multi-Place Training Track. Cost will be a […]