https://investor.textron.com/news/n...ctric-Aircraft-Pioneer-Pipistrel/default.aspx What are your thoughts here guys? Good news or bad news for us aviators? A remake of the Skycatcher?
Nice publicity for Cessna, a tax write off and maybe federal money will make it financially feasible, and the executives can brag that they are down with the fight for sustainable green whatnot. No viable aircraft will be involved.
Key part of the announcement: "Upon closing of the transaction, Textron plans to form a new business segment, Textron eAviation, focused on the development of sustainable aircraft, which will include Pipistrel"
ThePanthera will be an orphaned airplane. Values will tank. they should sell off the Panthera TC to a company that can sustain it…..but they won’t.
That seems a little unfortunate. Textron has not really innovated much in the small GA segment. Killed one of the best piston aircraft, the TTx. Took perhaps the best single pilot jet out there, the Mustang, and let it run its course with essentially no upgrades and shut it down. Hasn’t been able to innovate much on their remaining piston aircraft. Baron and Bonanza are pretty much deceased. Couldn’t bring the Jet-A 182 to completion. Killed the skycatcher. Even the Denali, a no brainer winning design, hasn’t met certification targets. They are a midsize jet company. We will see if they can innovate this project, but would not bet my money on it. For the little planes about the only companies innovating and stable are Diamond, Cirrus, Piper and Socata.
My observation based on owning a Taurus glider for a few years is Pipistrel lacked focus and depth. Their support structure was lacking. Their maintenance support was lacking. My fear is that the Pipistrel planes will become orphans. SLSA to ELSA, fellows?
TC was expected this year. No chance now. Unfortunate. Maybe someone will buy it for an eab kit as that's what pipistrel was doing until it was to be certified
I think Pipistrel had the horsepower to ramp up its production. Takes a lot of cash to manufacture an airplane.
Agree, no innovation in the GA market, but pretty impressive that the 408 SkyCourier got its type certificate this week. Clean sheet design to certification very quickly. I always felt the TTX was a better plane than the Cirrus, but too many people want the parachute.
It's going to be a while before anything happens. It seems to be all about business aviation now. Piston singles are slowly becoming extinct. Better become a multi-millionaire if you want to keep flying.
Yup. Note all of the announcements and press revolve around Pipistrel's electric aircraft and associated development work. No mention of Pipistrel's impressive piston lineup. I think corporations are taking note of the sky high valuations of companies like Tesla. They want in on the electric bandwagon. Ford did it by splitting out all their electric vehicle work into a separate entity. Textron is taking the path of buying Pipistrel. There will be many press releases and a lot of noise, and Textron will spare no effort in advertising that they are "thisclose" to a utopia of electric powered aircraft whizzing about. Resulting in no viable aircraft. The optimist in me hopes Textron continues to support existing Pipistrel owners, and keep manufacturing and development of existing models. The cynic in me thinks that, as soon as Textron sees a couple rough quarters ahead, they'll "streamline" the Pipistrel offices in Slovenia and Italy out of existence.
Textron's predecessor companies have been bitten almost every time they tried to be innovative in the lightplane market since 1965. Cessna ate it with the 177 (a worthy effort after some initial teething problems), the stillborn 187 and 327, the 162 and the diesel singles. They couldn't even make a success out of the Columbia foster-child. The Starship was an expensive embarrassment for Beech, and the Skipper, another nice airplane, was never really competitive. Party like it's 1964 -- squint a little bit and these 58-year-old airframes look like they're from Textron's current brochure ... 58 years is a long time in aviation. 58 years before the "modern" airplanes above, the Wrights were still practicing basic airwork at Huffman Prairie. Even Piper's highly-touted new trainer is a near-reincarnation of the 1971 Cherokee Flite Liner with modern avionics. Other than Cirrus and Diamond and some imported LSAs, what "innovative" airframes since 1965 have really been successful? PA-46 maybe. What became of the single-engine Commanders, the Grumman-American line, the PA-38? You're Textron. Do you tell your stockholders you're gonna sink a ton of coin into an innovative light GA airplane? My guess is the acquisition of Pipistrel allows Textron to inexpensively hang an "eTextron Division" sign in a back corner of a hangar somewhere and virtue-signal to the government, the public and shareholders that the company is all into sustainable, green, renewable, climate-friendly, and all the other approved buzzwords.
FWIW: you could always get a group of people together and make an E/AB knock-off of a C182 or PA28. It worked for similar TC models. I'm sure the Corsair V8 guy will sell you an engine for it. That should get you the range, useful load, pax, etc. you seek without reinventing the wheel so to speak.
Convert a SLSA to ELSA and you have all the freedoms of EAB, even more since you don't have to be the builder to get the repairman certificate.
Then there's no need to convert to experimental, any more than any other orphaned aircraft. TC'd aircraft aren't nearly as restrictive as SLSA, where you can't even install a different radio without approval from the manufacturer.
You seen the guys over at bushliner.com? They're building a 185 "clone" kit with a better wing which they purchased from another designer.
That dude has less credit to his name than Jim Bede. https://backcountrypilot.org/forum/brand-new-super-duper-turbo-170-with-2450-gw-22291
Weell, was going to list a few, but just saw the video on @Daleandee 's post above and I don't see any now LOL
Hard to kill it when it was never really alive. There's only a few in the US, they're all experimental (Not EAB -- experimental exhibition, which does have limitations), and from all accounts they weren't exactly close to getting the TC. Maybe Textron will carry it across the finish line for certification, but Pipistrel was already advertising it at $750k, which is a far cry from what the internet seems to remember.
I've heard of various clone projects but no specifics. I'm just surprised there aren't more attempts. How much will this Cyclone cost in kit form? If the $489K price they quote to give you a "new", used 185 is any indication.... And people complain about getting a brand new TT:-0- 182 for $400K.
