Special Report: NBAA ’99

Last week's 52nd Annual Meeting and Convention of the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) was about as good as it gets: Almost 30,000 of the business and corporate aviation faithful gathered in Atlanta for three solid days of meetings, seminars, press conferences and - oh yeah - exhibits of the latest and greatest goods, services and flying hardware. This year's theme - Business Aircraft Utilization Strategies - built on the foundation laid by a glossy 48-page brochure produced by the NBAA and including the results of a survey by J.D. Power and Associates of companies in the U.S. operating business (read turbine) aircraft.

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Also, be sure to check out our collection of images from NBAA ’99: The people, the exhibit floor, the static display and, of course, the aircraft.

Gloomy Outside The Hall, Sunny Inside

NBAA ’99 Enjoys The Glow Of Growth In Business Aviation Users And Products

NewsGood thing it wasn’t an airshow. The mood and the crowdunavoidably would have been down had last week been as gray and soggy as the NationalBusiness Aviation Association convention, its preliminaries and aftermath. Daysof rain and damp, low IMC might have stunted a different event into a shadow ofits usual self, but not the Mecca of corporate aviation, where open cockpitsare rarer than walk-in lavatories and turbine-class stand-up cabins as commonas fixed gear on singles.

NBAA '99 logoInstrument flight is the standard, as it must be foraircraft out of their element below FL180, so the days of deluge and scuddyskies served only as mere inconvenience to the faithful. All of last weekend,workers from Mercury Air at DeKalb-Peachtree Airport (PDK) and Showalter FlyingService from Orlando Executive hustled through deluges to arrange nearly 150airplanes into the static display space, while planemakers’ staff andconvention-service company laborers erected sundry displays and tried to keepthe furniture dry. Simultaneously, downtown inside the Georgia World CongressCenter, hundreds more workers converted 1.3 million square feet ofconvention-floor space into the world’s trade exhibition devoted to civilaviation.

ATCAll those days and nights, controllers at Atlanta Center andAtlanta Approach worked hundreds more instrument arrivals than the busiestHartsfield holiday weekend, as business planes from across the spectrumpenetrated the curtain to descend through the goop and soup for landing at PDK,Charlie Brown, Hartsfield and other area airports. A few lucky souls camethrough during a few hours of sunshine; but what little sun shined burnedthrough the mist for only a few off-peak hours. In fact, as the show concludedThursday, ZTL controllers established a record – 10,068 operations in one day.

And by the time Jane Garvey, NBAA President Jack Olcott andother dignitaries finally sheared the red ribbon to open the convention onOctober 12, the business of business aviation was largely business as usual,with a few notable twists: the unusually large number of arrival stories thatcirculated among GA and airline passengers, alike; and the unrelenting need forspeed exhibited by the steady throngs of prospects wading loafer-deep instanding water to view the planes for sale. Rain and IFR minimumsnotwithstanding, everybody there wanted to be there – and made it.

Business Aircraft Utilization StrategiesAnother twist:Sales and marketing people stayed as busy asever, despite the near-total lack of wall-to-wall crowds jockeying for placesin line at the static display. “But most of the sunshine supermen come tolook only because they can,” observed a marketing executive for one business-jetmaker. “When they wade in through the rain instead of staying dry at theexhibit hall, they tend to be real prospects, and we had as many of those asever.”

In yet another twist: Other than the announcement of one newvariant of an airliner-based business jet, NBAA lacked any new-airplaneannouncements – one dormant design marked a return to the market.

And that feeling was more than enough to counter foggyskies, soggy socks and damp dashes between hotels and cars and cars andconvention hall. Nearly 30,000 delegates attended, just short of last year’srecord Las Vegas numbers, and about 80 percent above the attendance when the NBAAlast visited Atlanta, in 1993.

Not that everything is peace and tranquility within thebusiness-aviation community. As one trolling market consultant confided to abar full of NBAA delegates, “Fractional owners are the new money ingeneral aviation, but most of the old money wants them regulated as charteroperators, to keep the new guard from sullying the old, but the argument is aself-inflicted wound waiting to happen.”

U.S. CapitolCongress, he went on to note, “can’t find the dollarsto fund the FAA properly and help the FAA improve the infrastructure” butthey “can’t keep from giving away bucks to unwanted pork projects.”Meanwhile, the industry is inventing new equipment and new capabilities and newflexibilities faster than they can effectively use them in the airspace.

“But, the business of business aviation is good, very,very good,” he concluded. “So it’s hard to be unhappy with the statusquo.”

“And you can quote me,” he offered. Very well. Wejust did.

Fractional Segment Creates House Turbulence In NBAA…

Don’t Regulate Me: Regulate That Fellow Behind The Tree…

FAA logoFractional ownership plans delivered the biggest share ofbusiness-aviation’s growth in recent years, bringing in more new first-timeusers than from converts to outright corporate ownership. But when the FAAraised questions about the regulation of fractionals, the community and NBAA’sstaff and board (plus, presumably, their lawyers and accountants) seemingly have beenin conflict over how to answer the FAA’s simple, initial question: how toregulate fractional programs, via the flexible, non-commercial oriented tenetsof FAR Part 91, or by way of the more complex and constrictive commercial-orientedguidance of FAR Part 135? And just give us a quick gut response, not a reasonedanswer constructed from your members’ input. Please.

The evolution of the issue should be enough to convince anyskeptic of Darwin; NBAA President Jack Olcott has evolved; the NBAA board ofdirectors has evolved; and membership seems, well, conflicted, favoring Part135 regulation of fractionals by a wide margin, but also favoring their ownabilities to exchange or share aircraft and use management companies in lieu ofin-house flight departments under Part 91. The mere loss of the ability to landIFR at an airport without certified weather alone would greatly cut into manycompanies’ flight ops.

NBAA logoWhat’s an association to do? Olcott moved from a 135 thinkerto 91, and the board went from split, at best, to solidly behind 91. The logicinvolved? The FAA was concerned about smaller, possibly less-capable entitiesspringing up on the basis of shared-ownership programs and smaller managementcompanies. But many believe it impossible to expand FAR 135 to cover thoseconcerns without also blanketing traditional flight departments with the samerequirements. So, in that direction the NBAA and its board seem headed. Barringa suggestion for a third solution under a new reg, FAR 91.501 remains themaster of private flight by individuals and corporations alike.

And for the FAA’s part, FAA boss Jane Garvey told membersduring the convention’s opening session that an industry/government committeeon fractional regs should be filled soon to address the question and come to ananswer by January. Even so, she couldn’t go out on a limb and state that the NBAAwould have a seat at the table, so in flux were the politics.

…Safety Can’t Be The Issue Now…

At least, not according to Aviation Data Services and AirResearch Group/US, which joined forces to develop operational and safety dataspecific to aircraft operated for shares owners in fractional programs. ARG/UScalculated an accident rate for the fractionally operated aircraft fleet at0.391 per 100,000 flight hours, slightly below the 0.262 rate for largeairlines, and well above the 1.559 rate for scheduled 135 carriers.

NetJets logoSo, justifying a different regulatory treatment forfractional operations as a safety issue would be tough. Besides, said JohnZimmerman, founder and president of AvData, fractionals are “the greatestthing since sliced bread,” particularly for converting prospects intogeneral aviation users. Since Executive Jet Aviation invented the idea withNetJets 12 years ago, the concept has brought more than 1,600 of them nowsharing use of 330 jets. Many past users went on to become traditionalowners/users.

…Meanwhile, Consensus Strong On Other Issues…

Whether user fees, Free Flight, ATC, airports, or airspaceissues, Olcott, the NBAA board and its membership seem harmonized: no”unspecified user fees,” even with the promise to exempt generalaviation; spend the aviation trust fund on aviation; maintain development ofadvanced ATC systems and operations like Free Flight; maintain GA airports andGA access; and allow the continuance of the management and procurementimprovements started at the FAA just a couple of years ago. Did we mentionspend aviation revenues on aviation issues? Instead of simultaneouslyeliminating the general-fund contribution and cutting funding from the TrustFund? Anybody listening inside the Beltway?

NBAA: Your One-Stop Aviation Hardware Store…

Big Additions, Small Expansions, And More Closet Space Than Ever…

NBAA '99 exhibit floorTheNBAA went beyond the 6,000-member mark just before theconvention, with the addition of Longwood Industries and its Westwind 2,marking a 100-percent gain since 1995 and more than 200 percent since 1990. Nowonder business aviation seems to be booming; and where the users are up, naturally,the suppliers are booming, as well. Never has that connection been clearer thanlast week. And from an updated business-strategies pamphlet and a J.D. Powers &Associates survey highlighting the documented assets of business-aircraftoperations, it’s clear that NBAA is hot after thousands more potentialconverts.

But if anything stuck out as unusual, it was probably thenear lack of any new-product announcements by the major planemakers. And whatwas announced was a biggy, from a small player in the grand scheme of things:the BBJ2, a new, even-larger version of the Boeing Business Jet. When we lasttuned in on the biggest of the business jets, the BBJ was a missionized versionof Boeing’s 737-700 fuselage with the -800’s wing and gear trucks and enoughauxiliary fuel to double its range to more than 6,000 nautical miles. Impressive,don’t you think?

Boeing's original BBJBut, according to the folks at BBJ, the original variantlacked the sort of luggage space needed by users used to the 80-foot-long cabinwith two full lavs, a couple of stateroom-like cabins, an office, conferenceroom and den/living room. Well, only five weeks after the first customer tookdelivery of a completed BBJ the company announced development of the 2, in timeto begin deliveries in late 2000. The BBJ2 brings nearly double the”closet space” thanks to a cabin floor 100 feet long – that’s 25percent longer than the standard. Other good news: It’s only about 20 percentmore expensive, at about $55 million finished, versus upwards of $46 millionfor the standard model. Such a deal you can’t get in a condo or townhouse.

Airbus Industrie was also aggressively pursuing theultra-large bizjet market, with its A319-based Airbus Corporate Jetliner.

…Planemakers Progress: Everywhere, Everything Is Better And Progressing…

While Boeing and Airbus Industrie search for new markets fortheir big jets, the small jet market is growing at a giddy rate. Cessna bowledover the industry last year in Las Vegas by announcing four new models;Bombardier added to the momentum with two announcements of its own; Fairchildhad a mock-up of a business variant of an airliner. And hold on to yourthrusters: The Supersonic Business Jet (SSBJ) could yet become reality. This year, though, mostmanufacturers were content to carve more notches in their yardsticks, with bothCessna and Bombardier telling anyone who would listen that they’ve setmilestones of 3,000 Citations and 2,000 Learjets, respectively.

…Elsewhere, Others Made Progress

Sino-Swearingen SJ30-2 cockpit mockupThe SJ-30-2 is on track for first flight of a productionprototype in March 2000, with four other planes to quickly follow.Certification is expected in March 2001 and already, company president JackBraly told AVweb, the company is training the initial employees for itsnew factory in Martinsburg, W.Va.

VisionAire chairman James O. Rice revealed that progresscontinues in development of the Vantage, with a final configuration modelheaded into the wind tunnel for the hoped-for final tests before constructionof a conformal prototype begins. The list of changes to the airframe, landinggear, wing, tail, engine inlets and other areas is too long to list here.Suffice it to say that Rice and company are stronger believers than before -because they’ve undergone a painfully long education and survived. Flying won’tresume until May of next year, with certification now expected in early 2002and deliveries to follow mid-year. Meanwhile, Rice continues the job of raising$150 million in additional capital to go with the $60 million already landed.

The Century Jet went from a single to a twin last year,thanks to a price for two Williams-Rolls FJ-33s that made going with a singleFJ-44 seem imprudent. In the interim, the design has undergone considerableairframe tweaking with a one-fifth-scale model headed into the wind tunnellater this fall.

Still plugging along, Advanced Aerodynamics and StructuresInc., or AASI, has slipped certification of the JetCruizer 500 again tomid-2000 from the end of 1999; many changes and additions are needed to makethe single-propjet pusher eligible for use in FAR 135 charter operations.

New Piper Meridian arrivesBombardier continues to make progress with the Continentalit announced last year at NBAA to fill a gap between the Learjet 60 and theChallenger 604; certification of the $14 million-plus Continental is expectedin 2002, about a year after first flight.

Aerostar Aircraft is advancing plans to build the AerostarFJ-100, a variant of Ted Smith’s original design finished as originallyconceived, as a twin-pusher light jet. It took the advent of Dr. Sam Williams’FJ-33 to make it possible. If the company can meet its $1.8 million pricetarget, the market will get really interesting.

New Piper brought the first production-finished Meridian toNBAA, and the sharp single-propjet derivative of the Malibu drew steady crowds.Unfortunately, the bird stayed only briefly before returning to Vero tocontinue flight tests. Certification is on track for next summer, the price upto $1.35 million. But a New Piper business jet, while well along in designdevelopment, won’t burst onto the scene until the Meridian enters deliveries.

Raytheon's Premier made an appearanceThe first production-completed Raytheon Premier I, and thethird test-bed, won raves after it arrived through the muck Monday morning,less than a month after its first flight. Thanks to some savvy work with theFAA and its staff, Raytheon has trimmed some of the flight-test time requiredand appears on-track to certificate its first in-house design by year’s end.

And then there’s Cessna. Last year, the big C blew the topoff the show by launching three new variants and one new design, four models inall. In order of size, progress continues on the revised CitationJet, dubbedthe CJ1, and the stretched CitationJet, the CJ2, on the Citation V growth modeldubbed the Ultra Encore, and the all-new Sovereign, giving the company itsbiggest mid-size entry ever. Certification of the CJ1 is due late this year,with deliveries expected next spring; the CJ2 follows by about six months, incertification and deliveries; the Encore by another six months; and theSovereign is farthest out on the horizon, with first flight in 2002,certification in latter 2003, and deliveries the following year.

…The Second Time Around

Piaggio's P-180 returned to NBAAElsewhere in NBAA: The return of Piaggio and the P-180, andpriced the same as when production stopped six years ago, about $4.6 million.What may have been a tough sell in the early 1990s could also seem moreattractive thanks to improved range and payload.

Also back on the concept boards was Russia’s Sukhoi DesignBureau, with its design for an S-21 supersonic business jet, picking up aheadof where things stopped in 1992 when then-Gulfstream head Allan Paulson wasteaming with the former Soviet aircraft shop. And the Russians aren’t alone;Gulfstream is studying the idea again, this time in partnership with Lockheed Martin.And, already, NetJets guru Richard Santulli believes he could sell shares for100 SSBJs for a cool $50 million each, $400 million for all eight shares.

AlliedSignal Looks Ahead

AlliedSignal logoEach year, AlliedSignal rubs its collective corporatecrystal ball and peers into the future of biz-av sales, and the picturecontinues to be a pretty one, according to the company’s 10-year long view.How’s 6,800 new biz jets worth $89 billion between 2000 and 2010 sound?? That’sup 300 units and $11 billion more than the forecast given a year ago. Thenumber of operators worldwide will continue to grow, with fractional usersadding the most new converts, according to AlliedSignal’s prognostication, and withentry-level, light and light-medium class jets accounting for the lions shareof the units.

But a small slide is ahead, most vendor voices at NBAAagreed, and this “plateau” is just around the corner. After about 605new-jet deliveries this year and 680 next year, deliveries will slip back intothe high-500 range until late in the next decade and rise again to above 600annually about 2009.

Still, forewarned is forearmed, vendors seemed to say,noting that the double-digit growth numbers of the past five years cannot besustained indefinitely. “As long as we keep expanding the user base,whether through fractional or traditional ownership, the community and thebusiness can keep growing all across the board,” noted Barney Byard, vicepresident of Aviation Data Services, the Wichita-based research firm.

The Milestones…Or Four Into 5,561

Cessna’s 3,000th…

Cessna logoYes, less than seven years after Cessna delivered its 2,000thCitation, the planemaker is back celebrating another grand’s worth, 27 yearsafter the first 500 series was delivered from Mid-Continent campus in Wichita.According to the company, that covers eight models flown 12 million hoursacross five billion miles, by any angle a remarkable achievement since 1972.The 3,000th will be delivered in ceremonies in Wichita and the lines continueto hum. If Cessna succeeds in its master “2020 plan” to home in ontotal customer satisfaction, the next 1,000 could come even quicker.

…Learjet’s 2,000th Rekindles Memories Of The Early Days…

Something old, something new - a Learjet montageToo much rain kept Bombardier from celebrating the 2,000thLearjet with a photo-worthy fly-by of the milestone bird, a model 45nonetheless delivered to Parker Hannifin president Pat Parker by the mother ofthe Learjet, Bill’s wife, Moya. Instead of a rare formation pass of all threeLearjets in production, the throngs toasted the occasion under a tent that barelymuffled the rhythm of the falling rain. His model 23 first flown 36 years agolast month may have been second in the biz-jet fleet behind the LockheedJetStar, but it was first in public awareness and became as synonymous withbusiness aviation as Bill Piper’s J-3 Cub was to the private plane.

…Raytheon’s 500th Beechjet…

Yep, in under a decade since revamping the MitsubishiDiamond into the Beechjet, Raytheon has notched up sales of 500, including 171delivered to the U.S. Air Force as the T-1A Jayhawk tanker and transporttrainer. Today, Raytheon’s Plant 4 jet-production line includes the Hawker800XP and 1000 and Beechjets, with two all-new designs in progress: the PremierI, due next year, and the Hawker Horizon, ETA a year later. The firstproduction Premier made it through the muck to sit at the static, resplendentwith its complete interior, roomy for its class.

…Bragging Rights: Gulfstream’s 61st G-V…

Nothing like a good race to bring out the bragging, andGulfstream Aerospace showed no shyness, painting the 61st G-V delivered like amilitary number, complete with mission marks and a boast about its nearestcompetitor delivering only two, so far.

…Galaxy Building 1.5 Per Month, Headed For 2…

It’s been a busy year for the folks of Galaxy Aerospace,what with last year’s certification of the Galaxy, last month’s ribbon cuttingon the new headquarters at Alliance Airport north of Ft. Worth, and now withsales steadily growing. “It’s simple when you’ve got a greatproduct,” said a beaming Brian Barents, company president. By year’s end,Barents expect to have delivered the fourth Galaxy; production is already at 18annually, to meet delivery plans of 12 next year, and headed for 24 to match2001 delivery projections.

…Fairchild Plans December Start For Envoy 7 Prototype…

Nothing like having an existing airliner to jumpstartdevelopment of a new business jet, as Boeing, Airbus and, now, FairchildAircraft have found. Fairchild’s Envoy 7 transcontinental business jet startsdown the line in December, the same line used to build Fairchild’s 70- to80-seat 728JET passenger plane. First flight and certification are bothexpected next year. Fairchild plans the same approach for the Envoy 3, based onthe 44-seat 428Jet.

…Raytheon Makes The Celebrity Sale Of The Show A “Great One”…

Yep, that was retired blade-master Wayne Gretzky signingautographs next to the Premier I mock-up at the Raytheon Aircraft exhibitduring NBAA. The “Great One,” who confessed to a slight fear offlying, bought a quarter-share of a Hawker 800XP from Raytheon Travel Air, theplanemaker’s in-house fractional ownership program. After only a month with thejet, Gretzky said, it has “made my life and my family’s life a loteasier.”

…Going Down: PWC’s PW6XX Targets FJ Power Ranges

PWC's PW6xx turbofanThe plethora of new, small turbofan airframes hasn’t beenlost on the folks outside Montreal, where engineers are working hard on a newfamily of turbine engines that takes the company to a new low in turbine power.The compact-scaled family includes high-bypass fans ranging between 1,000 and2,000 pounds of thrust and turboprop and turboshaft engines spanning thehorsepower range from 600 to 900. PWC’s smallest fans currently produce 2,200pounds of thrust, the smallest propjet at 500 shaft horsepower, the smallestturboshaft at 580.

Hitting The (Data) Links: Flight Improvements Abound, In Cockpit Wx, OnApproach

Head’s Up! Sight Beyond The End Of The Landing Light…

Staying a-HUD of the airplane gets much easier in IMC withthe sophistication of some form of head’s-up graphic display, and NBAA thisyear brought several players to the forefront, among them Rockwell Collins,Honeywell, and, interestingly enough, Gulfstream.

Three avionics makers showed off their versions of ahead’s-up visual aid for left-seaters, each with its own combination of airdata, navigation, energy-management and runway graphics. Truth is, followingthe guidance of sundry carets, balls, arrows, plus signs and digital-tapedisplays made simulated landings of large business jets a snap on the firsttry. And anyone who has ever tried to fly a computer sim knows how tough it canbe in the first few tries, the time it takes to sense the lead and lag betweentoy controls and a computer-generated display.

Demo of Rockwell Collins' HUDBut merely following the guidance of the display symbologyproduced consistently smooth, constant-rate descents to a runway invisibleuntil 50 feet AGL; the inertial-based guidance beats chasing needles down anILS by a considerable margin. Hand-flying CAT IIIa landings are approved to CATIIIa runways, that’s how good it is. The first installation approved forgeneral aviation is a Rockwell Collins HGS on a Challenger 604; expect more tofollow since Southwest, Delta, trendsetter Alaska, and a host of overseascustomers have long proved their value.

And Gulfstream has added its own twist to the mix: aninfrared camera in the nose that plays on a HUD display screen showing theactual runway lines, lights, even paint, in place of the runwaycomputer-generated by the flight-management system driving other HUD runwaygraphics. Available only from the Savannah-based folks, the Enhanced VisionSystem will allow CAT III landings to CAT II runways, and also enhances pilotvision during taxiing, parking, roll-out, the works.

…What You Don’t See Can Hurt You…

Everybody seems to be into turning panels into videomonitors, and the business-jet community has seen its share. But the hottestnews from this year’s NBAA covered gear many a piston-airplane driver canafford. Starting alphabetically, AlliedSignal, BFGoodrich and RyanInternational top this list.

From AlliedSignal comes two new products wrapped into onenew acronym. The IHAS, for Integrated Hazard Avoidance System, comes in an 8000and 5000 version, the former primarily for turbine-class equipment, and thelatter for planes of more-modest powerplant. Each IHAS integrates navigationmaps with weather, traffic and terrain depictions in an array of configurationsand priorities.

AlliedSignal has designed the line to allow a buyer to startsmall and expand the system building-block style until it’s complete. The IHAS8000 uses the Bendix King KFC 850 multifunction display, to better accommodateradar input for weather avoidance; the IHAS 5000 uses the more-modest KFC 550display and accommodates input from a Stormscope sensor, as well as the Bendix/Kingterrain and map functions. Both displays integrate the controls and softwarefor these functions into the same box with a panel-mounted four-inch colordisplay. As AlliedSignal said earlier this year, deliveries of the firstcomponents begin early next year, with all the components available by mid-2000.Display prices start at about $6,500, with traffic and terrain pushing thetotal price to $22,000 for a full-boat IHAS.

And for the light-jet market, AlliedSignal unveiled the MarkVIII enhanced ground proximity warning system (EGPWS) at $33,900 for the light(4.3 pounds), small (3-by-6-by-10.25-inches) box. In addition to terrainwarnings, the Mark VIII warns of excessive bank angle, descent after takeoff,excessive descent rate, closure to terrain, and even descent below aglideslope.

…And From BFGoodrich, TAWS For Ten Thousand…

BF Goodrich's TAWS, on a Bendix/King displayTAWS stands for terrain awareness and warning system, andBFGoodrich’s new LandMark system works off a GPS navigator to compare positioninformation against a database of terrain elevation and obstacle heights belowthe aircraft, ahead, and to the sides. Warnings come both aurally and visuallyby connecting the LandMark to an EFIS display or a radar display throughBFGoodrich’s RGC250 graphics computer. Certification is expected by year’send.

…Getting “Active” – Ryan International Unveils 9900BX ActiveTCAD…

After leading the light general-aviation market in trafficawareness for years, Ryan International has closed the gap with airline-styleTCAS with the development of the 9900BX active traffic-alert system. The 9900BXbuilds on the 9900B’s direction, range and altitude capabilities by adding fourinterrogating transmitters to trigger transponders as far away as 10 miles. Allprevious Ryan TCADs were passive, dependent on hearing a transponder respondingto air-traffic or TCAS radar interrogations. As founder/inventor Paul Ryan told AVweb, this gives the 99900BX coverage everywhere, independent of being whereATC radar can see. The tab: $20,200 for the 9900BX, or $5,200 to upgrade a9900B.

…Lost In Space: “You’ve Got Mail. Up Here,” Means AnotherAvenue Of Escape Lost…

Ever notice how much harder it’s gotten to escape? First itwas air phones, then cell phones, then aerial cell phones, airborne fax.Airshow unveiled its new aerial email system to make escape even harder. Thefolks who gave business aviation airborne DBS capabilities, on-board DVD, and,of course, phone and paging connections, have now devised a system that allowsmail to be forwarded from a ground-based ISP, or delivered directly to anAirshow Mail address. Just think of it: AVflash with your Monday morning coffeeat FL510.

…TCAS-Triggered Pulselite Gives Turbines The Wink

Yes, you heard it right: a Pulselite system triggered by aTCAS system in alert mode. Heretofore, the Pulselite worked off a simple pieceof electronic circuitry that flashed landing and/or taxi lights to enhance a plane’svisibility. With this new $2,495 system, the Pulselite circuitry triggers theflashing the instant a radar response trigger the traffic advisory.

Big Backlogs, New Products, New Markets

Data-link For The Masses?

FAA's Jane GarveyJane Garvey helped highlight the FAA’s continuing efforts todevelop the Aeronautical Datalink system, with a new test program due to beginin Miami. The test will include 28 datalink-equipped aircraft, possibly a few ofwhich will be turbines participating through the NBAA. By 2003, the plan is to havenationwide capability to broadcast basic altitude and route information viadatalink to equipped aircraft. For those ofus slow to invest in another new cockpit gadget, the faster the fastest move todatalink, the quicker the voice frequencies will get quieter.

…Elsewhere On The Cockpit-Technologies Front…

Universal Weather improved its own Uvdatalink service forthe biz-av set to include text and graphic weather, uploading flight plansdirectly into onboard navigation computers, and providing news and emailaccess to passengers, all while aloft.

Northstar's CT-1000Cleveland-based Flight Options is installing NorthstarTechnologies’ CT-1000 electronic flight bags in the 40 aircraft the companyoperates, providing crews with every approach chart and map needed, plus POHdocumentation such as weight-and-balance forms, takeoff- andlanding-performance grids, graphic, real-time weather, and moving map, at$11,000 per unit. Except for something to write down clearances, pen and paperseem redundant.

And finally, Arnav Systems got the formal five-year contractto launch its WxLink weather datalink and communications network nationwideover to VHF frequencies; with the inclusion of AlliedSignal’s NavRadio unit tothe system, live cockpit weather appears only about a year out for equippedairplanes.

…Garmin, Meggitt, S-Tec Landing In Vantage Panel

Here’s some black-box advances everyone should appreciate:VisionAire plans to adopt some advanced new avionics into the Vantage when itcomes into service a couple of years from now. From Garmin International, lookfor dual GNS 530 all-in-one navigators; from Meggitt Avionics, watch for afour-display panel with a primary flight-and-nav display and an engine displayfor each cockpit seat, and a tiny, solid-state AHARs; and from S-Tec, anall-new digital autopilot getting attitude and heading reference off theMeggitt AHARs while a more-conventional rate-based reference system stands byin case it’s needed. If this combination sounds familiar, think New Piper andthe new Meridian. And Meggitt is further deploying its technology throughdevelopment of an aftermarket engine-instrument display for older Citation Isand IIs based on its Meridian system. Sierra Industries is in the deal toperform the development, certification and production of the displays.

…Speaking Of New Piper…

Company chairman Chuck Suma spent enough time at NBAA toconfirm that the company is planning an initial public offering to take thecompany public again. The time and cost challenges of new-product developmentcould be more easily met by a public company infused with new investment money.Nonetheless, Suma pointed out that four of the eight products shown at Atlantahad benefited from changes in production and, particularly, avionics systems,in the past five years. The latest to see improvements: The Seneca V and MalibuMirage, sporting Garmin’s new GNS 430, the S-Tec System 55, and, on the 2000Senecas, the option to include BFGoodrich Stormscope, Skywatch and AlliedSignalradar combined on an Avidyne FlightMax 740 MFD.

…Re-engining A King

Say hello to Kilo Alpha 290 LLC, the latest company workingto give new life to old King Air 90s, in this case using a pair of newAlliedSignal TPE 331-10 propjet engines combined with two new-design McCauleyfive-bladed props. On converted E-90 or C-90 King Airs, the developers promiselonger hot-section cycles than the old Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6 turbines,better hot-and-high performance and higher payloads and cruise speeds. Alreadyin the field is Orenda, with a hopped-up, turbocharged V-8 recip being marketedby Stevens Aviation.

And This Is Only A Part Of The Big Picture

In the end, delegates and vendors alike talked about thesubdued mood of ecstasy that underpinned this year’s NBAA convention. Withoutthe big, new-plane announcements of years past, it did seem somewhat morerelaxed. Maybe part of the slower pace is due to the Southern Hospitality ofAtlanta.

But wait … next year it’s New Orleans. More new planeswill be there with new type certificates and new customers and a new buzz toadd to the background modulation. Next year, deliveries and sales are stillexpected to kick stabilizer; and next year, a new crop of new designs willlikely burst into the scene to help spark the energy the home of jazz deserves.

So, next year, we’ll do this, and more, all over again.

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