Business & GA

Expected single-engined aircraft to be step up from Meridian and fit between D-Jet and $4 million HondaJet

Piper Aircraft will unveil a next-generation aircraft, expected to be a very-light jet (VLJ), this month at the National Business Aircraft Association convention in Orlando, Florida. The aircraft will be positioned between the manufacturer’s $2 million single-turboprop Meridian and the under $4 million HondaJet, for which Piper is collaborating on sales and service under a alliance with the Japanese car company.

Piper’s VLJ is widely expected to be single-engined, but with the price projected to be between $2 million and $3 million it will be more expensive than both the single-turbofan Diamond D-Jet at $1.4 million and the twinjet Eclipse 500 at $1.5 million. Cessna’s entry-level Citation Mustang, meanwhile, is priced at $2.6 million.

Piper’s jet is likely to be larger and higher performing than the D-Jet or the “personal jet” being developed by rival light aircraft manufacturer Cirrus Design. Designed as a step up from its piston-powered aircraft, Diamond’s five-seat VLJ is powered by a single Williams FJ33-4, giving it a 315kt (580km/h) cruise and 25,000ft (7,600m) ceiling.

An aircraft that is a step up from Piper’s six-seat Meridian is considered more likely, although it would be relatively large for a single-engined jet. The company has not commented on whether the new aircraft will have one or two engines, but Piper began work on a single-engine jet in the late 1990s, after it canvassed owners of its Mirage high-performance piston single.

Around the same time another company, VisionAire, began development of a relatively large single-engined jet, the $2 million Vantage, to compete against the twin-turbofan Cessna CitationJet and single-turboprop Socata TBM 700. But the project folded in 2003, only to be reborn as the $3 million, twinjet Eviation EV-20 Vantage, for which its builders continue to seek funding.

Piper began taking $10,000 refundable deposits on the new aircraft at a meeting of Meridian and Mirage owners in mid-September, and says the orderbook has opened “with gusto”. Honda Aircraft, meanwhile, says the six/seven-seat HondaJet will go on sale for the first time at NBAA, where it will announce the price of the 420kt-cruise, 41,000ft-ceiling VLJ. Delivery of the first aircraft is planned for 2010.