Gulfstream announced on 21 October the company will cease production of the G450 large cabin business jet in 2018 after a 14-year run for the product and a market segment-defining, 35-year manufacturing life for the aircraft type.
The G450 will be replaced in production after 2018 by the similarly-cast G500, Gulfstream’s first clean-sheet aircraft in the large cabin segment since the GIV was certified in 1987.
“It’s fitting that the G500 will replace the G450 and build upon its performance legacy, creating another industry game-changer from Gulfstream,” says Gulfstream president Mark Burns in a statement.
In all, Gulfstream has delivered 870 GIV, GIV-SP and G450 aircraft, which shared a common type certificate. Excluding cancellations, nearly 400 G450s have been ordered or delivered since the type received certification in 2004.
But demand for the large cabin jet has waned since October 2014, when Gulfstream introduced the G500 and G600. Gulfstream officials said then that the G500 would not replace the G450 and there was room in the market for both types, but the delivery trends over the past two years have pointed to falling demand.
G450 deliveries peaked in the mid-30s, but dropped to the low-20s in 2014 and 2015, according to Flight Fleet Analyzer. With less than three months remaining in 2016, Gulfstream has delivered 12 G450s.
Though sharing the same fuselage cross-section and wing of the original GIV, the G450 introduced the Honeywell PrimusEpic avionics suite, which Gulfstream adapts as the PlaneView cockpit.
The G500 features several new advances, including a widened fuselage and new wing based on the G650. The G500 also is equipped with the PlaneView II cockpit, with fly-by-wire control surfaces commanded by active sidesticks. Gulfstream also selected the Pratt & Whitney Canada PWC814GA turbofan engines for the G500, a radical shift from the company’s historic use of only Rolls-Royce engines.
The G500 is expected to be certificated in 2017 and achieve first delivery in 2018.
Source: FlightGlobal.com
