Beechcraft sold

"Jim Macklin" wrote in message news : Premier jet is an original Beech design.


More of a clean sheet Hawker design don't you think? This new company (Hawker Beechcraft?) does a lot of fab work, and
the Premier contains a lot of composite (fuselage?) also...

In article om,
"Jay Honeck" wrote:

As an instructor, I get to fly a lot of different airplanes and talk to
a lot of owners. I'm convinced that the only people who hate Beech
airplanes are those who haven't flown them.

I didn't say I hated Beech -- far from it. Although none of their
birds fits my current mission, which requires lots of economical
lifting capacity and a wide CG range -- I would LOVE to own a Bonanza
some day.

What I said was that they have become irrelevant. They sell a tiny
number of aircraft each year (thanks to their outrageous pricing), and
the last new aircraft design to come out of Beech was....what? I
can't think of anything new since the Starship debacle of the early
1980s.

Since that occurred right after I graduated from college -- and I'm now
48 years old -- I think I'm safe in saying that Beech has become
irrelevant to aviation. If they went away tomorrow, we would all shed
a tear for the Beech line -- but it would have zero impact on general
aviation.

The same cannot be said, for example, of Cessna, Piper, Cirrus or
Columbia.

What on earth has Cessna or Piper done in the last 20 years? The 172
Cessna is selling today is the same airframe they were selling 20 years
ago, just with a glass panel, 13(!) fuel drains, and 100 lbs less useful
load. Same with Piper. I was in a brand new Archer a couple of years ago;
the biggest change they had managed to make was to move some of the
switches to an overhead panel which made the windshield smaller and reduced
forward/upward visibility. Made it look cool (like a miniature airliner),
but a net decrease in safety.

Cirrus, Katana, Columbia, and the like are the future of GA today.
Assuming there is any future left in GA :-(

The 172
Cessna is selling today is the same airframe they were selling 20 years
ago, just with a glass panel, 13(!) fuel drains, and 100 lbs less useful
load.

In all fairness, it picked up twenty knots.

Jose
--
"There are 3 secrets to the perfect landing. Unfortunately, nobody knows
what they are." - (mike).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

What on earth has Cessna or Piper done in the last 20 years?

I agree, they've been late to the game -- but at least they're starting
to get the hang of it.

Cessna is especially exciting, with their new LSA and composite planes.
Piper is shaking itself out of its old union mentality, and actually
looking at new things -- like jets. (When I heard Chuck Suma, Piper's
old CEO, making fun of Cirrus' "plastic planes" at the Cherokee Pilots
Association dinner in 2005, I knew he was history. 3 months later, he
got the axe.)

Raytheon/Beech still hasn't figured it out. Maybe the new owners will?


Cirrus, Katana, Columbia, and the like are the future of GA today.

No argument there -- although it may not be too late for Piper/Cessna
to recover. The fact that they've survived is a sign of underlying
strength.

Assuming there is any future left in GA :-(

Whether GA itself survives is a political, not economic, decision. If
the political class decides to tax it out of existence, as they've done
in Europe, GA will die.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck writes:

What I said was that they have become irrelevant. They sell a tiny
number of aircraft each year (thanks to their outrageous pricing), and
the last new aircraft design to come out of Beech was....what?

You seem to imply that not having new aircraft is bad. Aircraft are
not computers; you don't have to buy a new one every six months.
Designs that flew well seventy years ago will still fly well today;
the atmosphere of the planet has not changed. Why the desire to
continually spend more money and waste more resources fixing things
that aren't broken?

Since that occurred right after I graduated from college -- and I'm now
48 years old -- I think I'm safe in saying that Beech has become
irrelevant to aviation.

Just because it doesn't have new bells and whistles each year?

I've heard this in other domains, too (again in the case of Leica and
Hasselblad). Changing for the sake of change (or revenue) isn't
necessarily a good idea.

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Doug Vetter writes:

I'm convinced that the only people who hate Beech
airplanes are those who haven't flown them.

Probably just sour grapes. I've seen _exactly_ the same dynamic with
respect to companies like Leica and Hasselblad. Those who can't
afford it insist that it's not worth the money. Those who actually
buy it know better.

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Mxsmanic wrote:
I've seen _exactly_ the same dynamic with
respect to companies like Leica and Hasselblad. Those who can't
afford it insist that it's not worth the money. Those who actually
buy it know better.

Please. Leica sells a about a 5 MP digital camera for over a thousand
bucks when the going price for everybody else is around $300. Also
Leica doesn't have nearly the features that everybody else does. No
way, no how can the quality of the pictures be worth 200% more on the
price. At some point you realize they are just screwing you because of
the name. Basic marketing.

Recently, Newps posted:

Mxsmanic wrote:
I've seen _exactly_ the same dynamic with
respect to companies like Leica and Hasselblad. Those who can't
afford it insist that it's not worth the money. Those who actually
buy it know better.

Please. Leica sells a about a 5 MP digital camera for over a thousand
bucks when the going price for everybody else is around $300. Also
Leica doesn't have nearly the features that everybody else does. No
way, no how can the quality of the pictures be worth 200% more on the
price. At some point you realize they are just screwing you because
of the name. Basic marketing.

Perhaps you've only confirmed that dynamic? I'd bet that you don't own a
Leica. The appeal of the "over a thousand dollar" Digilux is that it can
use the owner's existing Leica lenses. Those that own an M8 or R8/R9
w/DMR, either of which will set you back more than 5 AMUs, appreciate the
differences in both image quality and camera functionality over all other
makes.

Neil

Newps writes:

Please. Leica sells a about a 5 MP digital camera for over a thousand
bucks when the going price for everybody else is around $300.

Leica's selling point is the glass, which unfortunately isn't really
used by digital cameras.

Also Leica doesn't have nearly the features that everybody else does.

The features that other people have aren't normally necessary.

No way, no how can the quality of the pictures be worth 200% more on the
price.

You need to look through some Leica glass sometime.

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On 2006-12-27, Newps wrote:
Please. Leica sells a about a 5 MP digital camera for over a thousand
bucks when the going price for everybody else is around $300.

I don't know about Leica in particular, but compare the image quality of
a 5MP camera with a decent lens with a $300 camera. Even if the $300
camera has a 10MP sensor, the 5MP camera with a full frame 35mm sensor
and decent lenses will look FAR superior, have much less noise
(particularly on long exposures). Megapixels is almost meaningless
unless you have the lens to back it up AND the sensor itself is large
(the typical sensor in a $300 camera will be smaller than your pinky
fingernail).

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