DA42 as a true four (and a half) seater?

[Erik]

Those of us who have spent hundreds and thousands of hours flying around the vast high-altitudes in the Rocky Mountain areas tend to be a bit dismissive of the "lowlanders. Last year I had occasion to be bemused by a sign I encountered in North Carolina along the highway proclaiming I had just crossed the "Eastern Continental Divide".

Well....after I went to Berkeley, I went to grad school in Boulder - and I can tell you that in some ways the hills are harder in the Oakland hills because they grade the roads steeper. But you know what - the hills are Waaay harder in North Carolina - around Boone - they never seemed to have heard of switch back roads! They just go straight up.

[fqb]

Thank you all again for the informative replies. And thanks to our moderator to approve my posts.

To answer a few more things that came up:
I will most certainly try out a DA40 and a DA42 and SR22 before flying. SR22 and DA40 are easy to rent, DA42 nobody in my area seems to have (Aspen flying club does not seem to have theirs anymore) but eventually I will be close to someone on a trip.

Antoine, my comments on the EA-400 - I secretly hoped a little bit you would go out to tell me otherwise. Reality is that there is so little information out about this plane first hand experiences are the only real way to find out anything. Walter Extra is an amazing aircraft designer and that the plane did not really make it to market success is very sad. I am aware that he sold it to a chinese company 18months ago and I don't see any news on their website of bringing it back to live, but of course the engine is supported and you replaced the panel anyway. Leaves the somewhat complicated gear? There is essentially nothing on the Internet that really describes its handling.

I do want to mention that I think (but hey, I am a student so what do I know) - and a lot of you might think different though - that there is a serious increase in risk from flying in the rockies with a plane that is neither a twin, nor a turboprop, nor has a parachute. It simply is somewhat often the case that your options for an emergency landing are between bad and very bad. Whatever ones opinion is on the parachute, if deployed over 500ft and without excess speed, it is a near guarantee to walk away alive, and without any piloting skills (besides being mentally ready to surrender the plane). Of course, being able to fly on one engine to the next airport is much better. Unless we can go very high, we need to avoid national forests and wilderness areas (which are very widespread) due to the rocky, forested terrain and the long search and rescue response times.
Additionally, we did have a single engine accident at KSBS a few weeks back. Bonanza took off on rwy 32 which goes into a valley of farm fields. Lost the engine at 200-400feet. Did the right thing and landed straight ahead in the field, climbed on the roof and waited for airport personnel to come get her (there were five feet of snow). Sobering sight to take off over the wreck for the next week until they brought an excavator to lift up the plane and carry it out. If she would have taken off rwy 14 she would have been right over town without any options. I know there is nothing new about this vs what we know of flying risks, but hometown accidents are always another level more chilling.

Hangar - If in the end I get a DA42, whether this year or after a few hundred hours, I will simply have to rent - it just precludes me from owning a hangar at KSBS.

One more precise question - on retrofitted DA42NG's with the KAP140 - do you have or can add a straight and level button like on the later models? It does seem to me that this should result in a serious decrease in LOC accidents.

Members brought up the issue of oxygen. There is no question that oxygen is far from optimal for kids, and I would avoid it. I also dont doubt that my family would find it the most comfortable to have a pressurized club seating arrangement. But I think on my routes oxygen can be avoided. Going west from KSBS at 12500' gives you a lot of freedom actually - going east into the front range or straight south you are pushing it a bit and may need to take valleys with all the downsides that come with it.

My Flight school was recommending the Cirrus/DA42 route until they heard of my dog which changed their opinion to Baron or 340 but for the reasons I had in my OP I am very hesitant to consider that.

[Colin]

This will probably be a series of messages as things occur to me.

I am extremely risk averse. I know that seems odd, since I am flying small planes, but I work hard to manage the risk. As far as I can tell, I work harder at it than most of the people at my home field, many of whom jump in their plane like it is a motorcycle in their garage and roar off into the sky. Every flight I stop before getting in, look over the outside one more time and think, "Is today the day?" And I fly over the golf course where Harrison Ford went down.

All that means that before I bought a plane I read a LOT of accident reports. It was strange because a lot of the low time pilots get in trouble because they have an under-performing plane. So they are flying out of Denver but they bought a regularly aspirated, twenty year old C172, and they are surprised that in mid-August at 2pm it mushes down after take off. And then the OTHER type of accident for the low-time pilot was the doctor in his Bonanza, where he bought more plane than he had learned how to control, and went skittering off the runway one night when he landed way too fast.

I wanted to avoid either of those. The DA40 I bought is not over-powered, although when you get in and compare it to the DA20 you will be very happy. In order to stay out of the first scenario I was *extremely* careful about what situations I put the plane (and me) in. I've flown over the Rockies over a dozen times, and I never do it without at least an hour of planning. And I am often watching the weather for a week. Everything is geared to crossing those monsters when the wind is calmest and the air the friendliest. I don't believe I have ever crossed the midline before noon, for instance. And I know the weather stations that are not airports, where you just get the information about the weather in the pass. I have O2 on board most of the time, but I'm actually usually below 12,500.

You should take a four day weekend and come fly in Long Beach. Let the kids go to Disney while you fly around in a DA40. There's a high-altitude airport (for us) at Big Bear Lake. And there are a bunch of short fields you can try it out on. More importantly, at Angel City Flyers you could do a day in the DA40 and the following day do an introduction to multi-engine in the DA42. In the DA40 have them take you out to 8,000 feet over the practice area and ride a stall down to 3,000 feet. It is extremely enlightening. And, for me, my cardiac workout for the week. But it is really great to see what happens when the plane is *fully stalled* and you start trying to steer from one heading to another.

(The spring-loaded controls on the SR22 are one of the bigger hurdles for me. I don't like that you can't feel what the wind feels like out there.)

When I was considering buying my DA42 I exchanged some mail with Vilis, who used to be on the board and owned two of the DA42s down at Angel City for a while. He said that he had sold the last one about six months before and had to come down to fly it to the new owner in Idaho. Crossing the Rockies and flying it up there he said he had forgotten how incredibly forgiving and simple the plane was. (He is now in a Turbo Commander Twin or something monster like that, all pressurized and boots for de-icing.)

(Speaking of more capable planes, after I received my multi-engine rating I looked at a lot of other possibilities. I am a member of Beechtalk and I love that community and the planes. But I am not flying enough, I don't think, to be safe in a Baron. If something goes wrong in that plane, you need to be a really well-trained, very current pilot extremely familiar with the plane. When my instructor would fail and engine in the DA42 it appeared that I could basically *do nothing* for the first ten seconds while I thought about it, and I was not in a worse situation for having done so.)

I am now putting the first fifty hours in my DA42 time and it is a much more serious plane than the DA40. Landing San Diego once I was asked to make a short approach because there was a 767 on a three mile final. I stood it up on one wing, pirouetted about a point as it dropped those few hundred feet to the numbers, and the slid it out to touch on the numbers just above stall speed so I was off at the first exit. An airline pilot holding short asked the ground controller "What sort of airplane was that just landing? That was great to see." It is a little sports car in the sky.

The DA42 is not a sports car. The interior is identical, but it is a big heavy SUV that carries de-icing fluid to get me out of conditions that I try to plan around. It carries the extra engine and the retractable gear so it is *marginally* faster. But, as far as I can tell in my first 25hrs, you fly it much more like an airliner. Pitch for 90kts in the pattern and make a few power changes and you will touch down on exactly the same spot every time. Lots of inertia.

I wouldn't look at full full payload with the DA42. Fifty gallons is a LOT of range, even with IFR reserves. It will be longer than you, your family, or your dog, want to be in the plane. Look at it with fifty gallons of fuel on board (or, really, to be honest, forty). I don't think you are carrying more than two nights of luggage with the dog, by the way.

I will be replacing the interior in the DA42 at the end of the summer. When I do, the front seats will recline and the right control stick will be removable. That will make pretty much as comfortable as an SR22 would have been for my wife.

Before getting the DA42 I looked carefully at the SR22. I think the G3 wing was a big improvement. Like you, I wasn't going to be able to get a brand new plane. But ultimately, the parachute didn't make me feel as good as a second engine. Crossing to Catalina, parachute still means my wife is swimming and she's not that good a swimmer. Parachute in the Rockies means you don't select your landing site and in the end, that could make a fatal difference. (The DA40 has been flown into the side of a mountain valley, at stall speed. All four occupants (two kids in the back seat) climbed out and walked away. I have the photos.)

Restarting above altitude is not something I think about. If I lose my engine I am landing, period. I guess it means you can't train in your neighborhood, but I'd want to do that at sea level anyway.

I guess I wrote one long message instead. Happy to answer questions.

[fqb]

Thank you very much everyone. I have learned an incredible amount from all the posts. Thank you also Colin for the long personal experience with your DA42 and DA40. Antoine, enjoy your EA400, I am next to the former factory tomorrow in Germany, might stop by there. I will be watching if there are any more responses but otherwise you will all hear back from me after I am another 100 hours or so down my flying career.

Again thank you everyone for helping out.

[Antoine]

Erik - we're hijacking the thread! See my "what comes after a DA40 thread for an update on the E400 just for you - my friend and I spent the last 24 hours in Bonn.

[Bartek]

After some 200h in DA40 I moved into DA42. In my opinion both are great planes for some beginning and low time pilots. DA42 is more capable (TKS, really makes sense in Europe) and requires some more discipline (retractable gear, twin operations). But I can easily imagine some fresh pilot transiting into DA42 just after few dozens of type training hours with the instructor. Stall behavior of DA40 and DA42 are both very good ones, main difference in flight characteristic from my experience – DA42 is little heavier on controls and needs more speed on landing.

[Rich]

Hi Florian -

FWIW, I have a friend with a similar family situation (sans dog) who regularly makes 300nm trips in mountainous terrain. From the SF Bay Area, that is pretty much any direction except West - but that has bigger problems.

Chris

Seriously? Years ago, in a Hershey-bar-wing Cherokee 150HP, I flew into OAK from the South (up the coast) with 3 adults, my 8-year-old son, and assorted baggage. I don't recall anything particularly mountainous along that route. And a day or so later, with a full load of fuel and one less adult, departed OAK to the NE, over the Sierras toward our home in Idaho. Fuel stop at Battle Mountain, NV. No particular problems. The Oakland hills are not "mountains" and being low-elevation to start and plenty of distance before having to clear the Sierras I don't quiver at the thought. Heck, MEA's to the East and Northeast are only like 5,000 ft until well past Sacramento. And to the South like 5-6000 ft. and to the North like 4-5000 ft. You do eventually have to deal with the Sierras, of course, but even as far as RNO MEA's are 11,500 ft. or so. Our OP, with his SS base, has to hit 12,100 on a missed approach.

Did I mention that this particular aircraft type is a real dog at altitude with a load? Not too bad at SL-ish, though.

I note umbrage has been taken at my reply. Let me clarify: The MEA's I note in the vicinity of the SF Bay are indicative, for the most part, of suggesting one fly at a cruise altitude that's pretty normal. i.e. 6-8000 ft or so. Heading East, of course, eventually requires you deal with the Sierras, but that's only one direction with lots of climb time. This isn't wildly dissimilar from what I've been dealing with flying out of Puget Sound all these years. The Cascades aren't as high as the Sierras, of course, but they are also a lot closer when you depart out of KPAE to the East. Icing and high winds change the equation, but needing to cruise at 11-12000 ft. isn't all that abnormal.

[dafzero]

I will be replacing the interior in the DA42 at the end of the summer. When I do, the front seats will recline and the right control stick will be removable. That will make pretty much as comfortable as an SR22 would have been for my wife.

Hi Colin,

Great post as always. I'm curious as to whether or not you have made the right control stick removable. I understand there is an STC for that. I know the wife would be much happier and comfortable without it. Not that I would do it for our DA40 but for when we upgrade to a DA42 one day.

Cheers!

[Colin]

You can't do it to the DA40, actually, the STC only covers the DA42.

Yes, I did it. It was not inexpensive (still waiting for that thing related to the plane where I say, 'THAT was cheaper than I though it would be...'), but totally worth it. Flew KSMO to KNEW with my younger son and he was sacked out in the right seat for most of the flight. It reclines, and he had a blanket and a pillow. He said he used to worry when he was in the front seat that if he fell asleep he might knock the control stick and cause something horrible to happen.

[dafzero]

It sounds like a really good set up. I don't intend to make any mods to my '40. Wouldn't be worth it.

I actually did have a "cheer than expected" moment last week. My dipstick got an SD and Lycoming is providing me with a new one. Stone the crows! I'll still get touched for shipping and possibly for documentation but still... Better than a kick in the shins.