Happy new year everyone!
First flight of 2018!
Yesterday a friend and I took a ride in the Extra 400. He is a flight instructor and examiner and also flies with people in high performance aircraft as a safety pilot. He loved the plane.
The flight went very nicely. I am especially happy about the climb performance: in ISA and cooler conditions I have now adopted 1'000 fpm climbs at max climb power.
The Extra 400 will climb right to FL200 like this with airspeed slowly tapering from an initial 125 KIAS to something like 115 KIAS at FL200. Temps are all OK and the engine sounds happy.
True airspeed actually increases with altitude as we all know and I remember passing FL150 at 150 KTAS
and 1000 fpm and thinking "this used to be my all-out cruise speed a year ago"!
On the way home we did an ILS approach in LSGG/ Geneva in IMC and very congested airspace, squeezed between two airliners. The cloud layer looked like a white blanket set on top of lake Geneva and there was this magic moment when you stick the nose in there and refocus on the G500 while shutting out the outside world. I love this feeling!
As I mentioned previously, since losing the GFC700 I always hand fly the approaches... What was initially a little stressful has become a positive safety factor and a great satisfaction: hand flying eliminates a critical transition in final when you have to kick out the AP and start messing with gear / flaps / engine etc. Plus as I get ready for the EASA CBIR (competency based instrument rating) - I feel relaxed about being able to pass the checkride.
Upon returning to the hangar, my friend showed me a spanking new turbine powered Piper Meridian. the airframe looked much nicer than a JetProp conversion thanks to the better engine integration, and the beautiful paint job successfully masked this "sheet metal and rivet" feel which we plastic plane pilots dislike...
Then we got inside...
The cabin on this specific aircraft was beautifully appointed. With only me inside it felt airier than in the Extra due to the larger windows, but as soon as a second person got in I realized it is much narrower with less legroom. Piper did a very good job at maximizing cabin feeling on the later model PA46s.
The bad part was trying to get to the front seats. You simply can't walk in there and must push your feet before you to slip between the seat and panel, above the centre console. I gave up... for fear of breaking something. Then I looked forward through the windscreen and was literally shocked : a narrow slot in the front and very little lateral view. I had not been in a PA46 for a long time and this confirmed my memory. I positively do not like the workplace. I'll keep my Extra 400 thank you very much!