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DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 12:22 am
by mbitran
Hello,
I'm going to be buying an airplane over the coming few months and have been looking seriously at the DA40 and the SR20. Diamond's safety statistics are fantastic and the advanced engine management of the NG is a big draw. However I've read many posts about poor product support from Diamond.

I'm wondering if any Diamond owners have recently made the same decision - looking for what tipped you one way or the other?

Thank you !

Marco

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 2:21 am
by chili4way
Are you considering new or used? That makes a difference in terms of support (and what that means). I think you're considering "new" as it's nearly impossible to find used DA40NGs. I bought a new DA40NG that I picked up in May 2019. It is a great plane for my "missions", i.e. two average-sized people and luggage with most trips less than 3.5 hours and perhaps an annual trip of 6-10 hours each way.

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 7:19 am
by jast
Hi!

I made two decisions in the last 3 years towards Diamond. First a DA40NG (new) vs a SR20 and 2019 a DA62 (new) vs ST22T (new). Both Diamond won due to the safety background and less cumbersome everyday handling. I flew the SR22T with a CFI and K had to watch so many things from the seat to brakes, lean, pull power in 10% steps in decent, fly exact speeds, never-ever underestimate base-to-final turns, etc that I felt that I would at least brake the plane and maybe endanger me and my passengers if I forget one of these in everyday flying. When I flew the Diamond the FI was like „Worst thing in a Diamond you can forget is the landing light“ and we flew all crazy maneuvers including base-to-final turn stalls at height ;-)

Leaving the marketing aside, I am sure that the Cirrus is a fantastic plane and as a tech guy I was drawn a lot towards the latest awesome features from the SR2x, however the robustness and ease of use combined with the lowest work load you can have in the class of plane in both Diamonds convinced me to go there.

There are a few special things for me, which helped with this decision: We are a family of 5 with 3 kids now and fly regularly, so having 7 seats is super useful since the 3 kids only weigh as much as one adult. We are in Europe and JetA1 is widely available, whereas Avgas can be a challenge, eg in Italy. Service centers and even the Wiener Neustadt Factory are close by for Diamonds. Just using a few gals per engine and not burning leaded fuel felt the right thing to to environmentally. It also gives a lot of flexibility and safety for fuel planning vs payload.

The software support is a pain, however things seem to move now at least for the Nxi G1000. So if you buy new you should eventually have the latest tech from today. I see the software support as a disadvantage, but not outweighing the positives above.

The DA40NG had almost no defects in 400h. The turbo was replaced under warranty as they discovered a broken housing at the 300h inspection. And the backup speed indicator got replaced under warranty.

Hope that helps,

Jan

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 2:16 pm
by AndrewM
Another point to consider, is especially related to the year of SR20 you may consider. The new ones have a little more horsepower, up to 215hp. There has been quite a bit of noise around the less powerful SR20's being underpowered. So depending on where you live and your most common "missions" that is absolutely something to factor in. If you have a decent density altitude or are taking off on a hot day (and at also higher elevations) with a fully loaded or just relatively heavy plane, apparently the SR20's will struggle. If you are not a member of COPA, I would recommend you spend the $60 or whatever it is as there is a huge amount of useful information on that forum (just as there is on this one), including some very good and detailed discussions on DA40 vs SR20 and SR22. There are also comments from Cirrus fanatics about the lack of appropriate power on the SR20, so again absolutely worth the time to read those posts.

I have taken off many times with my DA40 loaded to max, and never felt like I have had an issue. However, those takeoffs were not from higher elevations. Hope this helps, and good luck with your decision.

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:29 pm
by Rich
I'll just chime in about the relative safety records. In the last 7 calendar years (2013-2019) there has been 1 fatal accident in the US in a DA40. That was in 2016.

The SR20 has been doing pretty well of late, with zero the last 2 years. But the SR22, after a dip 2013-2016, in recent years has climbed to averaging 6 per year.

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:41 pm
by Steve
Rich wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:29 pm I'll just chime in about the relative safety records. In the last 7 calendar years (2013-2019) there has been 1 fatal accident in the US in a DA40. That was in 2016.

The SR20 has been doing pretty well of late, with zero the last 2 years. But the SR22, after a dip 2013-2016, in recent years has climbed to averaging 6 per year.
Hard to compare directly. Many more SR22s than DA40s flying. But I don't doubt that the DA40 is one of the safest airframes around. Admittedly old data, but when I purchased my airplane, I was considering the DA40 vs the SR20. The SR20 was slightly more expensive, but the insurance cost (private pilot with about 500 hours, complex endorsement, no accidents) was 3.5 times as much for the Cirrus!

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:58 pm
by Rich
Steve wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:41 pm
Rich wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:29 pm I'll just chime in about the relative safety records. In the last 7 calendar years (2013-2019) there has been 1 fatal accident in the US in a DA40. That was in 2016.

The SR20 has been doing pretty well of late, with zero the last 2 years. But the SR22, after a dip 2013-2016, in recent years has climbed to averaging 6 per year.
Hard to compare directly. Many more SR22s than DA40s flying. But I don't doubt that the DA40 is one of the safest airframes around. Admittedly old data, but when I purchased my airplane, I was considering the DA40 vs the SR20. The SR20 was slightly more expensive, but the insurance cost (private pilot with about 500 hours, complex endorsement, no accidents) was 3.5 times as much for the Cirrus!
That's the kind of weak defense often used. But you can't argue with zero, and there have been 11 years 2002-on with zero DA40 US fatal accidents. There have been 4 such for SR20's and none for SR22's. For the SR22's lots of fatal and non-fatal accidents were initiated by (real or perceived) engine problems. I haven't seen that with the SR20's. But common to both Cirrus models have been stall-spins.

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 4:02 pm
by Rich
As it happens, a non-fatal yesterday (a SR22, not a SR20):

AIRCRAFT REPORTED EQUIPMENT ISSUE, DEPLOYED CHUTE AND CRASHED NEAR AIRPORT, ASPEN, CO.

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 4:40 pm
by CFIDave
Bottom line: SR20 is a better PASSENGER's airplane (i.e., more spacious and comfortable) whereas the DA40 is a much better PILOT's airplane (i.e., better/safer flying characteristics and more fun to fly).

Re: DA40 vs. Cirrus SR20

Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2020 5:30 pm
by Steve
Rich wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:58 pm
Steve wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:41 pm
Rich wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 3:29 pm I'll just chime in about the relative safety records. In the last 7 calendar years (2013-2019) there has been 1 fatal accident in the US in a DA40. That was in 2016.

The SR20 has been doing pretty well of late, with zero the last 2 years. But the SR22, after a dip 2013-2016, in recent years has climbed to averaging 6 per year.
Hard to compare directly. Many more SR22s than DA40s flying. But I don't doubt that the DA40 is one of the safest airframes around. Admittedly old data, but when I purchased my airplane, I was considering the DA40 vs the SR20. The SR20 was slightly more expensive, but the insurance cost (private pilot with about 500 hours, complex endorsement, no accidents) was 3.5 times as much for the Cirrus!
That's the kind of weak defense often used. But you can't argue with zero, and there have been 11 years 2002-on with zero DA40 US fatal accidents. There have been 4 such for SR20's and none for SR22's. For the SR22's lots of fatal and non-fatal accidents were initiated by (real or perceived) engine problems. I haven't seen that with the SR20's. But common to both Cirrus models have been stall-spins.
Not a weak defense, since it isn't a defense of Cirrus at all. Simply stating the fact that statistical analysis of number of accidents without a denominator may be inaccurate. I'm not well versed in the accident rates of Cirrus vs Diamond, but my general understanding is that Diamond is better than Cirrus, and that Cirrus is slightly better than GA in general.

My comment was mainly to bring up that Insurance Companies thought (at the time that I purchased) that the DA40, even though it was a brand new airframe, was a lower risk than the Cirrus (which had been around for a few years).

Steve