Business
Down to
t’s still three or four years
away from first delivery but
the Stratos 714 looks like
it will be the next survivor
of the failed Very Light
Jet “VLJ” revolution to
actually go to market, after
debuting at the 2017 EAA
AirVenture airshow (better
known as Oshkosh) in August.
The first prototype of the 400-
knot single-engine Stratos f lew in
to Oshkosh with around 70 hours
of f light testing under its belt,
including f lights to 17,000 feet
and 320 knots.
The Stratos is designed to be a
four to six-seat personal aircraft,
business jet or air taxi, capable
of f lying four people 1500nm or
six people 1200nm at 400 knots,
with a service ceiling of 41,000
feet. The prototype is powered
by a Pratt and Whitney JT15D-5
turbofan developing 3400lb of
thrust, but production aircraft are
slated to have the PW535E, which
also powers the Embraer Phenom- The engine is buried deep in
the aircraft’s rear fuselage, fed by
dual air inlets in the wing roots
and accessible for maintenance
through removable panels.
The aircraft has some
sophisticated systems for an
entry-level aircraft, including rear
fuselage mounted speed brakes and
a pressurisation system that offers a
sea-level cabin to 21,000 feet.
Flight testing has demonstrated
some sprightly performance,
including a maximum weight
take-off in 2090 feet. With full
fuel the aircraft could f ly nonstop
Sydney to Port Moresby, or to
anywhere in New Zealand, or to
Perth with a single stop.
The Stratos was first
announced in 2008, when the
Global Financial Crisis (GFC)
was putting paid to the dreams of
around a dozen companies hoping
to go to market with a Very Light
Jet. To put this in to perspective,
before the GFC the US Federal
Aviation Administration (FAA)
predicted there would be at least
4500 VLJs f lying by 2016. NASA
was even more bullish, suggesting
the figure would be closer to
20,000.
At that time Stratos was
expecting a list price of around
US$2 million. But rather than
following many of its competitors
in to oblivion, Stratos merely went
quiet, stopped taking deposits
and carried on developing the
aircraft. The prototype first f lew
in November 2016.
Stratos says it is too early to
take deposits or announce either
a first delivery date or a price.
But the company plans to further
explore the aircraft’s capabilities
in f light test, before deciding
whether to seek investment to
help fund a certification process
which may cost US$200 million
and take around four years.Syberjet to fly first
“new” SJ30 this year
Actor Morgan Freeman of
Shawshank Redemption fame has
been punting his virtually unique
SJ30 business jet around the US
and across the Atlantic for eight
years, but it seems others may
finally have the chance to join him.
American company Syberjet,
which now owns the SJ30 typecertificate, believes it will f ly its
first updated SJ30i by the end of
2017 and expects to deliver its first
customer aircraft in 2019, with a
longer range, more powerful SJ30x
to follow.
The Syberjet (previously
Swearingen, Sino-Swearingen
and Emivest) SJ30 has had a
tortuous path from drawing
board to production since it was
first proposed by Ed Swearingen,
father of the Metro and Merlin
that bear his name, in 1986.
The six to eight-seat SJ30 was
originally going to be built by
Gulfstream as the Gulfjet. But
by the time the first prototype
f lew at the 1991 Paris Air Show
Gulfstream had withdrawn
from the program, as did later
backer the US State of Delaware.
Lockheed Martin then helped
broker a deal with Taiwanese
investors as part of an F-16 fighter
offset agreement, and Sino-
Swearingen was born.
The aircraft had gained
lengthened fuselage and wings
before the first customer SJ30 wasdelivered in 2007. The following
year Dubai based investors bought
a majority stake and renamed the
company Emivest Aerospace, until
filing for bankruptcy in 2010 (but
not before the aforementioned Mr
Freeman took delivery of his own
SJ30, in which he has now chalked
up more than a thousand hours
and a dozen Atlantic crossings).
At one point the company is
rumoured to have held around
300 orders.
In 2011 MT LLC of Utah in
the United States bought Emivest,
renamed the company Syberjet
and has since redeveloped the SJ30
in to what the company calls the
world’s fastest and longest range
small business jet. And it’s hard to
argue with their numbers.
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FJ44 turbofans, the SJ30 has a
top speed of Mach 0.83 (486 kt)
a 2500 nautical mile range, and
maintains sea level cabin pressure
up to 41,000 feet (maximum
f light ceiling of 49,000 feet). Its
30-degree swept wing makes
for high speed and fuel-efficientTwo weddings and a funeral
Two jets inch closer to
production and Pilatus
pulls the plug on the
mighty Turbo Porter66
AUSTRALIAN FLYING November – December 2017