The Eclipse has ECBs and I love them. No hunting for breakers, as they are organized by subsystem right on your MFD. E.g., if you pull up the flight controls synoptic page, when you hit the ECBs button you have all the flight control-related ECBs at your fingertips. ECBs also act as switches, and many are under dual control, i.e. you can manipulate them but so can the aircraft computer system. This makes for instant, automatic load shedding, for example.
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And it’s cheap!!
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Yes, yes, yes, yes. And yes!
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The mustang load sheds AC if one generator fails without ECBs. What else does the eclipse load shed using the ECBs?
We fly the most advanced single engine piston aircraft with an obvious weak point - our ancient power plants.
We need to transition to jet-A burning pistons with FADEC. This is more important than auto-land.
Guess what will come first? Auto-land.
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Must have a FADEC to make auto-throttles work for autoland. Might be a forcing function in there somewhere.
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A WX radar pod under the wing?
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In Continental and Austro diesels the power lever in the cockpit has no mechanical connection to the engine. The lever electronically tells the computer how much power you want. The FADEC does the rest. So auto-throttle is already there with those diesel engines.
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Software is easier than hardware.
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I understand the the spring cartridge isn’t the greatest hand flying feel. But to get rid of them you’re talking about about a fairly significant redesign of the flight controls and surfaces to add adjustable trim tabs. And the result is extra drag and loss of airspeed. (Though probably minor).
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For failure of a single generator/engine, just the A/C. But for a dual generator failure, it load sheds a shitload of items. Here’s what’s left after a dual-gen load shed:
I’m seriously not expecting this to ever happen. I’m just expressing how much I dislike that. And in a sense, kudos to Cirrus for not repeating this non sense in the jet. The jet is a joy to hand fly, just like any other “normal” airplane.
Interesting. It looks a lot like the mustang on EMER power which is one switch you have to flip (memory item) for dual gen failure.
The system seems cool, but I’m not sure how much practical benefit the auto load shedding has. I can see advantages to not hunting for breakers in the dark though.
Another thing the aircraft computer system assists with is an EFATO, as it will automatically set the remaining engine to APR thrust, set the FD to 6 degrees pitch up, bug Vyse (for flaps T/O or up as appropriate), reconfigure the fuel system and electrical system for single-engine operation, and load shed the AC as previously mentioned. That’s a lot of “load shedding” for a single pilot and lets you concentrate on aviating during the emergency.
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I would be ok with the springs if there was a stick shaker. Otherwise this is the very first thing I could not get over with in my very first SR flight back in 2014 (when I really really wanted to get a SR22 but bailed out).
Yep, there’s no feeling signs the airplane is about to stall. It just stalls.
I absolutely LOVE my 2015 SR22 and although some of the G6 features are appealing, I agree that the Fadec would be THE reason for Cirrus to unveil the G7…which should allow for Autoland.
I’m holding off until then…the SF50 just does not have the carrying capacity/range to make such a leap.
Seat locking mechanism. Time to upgrade from the 1950’s design. Something from, say, the 1990’s will be a welcome improvement.
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I’d be happy if the rear headset jacks were actually in the rear. I HATE leaving the a20 boxes strung across the floor so my kids can step on them
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They should be on the rear side panels…
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