CIRRUS IS CREAMING OL’ CESSNA
GAMA 2nd Qtr 2004 Report
http://www.gama.aero/resources/statistics/dloads/2004ShipmentReport.pdf
Cessna 172 20
Cessna 172S 87
Cessna 182 25
Cessna 182T 8
TOTAL 140
Cirrus SR20 40
Cirrus SR22 193
TOTAL 233
Absolutely Amazing - Hats off to Cirrus!
I believe Cirrus has indeed created an entire new market in general aviation. I for one, would have never considered buying a new Cessna or Piper. Why pay the price of a new aircraft from Piper or Cessna for 40 year old technology when a used one could be bought for a significant discount. Cirrus, however has changed that. Cirrus brought to the market the latest in design, materials and production and as a result created a new market for general aviation and taken away from the other GA manufacturers.
Cessna and Piper have got to be highly concerned. There is not much they can do to turn-around their sales other than maybe introduce a completely new model and/or add BRS as a standard or option.
Here’s to many more quarters of similar results!
Brian Fowler SR20
Always great news and congratulations to the K brohters and crew in Duluth.
I wonder if the conversion to the Garmin MFD/PFD combination had anything to do with the significant decrease in Cessna sales between the first and second quarters? I had heard that Cessna had a huge backlog of completed planes that they were waiting to deliver pending FAA approval of the modification.
In reply to:
CIRRUS IS CREAMING OL’ CESSNA
GAMA 2nd Qtr 2004 Report
What a feat the Klapmeiers and Cirrus employees have pulled off. They took an industry that was all but left for dead and shook the box so hard and fast that the old crusty players didn’t know what hit them. It is kind of pathetic that the response of the old guard has been the incremental predictable no-risk “me too” kind of crap they’ve been dribbling out for 50 years. Do you think Cirrus will prompt them to undertake a new ground-up Part 23 design and certification effort? I doubt it. Given the small percentage of the bottom line that Beech and Cessna realize from piston GA, plus the relatively staggering risk exposure these aircraft represent relative to the professionally-piloted bizjets they peddle, I think at some level they’d be glad to get out of that segment of the business. Maybe this is the excuse they need to do so.
With all the major airplane manufacturors moving to glass cockpits, can someone explain to me what the practical advantages are that justify the costs? Some things obviously need a screen, eg, moving maps, weather display, etc, but when it comes to basic flight instruments I tend to prefer the look of the mechanical gauges. I see it as the difference between the old analog auto speedometers vs digital readout speedometers (which were a market bust). Even if one fashions a glass readout to look like analog, what is gained? And haven’t you added an unnecessary risk factor, ie, the potential failure of electrical connections, software and so on?
I believe the biggest complaint about old time AI’s has always been the vacuum pump, rather than the mechanical gyro itself. Is this improved in a glass cockpit setup?
net financials should definately be in the plus column this quarter…
strong cash flow no doubt.
Summarizing what everyone has said, as well as what I’ve gleaned from places like Aero-News:
2Q 2004 small aircraft sales:
Cirrus - 233 51.2% (of known results)
Beech (Bonanza/Baron) - unknown at this time
Cessna (excludes jets) - 140 30.8%
Lancair - 37 8.1%
Mooney - 13 2.9%
Piper - 32 7%
Diamond (Cdn mfr) - unknown at this time
So, not only has Cirrus outsold Cessna’s non-jet results, they have outsold the rest of the market combined [subject to those “unknowns”]!!
Capitalism—what a wonderful system—competition is the food of capitalism!!
I forgot to mention that Lancair shipped 37 aircraft. (Now, isn’t that nice.)
Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t this all mean that Cirrus now has 57% of the single engine GA market? Thus far in 2004, Cirrus has shipped 233, Cessna 140 (34%) and Lancair 37 (9%).
Don’t forget Mooney, Piper and a few other smaller companies. Also, these must be US manufactured aircraft because I don’t see Diamond listed at all, although I though OMF was made in Canada.
Mooney shipped 13 aircraft in total, (all priced over $300,000). “New Piper Aircraft” shipped 32 Warrior/Archer series. All together and allowing for a few more stragglers, one could still safely say that Cirrus has captured over 50% of the 2004 domestic market.
And is this share more likely to lose or gain momentum in the foreseeable future?
From what I can tell, Cirrus is still gaining momentum, but for how long? I’ve been away from flying for 20 years. What’s bringing me back is the promise Cirrus holds for safe, efficient travel for my family. Above all the one sure selling point is CAPS. I don’t care how many hours or ratings you have, who could deny their passengers one last hope CAPS provides. To the average non-pilot, flying is expenseive and dangerous. Cirrus will have to turn that perception around. I’d expect Cirrus to begin wooing non-pilots probably with a turn-key program where you get flight training from hour 1 in your own or shared Cirrus. Cirrus plane, Cirrus financing, Cirrus instructor, etc. an all inclusive package. Is this good for safety? I don’t know. Would it sell planes? Yes.
In reply to:
With all the major airplane manufacturors moving to glass cockpits, can someone explain to me what the practical advantages are that justify the costs? Some things obviously need a screen, eg, moving maps, weather display, etc, but when it comes to basic flight instruments I tend to prefer the look of the mechanical gauges. I see it as the difference between the old analog auto speedometers vs digital readout speedometers (which were a market bust). Even if one fashions a glass readout to look like analog, what is gained? And haven’t you added an unnecessary risk factor, ie, the potential failure of electrical connections, software and so on?
I believe the biggest complaint about old time AI’s has always been the vacuum pump, rather than the mechanical gyro itself. Is this improved in a glass cockpit setup?
Dave:
Advantages:
For IFR/IMC flight, the glass PFD is light years better than the 3" Attitude Indicator
No gyros
All electric… No vacuum system
Potentially redundancy via swapping the MFD for PFD if the primary PFD fails
more information presented in a easy to comprehend fashion (once learned).
It looks cool
For now it is more expensive, but in 3-5 years, when production is increased, they very well may cost less than the entire conventional avionics suite.
It would be nice to have the choice though. Right now, my all electric steam gauge plane gives me everything I want. It is better than what I have been used to because there is no vacuum pump to worry about. having flown instruments all these years, I really do not see how the PFD is THAT much better to justify its cost over steam gauges. In addition, what will be the replacement cost when the thing goes belly up?
I can replace an airspeed indicator and an altimeter cheap. The thought of a $25000 replacement cost for the PFD would worry me. That is almost the cost of the engine!
You say the glass panel has “no gyro” and is “all electric, no vacuum” I understand the missing vacuum, since a gyro can be spun electronically…but how do you get a heading indicator and attitude indicator, without some sort of gyro??? Is there some sort of motion sensitive, pure solid state device that replaces the gyro? How is it calibrated? Does the plane have to be motionless (You can tell, I’m reaching into a foggy memory with some of these questions)…if so, what happens if it blinks on and off during flight and what are the odds of that compared to an old fashioned gyro failing? Is the turn coordinator powered by the same system that replaces the gyros, or does it have a separate system for redundancy?
Also, does the glass panel still rely on a traditional static and airspeed ports? Does it use these just for airspeed, or also for rate of climb and altimeter?
Sorry for the 10,000 questions…just trying to understand what the buzz is all about
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In addition, what will be the replacement cost when the thing goes belly up?
Good question. Of course, the entire system doesn’t need replacing, just the screen or associated defective part.
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The thought of a $25000 replacement cost for the PFD would worry me.
Me, too, but that sounds extremely high. Has anyone replaced a PFD out of warranty or know the approximate cost?
And it’s not like 6-pack gauges never need replacing, nor are they especially cheap. Anyone who’s owned a “conventional” panel for any length of time has likely had the joy of replacing various gyros and/or pitot/static instruments.
I’d like to think that the large reduction in moving parts should enhance the reliability of the PFD as compared to steam gauges, but we shall see…
Sure hope so but there are a lot of PFD’s being replaced under warranty at relatively low time. My concern is that these gadgets are basically computers. My experience with computers is they just do not last more than 3-5 years. Stem gauges break but not typically at that rate.
Dave,
The Avidyne PFD actually does use gyros — but they’re miniature solid-state gyros rather than the large mechanical gyros of yore. There are good articles about this on AvWeb (http://www.avweb.com/news/avionics/185171-1.htmlclick here) and on the Flying magazine web site (http://www.flyingmag.com/article.asp?section_id=17&article_id=265click here).
I plan to investigate the properties of gyros this weekend at the Santa Barbara Greek Festival…
Cheers,
Roger
Thanks for the links to the articles. The Flying Mag article seemed the most informative. I note it was a year old, so I assume the MEMs technology has continued evolving since then (based solely on the admittedly older article, I’d be inclined to let others test fly these in IMC for a few years, before getting one). In any event, it all seems to be truly an exciting technology with a lot of potential.