I live in Northern New York State near the Adirondak Mountains and our winters can be very cold. I have flown my Commander in -25degree F temperatures routinely. Anyone have experience with the heating system on the SR20 yet. Plenty of heat from the heat muff or so so? How about cooling from just 2 eyeball vents in the warmer months? My Commander had 4 overhead vents and 4 floor leve vents. Anybody with experience please comment.
I don’t have much experience with the heating system. The cooling is not real sophisticated – just air jets from the little eyeball vents – but does the job, with one exception.
The exception is when you’re on the ground on a hot, sunny day. The air jets apparently depend on ram air pressure to work, so they’re doing nothing to cool you, while the big windows are letting in plenty of sun. The solution, as you’ve seen mentioned here before, is taxiing with the doors open or at least ajar. In my experience an overheated cabin ceased to be an issue once you were a few hundred feet off the ground and going at a reasonable speed. That’s why, for me, an air conditioner wouldn’t be worth the cost and (especially) weight, but I know that others view that question differently. jf
I live in Northern New York State near the Adirondak Mountains and our winters can be very cold. I have flown my Commander in -25degree F temperatures routinely. Anyone have experience with the heating system on the SR20 yet. Plenty of heat from the heat muff or so so? How about cooling from just 2 eyeball vents in the warmer months? My Commander had 4 overhead vents and 4 floor leve vents. Anybody with experience please comment.
I had the heat on this past weekend for the first time. It was -10C outside, and I was comfortable with the heat setting at about half. The sun was shining which helped heat the cabin.
I concur with JFallows. My wife and I spent a lot of time on the ground during our check out. Allowing the doors to remain up during the taxi makes a huge difference. Having flown Archers and C-172’s, it is better than both - well, at least the Archer. Opening the port hole on the Archer was not enough this past summer. I also had to place my hand there to help direct more air in. After my run-up in my SR20, however, I often quickly re-opened the doors to let some air in. I pretty much leave them open until I am ready to call the Tower. It is not perfect, but it is all relative to what you are use to. It does not get much worse than Tennessee in August. The heat index was 100+ degrees and the humidity was high.
David, what kind of Commander did you previously own? I would be very interested to get your opinion on the biggest differences between the Commander and the SR20 and why you would therefor prefer a SR20 or even a SR22.
I live in Northern New York State near the Adirondak Mountains and our winters can be very cold. I have flown my Commander in -25degree F temperatures routinely. Anyone have experience with the heating system on the SR20 yet. Plenty of heat from the heat muff or so so? How about cooling from just 2 eyeball vents in the warmer months? My Commander had 4 overhead vents and 4 floor leve vents. Anybody with experience please comment.
I flew in Walts plane this summer in San Luise.It was about 95 degrees.We had to taxie with doors open.One easy fix would be to copy the piper cherakee and put a porthole type operatable window in the drivers door glass .This alone doesnt let much air in but for $20 you can buy from Sportys a air scoop (taxie only)that flips in and out.It picks up an unbeleivable amount of air from the prop.I wonder if it would be legal to retro the little porthole door into the existing fixed glass.? The Piper porthole fix would be a whole lot cheaper for Cirrus to incorperate vs.redoing there present inadiquate vent. system.
The exception is when you’re on the ground on a hot, sunny day. The air jets apparently depend on ram air pressure to work, so they’re doing nothing to cool you, while the big windows are letting in plenty of sun. The solution, as you’ve seen mentioned here before, is taxiing with the doors open or at least ajar. In my experience an overheated cabin ceased to be an issue once you were a few hundred feet off the ground and going at a reasonable speed. That’s why, for me, an air conditioner wouldn’t be worth the cost and (especially) weight, but I know that others view that question differently. jf