First Conforming Cirrus Vision Jet To Fly in 2014

Cirrus Aircraft plans to fly the next iteration of its single-engine SF50 Vision jet in February 2014, according to Todd Simmons, executive vice president of sales and marketing, “although our goal for this first conforming aircraft is to beat that date.”

Cirrus, which was bought by China Aviation Industry General Aircraft (Caiga) last June, now has orders for 510 Visions. Caiga has committed to “funding for all design, test, certification and production tooling/facilities necessary for production,” Simmons told AIN, and Caiga will disburse funds periodically as the program progresses.

The Vision “aerodynamic configuration and loft is frozen,” he added, and “we are ready to make tooling for some structures and still designing tooling for others. Areas needing focus and development include Caps [the ballistic parachute system], final avionics configuration and interior.” Avionics are a Garmin-based Cirrus Perspective system. Simmons said that Cirrus will build three flight-test airframes and three shipsets of structural test assemblies. The Vision jet will use a stick-pusher to meet single-engine stall requirements. Flight into known icing capability will be provided using deicer boots. Certification is planned in 2015.