C182T NA (2006) has a very effective heater (I mean it will burn your ankles if let fully open), but I never used it above FL150 and -15°C, so not really in the “race”.
We haven’t yet heard from the owner of a modern plane, AFAICS.
Diamond Diesel aircraft have terrible heaters. In winter, it makes no noticable difference whether the Cabin Heat is ON or OFF…
The Mirage was cool in the back if you didn’t have proper insulation. Most heat in the 200+ FLs is lost through the hull given the very low OATs.
The Meridian had a much better environmental system with bleed air from the turbine. A/C was good but driven off engine so couldn’t be run off GPU.
The Mustang is very good with two separate bleed sources. Also A/C is electric so if it is hot on the ground you can run the A/C off a GPU or a single engine.
My TB20 was great heater while DA42 is nowhere near. Large DA42 canopy helps when it’s sunny outside and the then OAT is not so important but when it’s dark you need a jacket if OAT is below -15.
Our cabin heater is a lukewarm jet of air that vaguely warms my right knee and nothing else. Wintertime flights at FL060 usually mean lots of layers and gloves. Although calling it a jet of air is probably being generous!
I would imagine the Cirrus composites are good down to a pretty low temperature. In the composite world which was pioneered by gliders, composite gliders have been soaring at FL350+ in wave since the 1970s so it should be a pretty well understood subject by now.
lenthamen wrote:
Diamond Diesel aircraft have terrible heaters. In winter, it makes no noticable difference whether the Cabin Heat is ON or OFF…
Would it not be more due to “diesel” than to “Diamond” (or anything else)? The common rail diesel cars take forever to warm up, even more so at -15C.
tmo wrote:
Would it not be more due to “diesel” than to “Diamond” (or anything else)? The common rail diesel cars take forever to warm up, even more so at -15C.
The small car diesels have extra cabin heaters from Eberspächer/Webasto for exactly that reason.
achimha wrote:
The small car diesels
The larger cars are even worse, like family vans etc with their large cabins. The heater in my eUp is adequate for Norwegian climate, and all electric. I wonder how much it would simplify things to install a higher capacity Li-ION battery and a modern generator and use all electric heating in small aircraft as well, even though it would be a bit stupid from an efficiency point of view. Electrically heated seats is a normal addition in many homebuilds, and greatly reduces the need for high capacity heater.
LeSving wrote:
The heater in my eUp is adequate for Norwegian climate
And what may I ask is a " eUp" ?
