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Honda Jet (merged thread)

Apparently it is nearly ready.

While I know almost nothing about jets, it’s dead obvious that the bottom has dropped out of the used market, so what do Honda have to offer that is special?

If it is performance – as they claim – how do they achieve it? Is it new engines or the novel way they mount them?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I saw a programme on the TV last night about bizjets. Every now and then a new one seems to come out which has either the longest range, the fastest climb rate, the fastest cruise speed, the highest service ceiling, the largest cabinet for Champagne bottles – it doesn’t matter what it is as long as there is one things more impressive than all of the other bizjets around. The programme last night was dated, but it remarked that there was an increase in sales of these kind of things after the upturn of a flat lining economy – possibly the situation now – depending on your location or optimism.

I always wonder who flies in these things. There are a number at Biggin Hill or Farnborough in the UK. At the large German Bank I work for, I have once or twice seen our top dog on the same Lufthansa flight as me, so if it is not top dog Bankers, who flies them besides the Simon Cowell’s of the world and Prince Andrew?

Don’t know what is special about the Honda jet, other than the potential for it to be a seamless, well developed product… Because its a Honda. If true, that might be enough to earn a market.

Otherwise, who flies in biz jets? In the US, lots of people working for a living. My employer has a manufacturing facility 1500 miles away and uses a new (and now appreciating, bought cheap) biz jet for a kind of shuttle service – out and back on Fridays and Mondays. The facility is near a small airport and two hours by car from a commercial airport. I catch it every once in a while and its particularly fun because an airport bum friend is one of the pilots. If he’s not in his hangar wrenching on something he’s probably out flying the jet.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 27 Dec 17:11

Actually, the Hondajet is one of the more interesting to come along of the single pilot jets. It’s priced pretty competitively at just over $4 million and is faster and flies further than it’s competition. Considering a TBM is like $3 million and a PC12 is over $4 million this does seem like a good spot. The Phenom 100 is slightly cheaper, and the Mustang is a lot cheaper, but none of them can go as fast or as far. I also happen to like the design, but we all know aviation buyers are as conservative as the Spanish Inquisition, so only time will tell if it is palatable. Personally, if I came into a lot of money I’d buy a Piaggio Avanti II. They’re almost as fast on 40% less fuel burn. But after that I’d look pretty hard at the Hondajet.

Last Edited by AdamFrisch at 27 Dec 17:42

The main design benefits of the Honda jet are lower drag profiles as compared to existing designs. This translates into better fuel economy and range for a given load.
While the design doesn’t look too radical perhaps, aside from the “OTWEM”, it has a very different nose allowing for a much higher level of laminar flow. The engines supposedly add another level of efficiency.

Looks cool, but it does the same job as any other light jet, Phenom 100, Cessna CJ1 (M2), or even the Mustang as mentioned.
When deciding whether to purchase a Honda vs a Cessna or Embraer I’m really curious to know who cares about a 20 GPH fuel flow difference. For a businessman who purchases a flying tool, how much is that fuel savings really worth? If the Honda consumed half, then that would be something. Or, if they were developing an airliner, 15% savings is a really big deal.
What about depreciation on that 4MUSD? Or, what about downtime due to service, maintenance, repair issues. And how about worldwide service?

Cessna is probably among the best there is, and even they get it wrong sometimes…
Not too convinced about their USPs…

ESSB, Stockholm Bromma

I’m afraid this new light jet has nothing special on offer to a market segment that is more than saturated. AFAIK the production of all jets that are lighter than the Excel is still on hold at Cessna. Unsellable at the moment. For a newcomer to the field it is even more difficult. No maintenance network, no training facilitilies, no type-rated pilots, no instructors. Honda will have to provide all that for free (or nearly) if they want to sell their jet. As Krister wrote, 20 Gallons less of fuel per hour don’t outweigh that. There have been other smart jet designs in the past that never really made it to the market (Swearingen-Jaffe, Grob XPn, VFW-614 and even the Premier 1) because they came too early or too late. This one comes too late by ten years.

Maybe some Japanese will buy it out of national pride (or similar reasons) but that didn’t work 25 years ago with the Mitsubishi Mu300 (later BeechJet) either.

Last Edited by what_next at 27 Dec 19:06
EDDS - Stuttgart

Seems to me the unique thing about the Honda jet is that the company sells $100 billion of vehicles per year, and they are arguably the best vehicle engineering company in the world. That puts the potential of the product in a unique place, and given Honda’s 50+ years of devotion to the American market, nobody there will need convincing of the credibility of anything Honda.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 27 Dec 21:10

But the same applies to Mitsubishi. They even have a history of making formidable warplanrs. Yet bizjets, they sold close to zero.

Last Edited by what_next at 27 Dec 21:09
EDDS - Stuttgart

No, Mitsubishi barely exists as a US vehicle retailer having basically failed in that market. Not remotely in the same universe to the reputation for engineering and business ethics that Honda carries with everyman, including every US business jet buyer. Mitsubishi aircraft are also best known for their role with the Japanese Air Force several decades ago, which was not a good PR move for them. Maybe that’s why they sold Zero

Last Edited by Silvaire at 27 Dec 21:23

Honda jet is that the company sells $100 billion of vehicles per year,

Toyota has/had also been playing around with a piston 4-seater for many years. Google digs out this.

It may have been this one

Now, I can see why nobody would bother doing a piston single (though Cirrus showed it can be done, with a bit of good marketing) but jets always seem to sell. That is, until recently…

The TBM/PC12 are for a different market – short or even grass runways, which Europe is full of.

There is also an EASA proposal in the works to mandate commercial factors even for private jet ops, which would have excluded bizjets from a huge % of the smaller airports where they currently operate. I don’t know if this got squashed but it deserved to be. Socata and Pilatus would have loved it, however. It would have multiplied their sales instantly.

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Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
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