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The 21st century that flies like a fighter 7x FULL FLIGHT TEST INSIDE

BUSINESS AIRCRAFT IN THE P1 DATA GUIDE 103 MARKETPLACE: WHAT’S HAPPENING TO VALUES · NEW AIRCRAFT DATA · PRE-OWNED FOCUS ON DORNIER 328JET FLIGHT TEST

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FalconDassault's Falcon 7X is a technological tour-de-force but what's it like to fly? Former fighter pilot Nick Heard takes on the fly-by-wire business aircraft Photography Remy Michelin FLIGHT TEST dassault falcon 7x

Falcon 7X is one of a select few aircraft certifioed to N the 1970s when I was The flagship of the Dassault range of operate in and out growing up, I remember a business aircraft, the Falcon 7X is the first of London City. TV programme called The Yet it has business aircraft to use fly-by-wire digital Aeronauts. The series followed flight controls. With a new high-transonic the adventures of two French the ability wing, the 7X has a range of around 6,000nm Air Force pilots flying the to operate but with the fuel efficiency of much smaller III. aircraft – even with three engines. Yet it has Being mad keen on aircraft into small the ability to operate into small airports, I was an avid fan of the meaning it can make several small hops programme; I can still hum the airports collecting passengers before heading off theme tune. across an ocean or continent. Many years on, after various With a wingspan of 86ft (26.2m), a length encounters with Mirages of 76ft (23.2m) and a height of 25ft (7.8m), during my RAF time, I finally the 7X is larger than many other business got the chance to fly a Dassault jets. The cabin is 39ft long (12m), 92in aircraft. (2.34 m) wide, and 74in (1.92 m) high, with It was not a Mirage, but up to 12 seats available depending on an aircraft which has been customer preference. Max Take-Off Weight produced after years of is 69,000lb, with Max Landing Weight Dassault fighter aircraft 62,400lb and Equipped Empty Weight development: the Falcon 7X. 33,200lb. Vmo/Mmo are 370kias/0.90M I was able to fly the 7X at the respectively. Dassault test centre at Istres, near Marseilles. PERFORMANCE The Falcon 7X is an ultra-long range aircraft, with a quoted maximum range of 5950nm, based on full fuel, 3 crew, 8 passengers plus bags, 0.80 M cruise and zero wind, with NBAA IFR reserves (one approach and go-around, 5 minute hold, 200nm diversion, 30min hold at 5000ft). This range gives the potential for non-stop from Paris to Tokyo, Hong Kong, and US west coast; from Dubai to Europe, Asia, Africa, and western ; and from Los Angeles to most of Europe and all of Latin America. Under the same performance conditions, balanced field take-off distance required is just 5505ft (1678m), with landing distance required (with the NBAA reserves) just 2262ft (689m) from a Vref of 104kt. These are fabulous figures for the business jet operator. Like other business jets the 7X can get up to FL510. The cabin is maintained at a remarkable 6000ft, a pressure differential of around 10psi. As a long haul pilot myself, I would never like to spend too much time at that sort of level. Any loss of pressurisation would require very rapid actions to get to a sensible level, and cosmic ray absorption would be a very real long-term health concern. Again, these are not problems exclusive to the Falcon 7X, but merely an observation about business jet operation generally. However, some other interesting performance figures are worth looking Left: P1's Nick at for the 7X. Initial maximum cruise at Heard at high weight is around FL390, so the 7X can Dassault's Istres, immediately clear the busiest airspace (the test low to mid 30s) to get the best available centre where direct routings. Unfortunately there are he flew the 7X still many parts of the world where direct with Chief Test routings are still difficult to get due to rigid Pilot Jean-Louiis ATC structures, but at least the potential Dumas. is there.

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With three engines, options are better for take-off, climb, cruise, descent and in the (highly unlikely) event of an engine landing. With the aircraft at 47,500lb, shut down in flight. With a two-engined including 10,100lb of fuel, and Met aircraft, lose one and you really have to conditions of +25 deg C and QNH 1012, V1 land soon. With three engines, the loss of came to 99kt and V2 113kt for runway 33 at one should mean that you can continue Istres, with flaps set at the SF2 position. to the planned destination, subject to Engine start is simple, turning on the fuel We were increased fuel burn at a lower level and control switches and selecting start for the urged to en-route terrain clearance. Even in the respective engine. Full autostart capability worst case, the 7X can maintain FL250 means the FADEC will cope with hung ‘Increase with one engine inoperative, so the latter starts or hot start if necessary. On releasing Speed’ by consideration is still taken care of in most the park brake the 7X started to move parts of the world. away on residual idle thrust. Taxying turns the audio The 7X has recently been certified for using the rudder pedals required smooth warning the steep approaches at London City and input, as did the brakes, and all was very New winglets Lugano airports. The short runway at straightforward. system are a giveaway London City naturally leads to a regulated As we got near to the holding point, the for the 900XP take-off weight, but even so leaves the 7X Runway Awareness and Advisory System model. with around 8 hours of fuel - enough to get (currently under trial) politely called to the Middle East and much of the USA, ‘Approaching Runway 33’. We lined up with the same eight passengers. and selected full power on the roll. Engine The 7X naturally has the full range spool-up seemed slightly slow, but a of modern navigational requirements satisfying push in the back as the power certified, such as RVSM and RNP. It is also bit quickly reassured me that all was well. certified for Cat 2 All Weather Operation, Acceleration was tremendous, and after with Cat 3A potentially available should cross-checking speed at 80kt, we were customer demand warrant it. soon at V1 and rotating. Take-off run was around the expected 900m. With positive FLYING THE FALCON 7X rate of climb the gear was raised, followed The aircraft to be flown was the first 7X to shortly after by the flaps. be built, and which remains a test aircraft. The flight path vector flight director (FD) Thus there was no standard cabin fitted guidance was easy to follow, both on the as such – just a few seats and a lot of test PDU (by following the magenta command equipment. After a full detailed brief of bar with the green FPV bar) and the HUD the sortie profile, test pilot Jean-Louis (by following a small green FD circle with Dumas showed me around the 7X before the larger circle of the FPV). settling into the flight deck. The cockpit is The FD commands anticipated the beautifully presented with an uncluttered initial level-off altitude of 2500ft, but strict look (always helped by sidestick controls – following of the commands was necessary just look at any Airbus cockpit). given the initial high rate of climb to avoid Dominating the flightdeck are the four busting the level. Climb thrust was set by 14-inch displays of the EASy Flight Deck moving the thrust levers back to a detent avionic system, with standard radio and from the full power position. Never having communication boxes mounted below flown sidestick before, I was pleased on the pedestal. Here sits the three neat to find that it was all very comfortable, thrust levers, fuel switches, parking with small smooth inputs required. The brake, and flap levers. autotrim function was also simple to get The trackball-type cursor controllers fit used to, such that any attitude selected comfortably to hand on the lower panel was trimmed out quickly. as well. Immediately above the screens Further climb clearance to FL150 to the is the Guidance Panel, comprising flight west was given by ATC, and Jean-Louis director and controls. Overhead, selected the FD commands for the climb. the panel again neatly arranges the Once again, FD guidance was easy to The 7X is high-tech in controls for fuel, hydraulic, electrical, air follow, and I was enjoying the flying by every way, from initial conditioning and pressurisation... spending most of my time using the HUD, design to manufacture The EASy system is set up through reminding me of a previous life on the and continued operations a simple arrangement of menu icons Tornado. The basic symbology in both and full support.

40 | P1 BUSINESS AVIATION MAGAZINE | May-June 2009 May-June 2009 | P1 BUSINESS AVIATION MAGAZINE | 41 FLIGHT TEST dassault falcon 7x

the HUD and the PDU was intuitive and easy to follow and interpret. At FL150 we accelerated to 300kt for some general handling. I flew 60 deg AOB (Angle of Bank) turns (2g), and these could be flown accurately to +/-50ft, again using the FPV. I found better accuracy using the FPV on the PDU rather than the HUD for these manoeuvres. Releasing the sidestick whilst in the steep turn gave the DFCS the chance to automatically reduce bank angle. We then slowed to check the DFCS speed protection. As we entered the Low Speed Cues (LSC) speed range (amber strip of the PDU speed tape), we were urged to ‘Increase Speed’ by the audio warning system. With the disconnected, further slowing towards the redline stall indication, with the sidestick now fully aft, resulted in a lowering of the nose a few knots above the redline stall indication. There was noticeable buffet at this point. Carrying out the same exercise with autothrottle now connected gave the same lowering of the nose plus a load of power to assist with regaining speed. In the approach configuration (flaps to SF3 and gear down) we repeated the low speed exercise. The amber LSC began at 108kt with the stall indicated at 90kt. Once again the DFCS lowered the nose as we attempted to decelerate to the stall. Equal protection is provided at high speeds. In a gentle descent we accelerated up to and then slightly through Vmo (370kt). The DFCS raised the nose to prevent further excursion beyond Vmo, and (with autothrottle connected) closed the throttles. We set up a return to Istres, generating a Vertical Navigation descent path at 250kt which was followed using FPV flight director command. The long recovery to Istres gave us the chance to view the various EASy displays, including synoptics, navigation, and particularly the vertical profile, a highly intuitive display at the Nick turns the 7X bottom of the MFDU, which shows the back towards Istres aircraft’s profile relative to both the and engages in some Standard Arrival routing and to terrain. 2g steep turns over I could see that this would be a really the Med.

Final approach to Istres and nick is hands on. Right, back of the test aircraft filled with measuring equipment.

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useful feature for situational awareness when one is descending into any range unfamiliar airport. rover Establishing on a long final approach I really The fuel efficiency for RW 33, it was here that I remembered enjoyed of the Falcon 7X just how easy it is to fly approaches using gives it astonishing a HUD and FPV: simply place the HUD the fighter- range as these FPV symbol on the aiming point of the range maps runway and the job is essentially done, like feel of produced by within reason. With gear down and flaps the 7x Dassault show. to SF3, the throttles were closed at 50ft They use three radalt (automatic call-out) and the flare different cities to initiated at 30ft. Thanks to the trailing link show possibilities: main gear, the landing was smooth. The Paris, New York nose had to be lowered what felt like quite and Dubai. a long way to get nosewheel contact on the runway. Jean-Louis reconfigured the flaps during the roll-out, and we re-applied power for a further circuit. With sidestick and HUD, it was in the circuit that I really enjoyed the fighter- like feel of the 7X. Tight visual circuits were comfortably flown, selecting SF1 downwind, gear down abeam the touchdown point, and final flap selections around the finals turn. Speed control throughout all the circuit work was made easy by using the energy chevron. On the final landing, after nosewheel touchdown I selected idle thrust reverse and we decelerated gently without testing the full capability of the carbon brakes.

OPERATIONS After this short flight test it was very clear that from a pilot’s perspective the Falcon 7X is a great aircraft to fly. Pure handling on the sidestick requires small and smooth inputs, but the results are very satisfying,

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FLIGHTDECK he avionics system on the Falcon the panel, and are dedicated to mapping, through it if you don’t take any action. 7X requires explanation in its flight management, electronic checklist Associated with flight path display is T own right. Dassault designed the displays, and systems management. the energy chevron and Thrust Director Enhanced Avionics System (EASy) from The great advantage of this large-screen Data entry display. The green energy chevron gives years of development of cockpits for system is that anything that one pilot does is similar an instant display of acceleration and its Mirages and Rafale. Transferring the can easily be monitored by the other, deceleration, and the magenta Thrust task-reduction designs from its fighters to greatly helping with the crew coordination to the Director tells the pilot or autothrottle the 7X business jets has brought about a aspect; there is no need to lean over to common where to place the throttles to achieve a whole new concept to cockpit layout. check what the other pilot has done. The desired speed. Together, these displays 2 Based around the Honeywell Primus whole concept of the flight deck is based PC provide the pilots with information on EPIC avionics suite (1), Dassault adopted on a common workspace, easing the the aircraft's total energy state, another 5 a clean sheet approach to the flight deck crosschecking process that is so essential inheritance from the Dassault fighters. of the Falcon range of aircraft, based on for efficient two-pilot operation. improving crew situational awareness, The other major new concept with EASy 4 reducing pilot workload, and achieving is that of flying primarily by reference to better crew coordination. The emphasis Flight Path rather than pitch attitude. Flying was placed on graphical visualisation, by reference to a Flight Path Vector (FPV) the limiting of stand-alone switches and symbol removes an enormous amount 1 buttons, and a layout that would prompt of pilots’ efforts in maintaining a desired 6 head-up flying and crew coordination. profile. To maintain level, simply put the The result is a fully integrated system FPV on the horizon line – any speed, which features four large format LCD configuration, weight, throttle setting, etc. screens (2) with data input from pilots via Similarly, intercept an ILS glideslope, select a track-ball (3), called a Cursor Control 3 deg nose-down on the FPV, and you will Device (CCD). In many ways this method maintain the glidepath. of data entry is similar to the common PC, Couple FPV and ILS guidance in a thus pilots quickly become familiar with the Head-Up Display (HUD), and then not 3 concept of moving the crosshair-shaped only are you flying an accurate glidepath icon around the screens. but you are already looking through The four screens are arranged in a the windscreen, ready to convert to the T-configuration. The screen in front of each visual transition to complete the landing pilot is known as the Primary Display Unit – a particularly useful feature when the (PDU) (4), and contains all information weather is on minimums. Even en-route, a pertaining to piloting the aircraft. HUD FPV is useful. If the FPV is buried in The Multi-Function Display Units (MFDU) a large build-up of cloud 100 miles away, (5) are installed vertically in the middle of then you know that you will eventually fly The EASy allows each pilot to know what the other has done.

and the DFCS does its job beautifully. The flight deck is a delight to be in, with SYSTEMS WELCOME ABOARD extremely well organised displays and low noise levels. With FPV as primary reference Pilots onstructed from metal alloys under the right forward in case Dassault's Falcon 7X is a high- FACT FILE coupled with a HUD, any pilot should and composite materials, the of total loss of hydraulic pump pressure. end business jet and interiors are DASSAULT FALCON 7X quickly feel at home with this different yet should CFalcon 7X has three rear- Flight controls comprise two ailerons specified to VVIP tastes. Notice CATEGORY Long-range highly intuitive way of flying. quickly mounted Pratt and Whitney Canada and two spoilers, a single rudder, two how much room there is, right. large jet There can by major differences, of 307A engines, controlled by dual elevators and trimmable stabilizer, six At this year's EBACE, Dassault BASE PRICE $45ml course, between just flying an aircraft and become Full Authority Digital Engine Control leading edge slats and four trailing unveiled a new cabin interior MAX CRUISE 515kt operating it around the world. However, I familiar (FADEC) and each producing 6,400lb edge flaps, and four airbrakes used designed in collaboration with BMW MAX RANGE 5950nm don’t believe that this would be a problem of thrust at ISA conditions. jointly with roll spoilers for lift dump Designworks USA – see photos CEILING 51,000ft for the Falcon 7X. With proper training, with the The centre engine includes a clam- and aerodynamic braking. The Digital below. They said, "The new Falcon TAKE-OFF DIST 5505ft (ISA, pilots should quickly become familiar with EASy shell thrust reverser which can be used Flight Control System (DFCS) includes 7X cabin introduces subtle curves 8 pax) the EASy flight deck, such that operations down to full stop without reingestion three primary and three secondary throughout the interior. Curved LANDING DIST 2,262ft (ISA, can run smoothly and efficiently wherever flight deck problems, and which can also be used computers, together with a back-up bulkheads visually expand the main 8 pax) they may be in the world. Dassault have for backing up. Autothrottle function is analogue computer for direct operation cabin volume while subtle curves MTOW 69,000Ib invested a great deal to ensure long term included, and the engines meet modern of the flight controls. in the galley and main cabin create EMPTY 34,272lb reliability of the aircraft, and the service FAA/EPA emission requirements. Each landing gear leg has two wheels, better flow. Cabin lighting techniques MAX PAYLOAD 6728lb backup (including three new technical Fuel is contained in the wings and the with the main gear using trailing link feature up-wash and down-wash PAYLOAD WITH FULL FUEL backup centres) are in place to sort out centre and aft sections of the fuselage. arms. The nosewheel is steered via the ambient lights as well as light strips. 2988lb technical issues quickly. The lateral engines are supplied by rudder pedals only. A manual override The final result is elegant and styled FUEL CAPACITY 31,940lb It’s obviously an aircraft that can fly fuel from the respective wing tank and allows the landing gear to freefall cabin fused with function." WINGSPAN 86ft for some 11-12 hours at a time, so pilot centre tank, with the centre engine if required. Carbon disc brakes are CABIN LENGTH 39ft 1in comfort is clearly something to consider. supplied by the centre and aft tanks. fitted, together with antiskid, and the CABIN HEIGHT 6ft 2in A crew rest area is an option that I don’t However, ultimately any fuel tank can braking system also provides signals CABIN WIDTH 7ft 8in suppose will be installed on many aircraft, feed any engine. Total fuel capacity is for automatic airbrake activation during ENGINES 3 x Pratt & but at least the cockpit area is quiet and around 32,000lb. landing or rejected take-off. Whitney PW307A comfortable. The three hydraulic systems (A,B, and The electrical system is 28V DC, with POWER 3 x 6402lb thrust The Falcon 7X is clearly an aircraft that C) are powered by combinations of power provided from two batteries, AVIONICS Dassault EASy we will see a great deal of, and orders are engine and electrical stand-by pumps three engine-driven alternators, the MANUFACTURER holding up well through the worldwide to provide redundancy to the necessary APU starter generator, and the RAT. , France slump. It is a real 21st Century pilot’s services (flight controls, flaps, landing External power can also be connected. aircraft, and certainly one to be proud to gear, brakes, and thrust reverser). A The APU, in the aft fuselage, is available fly and operate. (RAT) is also installed for ground use only.

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