Beechjet

The best small-jet cabin just got better

What do you do with a winning design? Well, if you stick to the traditional credo of airplane manufacturing, you certainly don't leave it alone. Once first deliveries of a new type of airplane begin, you make plans to hang more powerful engines on it; install the latest, snazziest avionics suite in the cockpit; rearrange or stretch the cabin; and bump up the useful load. Anything to boost speed, comfort, and utility with each succeeding model offering. In this way, you keep a product alive in the market and on the lips of industry cognoscenti.

The Beechjet is a good example of this theory. Mitsubishi introduced the design in 1981 as the underpowered Diamond I but wasted no time the following year in boosting the Diamond's power by 5 percent (while retaining the same basic, 2,500-lbst Pratt & Whitney JT15-D engines), creating the Diamond IA. The power fix wasn't enough, however, to give even the IA decent hot-and-high climb performance. To get the second segment climb performance required by FAR 25, you had to take off with the ECS (environmental control system — a/k/a heating and air conditioning) off, use zero flaps, and consume more runway than in a straight I. The Diamond II, rolled out in 1985, had — you guessed it — even more power. Its 2,900-lbst JT15D-5 engines finally let pilots climb with pride in most hot-and-high situations — and even do it with a full load (the II's useful load and max takeoff weight are 865 pounds and 1,150 pounds greater, respectively, than a IA's). It can cruise 30 knots faster, too.

But the stigma of poor performance dogged the Diamond; and in the end, the Beech Aircraft Corporation bought the Diamond line in 1985. It renamed the Diamond the Beechjet 400, then set about improving what really was, at heart, a clever design idea. That idea, to be brutally concise, was to match or beat the Citation II's and Lear 35A's speed and fuel specifics and provide a larger, more comfortable cabin in the bargain. Part of that bargain involved paying about $500,000 more than the price of an average-equipped Citation II, S/II, or Lear 35A, which ran about $3 million in those days.

Hits:

• Biggest, most comfortable cockpit of any jet in its class
• Biggest, most comfortable cabin of any jet in its class
• Neat glareshield writing surfaces
• Easy nosewheel steering that means you taxi like a pro
• Low noise levels in cockpit and cabin
• Decent payload/range — can carry four pax, two crew, and their bags 1,500 nm with IFR reserves.
• 465 KTAS/0.78 M attainable in high cruise
• Built like a tank

Misses:

• Thrust reversers and R-134a air conditioning not included as standard equipment
• Weird windshield design — but you can see out the side on approaches with iced-up windshields
• Aft baggage compartment is beneath left engine, and can be awkward to load
• Heavy roll forces
• At $5.4 million plus, a tad pricey

Eleven years later, and the Beechjet is going strong. Why? Dedication to the credo, and a big, fat Air Force contract. In 1989, Beech created the 400A by upping the power, increasing zero-fuel and takeoff weights, and reconfiguring the interior with double-club seating and an aft flushing lavatory. Even though the price tag was progressively bumped up to today's $5.9 million for a typically equipped airplane, more than 164 400As have been sold in the past 5 years. Add to this the 180 Beechjets ordered by the U.S. Air Force in a 1990 tanker trainer contract worth some $775 million, plus a dozen of another version designed for the Air Force's Specialized Undergraduate Pilot Training program and you have a fair-sized fleet of 400As out there. Virtually all of the Air Force versions are used in the Tanker Transport Training System — a program to train pilots of in-flight refueling tankers — and are called T-1A Jayhawks.

With the 1996 Beechjet — the civilian model, that is — came more new enhancements. They mainly address the earlier models' cabin shortcomings. It dawned on Raytheon, the current owner of Beech, that the old club seating had the odd effect of preventing any seat from adequately reclining. The seats were either backed up against each other or planted in front of a bulkhead or partition. The solution was to optimize the cabin for four or five seats (a realistic passenger load) rather than stick with the old configuration, in which you could cram eight rather uncomfortable seats.

This arrangement creates the immediate effect of more interior spaciousness. Makes sense: fewer seats, more room. Moreover, the new club seats are far better than the old. They swivel 360 degrees, track laterally (away from the cabin sidewalls), and can recline all the way into a berthing position. Add the newly designed forward galley/closet, wood arm ledge, and the cabin's own temperature controls (they're on the arm ledge next to the "boss's seat" at the aft starboard seat position) and you've got a pretty comfy setup. The new, optional air conditioning system sends huge volumes of cool air through enlarged ducts, allowing for faster cabin temperature drawdowns in summertime.

Small touches also make a difference. A new headliner has a smoother appearance. The emergency lighting battery packs that used to be above the headliner were relocated below the flooring, and old-style passenger reading lights have been restyled. Those changes both raised the headliner a bit and cleaned up the entire cabin's looks immensely. The rotating, polarizing cabin window sun shields have been replaced by sliding pleated sunshades. (The polarizing shades could scratch window surfaces and develop bleached spots in their centers).

As for the cockpit, even more changes grace the newest Beechjets. First off, there's an overhead assist strap, which lets pilots slide into their seats with more grace and less threat of kicking out the avionics in the center pedestal. There's a new set of Rosen sun visors that can be slid along a rail extending the full width of the cockpit windows, providing protection against glare coming from just about any direction. New crew seats have five-point restraint belts and adjustable lumbar support; they can be tilted and raised or lowered vertically as well as fore and aft — all big improvements over earlier seats. Borrowing from the Raytheon Hawker motif, the new cockpits also have sub-glareshield pen/pencil holders, glareshield-mounted writing surfaces, and yoke-mounted approach plate holders.

Starting the Beechjet is still a simple process: push the start button; wait for 8 percent turbine speed; then move a thrust lever from the Cut-off to the Flight Idle position. Taxiing is a no-sweat deal, too. For takeoff at Wichita's Mid-Continent Airport, a takeoff power setting of 97.7 percent N1 (fan speed) was selected, the thrust levers went up, our V1 of 106 knots flashed by; rotation and liftoff came at 111 knots. Then we were doing 200 knots in a 3,000-fpm climb, heading west, and leaving Wichita's Class C airspace — in about the time it took you to read this paragraph.

Our takeoff weight was a little over 14,000 pounds (two pilots plus three passengers plus 2,700 pounds of fuel), and we used a 10-degree flap setting for takeoff. We could have used 20 degrees for takeoff (a new operational procedure) and used less runway, but Wichita has plenty of asphalt. In the initial portion of the climb, fuel burn ran about 1,000 pph for each engine.

ATC made us level off at FL290 for a while. At a high speed cruise power setting we easily hit 0.78 Mach — the airplane's MMO and advertised high cruise speed — while burning 725 pph per engine.

Eventually, we were cleared to FL410, and while climbing through 40,500 feet, it was impressive to note that our rate of climb was hanging in there at a respectable 600 fpm. We hit 0.78 Mach after leveling at 410 and were down to burning just 500 pph per side. Two notes of interest: We could have climbed directly to FL410 in 17 minutes at our weight and in our ISA-plus-5 conditions; and we could have easily flown for 2 hours (about 900 nm) and still landed with IFR reserves — even though we carried just under one-half the ship's total fuel capacity.

Down at 15,000 feet, it was time for some air work. The Beechjet uses differential spoilers for roll control, thus eliminating adverse yaw during turns at high angles of attack. Roll forces are somewhat heavy in turns, and the bigger the bank angle, the heavier the force required. Some may not like this quirk, but others may well believe that this heaviness — coupled with the airplane's comparatively high wing loading — makes for a surer, more stable feel in instrument conditions and turbulence.

With no need for ailerons under this arrangement, 80 percent of the wing trailing edge span is given over to the flaps. It's this large flap area that permits such low approach and landing speeds, as we'll soon see.

As a Part 25 airplane, the Beechjet must have a means of providing flight control redundancy. In roll and yaw, this redundancy comes via dual electric trim systems. For pitch, redundancy is provided by a dedicated emergency electric pitch trim system, actuated by a trim selector switch on the right side of the center pedestal. Under ordinary circumstances, mechanical linkages actuate the spoilers, stabilator, and rudder. A "coolie hat" — a four-way electric trim switch, also on the captain's yoke — provides normal trim inputs for pitch and roll.

Hit the guarded spoiler switch on the center pedestal and the spoilers deploy simultaneously and with double the deflection of independent use. There's the predictable airframe rumble, and with it come the high descent rates that are so handy in complying with ATC slam-dunk clearances. Spoilers can also be selected immediately after landing, to dump lift and improve braking effectiveness on shorter runways. With flaps 30; maximum landing weight (15,700 lbs); anti-skid on; and standard, no-wind conditions, the 400A's landing distance over a 50-foot obstacle is 3,514 feet.

The Beechjet's Collins Pro Line 4 flight control system is as user-friendly as they come and includes a flight management system that's probably the easiest of any of today's to master FMSs. A three-tube display is standard, and so is a Rosemount ice detection system. There are dual transponders; a radio altimeter; dual attitude/heading reference systems; and, of course, the standby attitude, altimeter, and airspeed indicators required by Part 25.

As for landings, Beechjet chief demonstration pilot Mahlone Becker recommends adhering to a full-flaps, 60-percent-N1, maintain-VREF mantra for most situations. Sure enough, a 60-percent power setting and full flaps set us up well for a descent on glideslope at our VREF of just 106 knots. At 50 feet agl, Becker suggests that power go to flight idle and that pitch be set only slightly nose-high in preparation for touchdown. Immediately after landing reverse thrust (an option that most order) can be selected to maximize deceleration, and spoilers can be deflected for lift-dumping. It's important to stow the reversers before decelerating below 60 knots, lest dirt or other foreign objects be ingested into the engines.

Let's go back to that 106-knot VREF. That's only 6 knots more than the speed we use for instrument approaches in our 3,600-pound A36 Bonanza. In operational terms, this means that those stepping up from lesser airplanes are likely to have an easier time of transitioning to approach proficiency in a Beechjet.

The new Beechjet's attention to comfort items is a direct result of Raytheon's acquisition of the Hawker line of mid-size corporate jets. With a swankier cockpit and cabin (right down to CD players, passengers' headphones, video displays for videotapes or Airshow "moving map," and power outlets for laptop computers), the Beechjet is another affirmation of the strategy that has kept Hawkers so strong in the marketplace.

We once caught a glimpse of a Hawker salesman's memory jogger. It listed all kinds of bulleted items to stress in a sales situation. After a parade of virtues about speed, payload-range tradeoffs, advanced systems, fuel burn, pressurization, and other technical exotica, the final line said it all. There, in all capital letters, was the phrase "JUST REMEMBER, DUMMY, IT'S THE CABIN."

Same thing with the new Beechjet.