Turboprops

The new turboprop brings together the Beechcraft airframe and GE Aviation powerplant for the first time in the air.

Company offers slightly optimistic projections; a “deceleration” compared to pre-COVID growth.

Two larger-than-life FLYING covers grace the factory walls at the Piper Aircraft manufacturing facility in Vero Beach, Florida. The first, from March 2008, shows off the newly launched Piper Matrix, a nonpressurized version of the original PA-46 series made a little bit easier to manage by its relative lack of complexity, bringing a big-cabin feel […]

Blackhawk Aerospace says it is developing an supplemental type certificate (STC) for the Pilatus PC-12, replacing the PT6A turboprop engine with a new, more powerful model. The single engine turboprop conversion builds on Blackhawk’s success with Cessna’s Caravan series of aircraft. The news was announced at a press conference at the National Business Aviation Association’s […]

Textron Aviation announced Thursday that with the stroke of a pen, it had passed an important milestone in the progression of its latest King Air models—the 260 and the 360/360ER—with the certification of both under EASA. The approval means that customer deliveries of the workhorse turboprop can begin across Europe. “EASA certification begins a whole […]

As I stood on the Textron Aviation ramp in Wichita, Kansas, for my first look at the company’s new turboprop flagship, the King Air 360, I slipped back in time to a different era and form of transportation: cars (muscle cars as they called them). My pal Lennie had just bought a brand-new, fire-engine-red Chevrolet […]

Textron Aviation has completed the initial ground-test runs of the GE Aviation Catalyst engine on the Beechcraft Denali at one of the company’s facilities in Wichita, Kansas. The clean-sheet design Catalyst was put through its paces to determine its baseline operational status and fuel system functionality. The powerplant’s interface with the avionics and electrical system […]

GE Aviation’s Catalyst engine will be the company’s first, all-new clean sheet turboprop engine in 50 years, according to the company’s website. It borrows many technologies from GE’s big engine business to create a full-authority digital engine control (FADEC) turboprop that—if it lives up to expectations—is certain to give Pratt & Whitney Canada’s venerable PT6 […]

Piper Aircraft introduced its new interim president and CEO John Calcagno at EAA AirVenture on Monday, July 26, and Calcagno expressed enthusiasm for his new role at the legendary manufacturer after 11 years as its CFO. “It goes without saying that I’m honored to be here at Piper Aircraft,” and he went on to stress […]

When Textron Aviation first announced the single-engine turboprop Denali in 2015, it was assumed the aircraft would be branded as a Cessna product. On July 20, Textron Aviation announced the new turboprop will become the single-engine aircraft under the Beechcraft brand family with the King Air 260 and 360/360ER as part of the company’s high-performance […]