Remember the ill-fated SIAI-Marchetti SF-600 turbine twin? As
though it were an aeronautical Lazarus, it's been brought back
from the dead and transformed.
Vulcanair SPA, based in Casoria near Naples, is displaying its
VF-600W Mission directly across from Dassault Aviation's Falcon
Jets at the static display. To create the Mission, the firm yanked
the wings, with their twin Rolls-Royce 250 turboprops, off the
old SF-600. Then, its engineers put a 777 shp Walther M601 in
the nose and installed a braced wing, with a new technology, high-lift
airfoil and generously sized Fowler flaps that reduce stall speed
to 61 knots. The wing, albeit with struts, also should have less
drag than the old technology, fully cantilevered wing of the SF-600.
The result is a $1 million utility aircraft that's designed to
go head-to-head with the $1.6-million Cessna Grand Caravan. Vulcanair
Mission is slightly larger than the Caravan, but it has a 600
lb lower operating empty weight. With a maximum takeoff weight
of 8,653 lb and a full 2,300 lb fuel load, Mission will be able
to carry a 1,943 lb payload 1,000 nmi. On short missions, it will
be able to tote more than 3,500 lb.
Mon dieu! Think of how many cases of vintage Chateau Dassault,
along with lesser Vin du St Emilion, you could fly home from the
45th Salon du Bourget. Mission's $600,000 price saving over the
Caravan, though, wouldn't make a dent in the cost of a metric
ton payload of Premier Grand Cru Bordeaux.
