Pilotcast #044 -Diamond CEO Christian Dries - 2006.09.21

Pilot Kent is on the phone from Dexter, MN. Pilot Dan spent his first ever two week vacation working on his house on Martha's Vineyard. Dan will be at the Nantucket Island airshow September 30th and October 1st with The Blue Angels, Patty Wagstaff and Rinker Buck.

Over the U.S. Labor Day weekend Kent returned to join "EdFred" at the reopened Prickett-Grooms Airfield in Sidnaw, MI discussed on Pilotcast #42

As he flew home Kent claimed 15 Wisconsin airports for the ConUS challenge discussed on Pilotcast #43. Door County, Wisconsin is popular destination in the Autumn for tourists to view the fall color show.

Mike and Kent have a "friendly discussion" on the short field performance numbers of their high performance planes, the real world experience they've had, and why they may look at short runways differently.

• Prickett-Grooms Airfield, 6Y9, in Sidnaw, MI
• Door County, Wisconsin airports:
  • 3D2, Ephraim-Fish Creek airport
  • 2P2, Washington Island airport off the northeast tip of the Door County peninsula
  with a grass runway that has slope.
  • KSUE, Door County Cherryland airport in Sturgeon Bay, WI has longer asphalt runways for the less adventurous.
• 68C, Central County airport in Iola, WI has a friendly bunch of pilots who have a BBQ every Friday afternoon and the best slogan on the hangar barn.

The Pilotcast pilots also talked to Tony Bill, producer and interviewed an actor pilot from the new thrilling. Flyboys movie. Look for the "Flyboys" interviews on the Pilotcast soon.

Pilot Kent managed to talk to Mr. Dries in front of the the Diamond D-Jet prototype just minutes before the D-Jet was towed out for the flight back to London, Ontario!

• Diamond Aircraft
• Diamond planes discussed:
  • The Diamond D-Jet personal jet
  • Designed for the owner-pilot
  • Business jet
  • Seats 5
  • Roomy interior
  • The Diamond D-42 Twin
  • First owner flown D-42 shown at Oshkosh
  • First D-42 flown around the world,
    • with 3 on board
    • using less than 1000 gallons of fuel.
    • Flew non-stop Hawaii to California.
  • The Diamond D-40 XL
  • Can cruise 160 knots
  • 150 knots at 10 GPH

The pilots discuss the position of the Diamond D-Jet and Javelin"personal jet" vs. the other "VLJ," Very Light Jets like the Eclipse 500. The D-Jet is designed to be simpler to fly and owner flown.

Pilotcast notes:

A reminder to join the Pilotcast forums at http://pilotcast.com/forums. We've had great participation from Pilotcast pilots from all over the world.

We've gotten great feedback on special Pilotcast with Pilot Kent's flight into Airventure Oshkosh. The Pilotcast will have more "fly-alongs" from all over the world. If you want participate or have ideas please add those to the forums.

The Pilotcast is planning an open Pilotcast pilot roundtable Skypecast for Tuesday, October 10 at 2300Z (1900 U.S. Eastern, 1800 U.S. Central, 1600 U.S. Pacific). If you have a Skype account, a PC headset or microphone and earphones you can join in for free as the show is recorded. Listen on the Pilotcast and look on the Pilotcast forums for updates.

• New York Governor Pataki signs a law to mandate criminal background checks for anybody getting flight instruction. The nearby states have no such law.
• Followup on the Lexington, KY Comair crash. The news media reports that the printed airport diagram was not current.
• A Cessna makes an emergency landing in downtown Montreal.
• A Comanche makes an emergency landing on a interstate in Denton, Texas. It takes off successfully soon after.

• The Eclipse 500, the first VLJ to receive FAA certification
• The HondaJet VLJ
• The Flyboys movie site
• The Pilotcast #042 - OSH Vidcast #1 interview with Alan Klapmeier, co-founder and president of Cirrus Design

Song: "Sound Scientist" by bill Music on the Pilotcast is from the Podshow Podsafe Music Network. Check it out at http://music.podshow.com

Pilotcast show notes are at http://www.pilotcast.com