Multiple Falcons to Alight

Dassault Aviation will showcase its latest and largest business aircraft models—the twin-engined Falcon 6X and 10X—at 2023’s European Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (EBACE), which opens 23 May in Geneva, Switzerland. Static displays of Dassault’s most popular in-production models, the Falcon 2000LXS twin and the 8X trijet, will also be featured.

EBACE is apt to prove a fitting venue at which to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Dassault’s storied Falcon brand. Since the introduction of the Falcon 20, the French marque’s first business jet, the Paris-headquartered company has established itself among the aviation industry’s leading OEM’s. To date, Dassault has delivered upwards 2,700 business aircraft, 2,100 of which remain in operation. Across all models, the Dassault business aircraft fleet has amassed north of twenty-million flight-hours.

The third Falcon 6X flight test aircraft, which features a fully-fitted cabin interior, will head Dassault’s 2023 EBACE exhibit. Prior to its arrival in Geneva, the aircraft will have endured a gauntlet of extreme hot and cold temperature soaks, flooded runway trials, and demanding high-altitude, high-speed testing.

In addition to an advertised 5,500-nautical-mile range, the 6X features a cabin with a stand-up-height of six-feet, six-inches—the largest in contemporary business aviation. Dassault asserts its Falcon 6X will reign as business aviation’s largest cabin until the even larger, longer-range Falcon 10X enters service. After the fashion of its 10X stablemate, the 6X’s interior has received the coveted Red Dot award for its sleek, modern, and high-productivity design. During a one-hundred-hour-plus global proving campaign, passengers praised the cabin’s superior comfort, low noise-levels—the lowest ever on a Falcon—and reliable high-speed connectivity.

After accumulating 1,480 flight-hours over 580 sorties, the 6X recently completed its certification flight test program. Dassault anticipates the model will be certified in the following weeks, with entry into service to follow thereafter.

Dassault’s global factory service centers are currently being equipped and staffed in a manner commensurate with comprehensively maintaining the new aircraft.

To the subject of pilot training, a state-of-the-art CAE 6X simulator is being made functional at CAE’s Burgess Hill, UK training center. The first customer type certification classes utilizing such are set to begin presently. Dassault has formed a dedicated team tasked with managing and coordinating all Falcon 6X entry-into-service training and preparation activities.

The Falcon 2000LXS twin-jet to be displayed in Geneva will feature a modern two-zone cabin and a range of new options devised to keep the highly-economical, 4,000-nautical-mile, short-field-capable machine at the top of its market segment. The model’s new capabilities include high-speed Internet/WiFi and Dassault’s unique FalconEye Combined Vision System—an architecture that allows flight-crews to legally attempt low-visibility approaches to decision heights as low as one-hundred-feet AGL.

The Falcon 2000 series has been continuously updated through several iterations and, year-in and year-out, has proven Dassault’s best-selling model. To date, nearly seven-hundred 2000 series aircraft have been delivered to customers worldwide.

Dassault’s 2023 EBACE exhibit will also feature the company’s very-long-range Falcon 8X trijet, which sports EASy IV—the latest and most capable generation of Dassault’s proprietary EASy flight deck. Restyled in 2021 to include elements of the Falcon 6X cabin environment, the 8X provides operators a 6,450-nautical-mile range and best-in-class operating economy.

The 8X has also received acoustics improvements by which aircraft noise levels have been reduced to less-than 50 dB—the approximate ambient room-noise of a private residence—thereby consolidating the aircraft’s reputation as the quietest business jet currently on offer. The 8X is renowned for exceptional maneuverability, short-field prowess, and stable approach speeds as low as a glacial 107-knots. The model’s digital flight controls instantiate an evolution of those pioneered on Dassault’s Falcon 7X. To date, nearly four-hundred Falcon 7X and 8X aircraft have been delivered.

Among the highlights of Dassault’s 2023 EBACE display will be a full flight-deck and cabin mockup of the company’s Falcon 10X—slated to earn Dassault the distinction of producing the industry’s largest purpose-built business jet. The Mach 0.925, 7,500-nautical-mile 10X has garnered two of the world’s most prestigious design trophies: the Chicago Athenaeum award for Good Design and the Red Dot Design Award.

True to the actual 10X cabin, the 65-foot-long mockup comprises an eminently and endlessly configurable modular design. The mockup to be displayed at EBACE will feature an extended dining area by which the installation of individual sliding seats is permitted. A separate mockup to be made public at EBACE will showcase Dassault’s new Falcon Privacy Suite, a cocoon-like personal space that affords passengers greater peace and quiet on demanding intercontinental flights. The suite—the first such environ to be featured on a purpose-built business jet—is equipped with an electrically operated seat that reclines to a lie-flat bed. The Falcon Privacy Suite will be similarly available on Dassault’s Falcon 6X and 8X models. A third cabin mockup featuring Dassault’s master-bathroom and two-window shower options will also be on view at EBACE.

Parts production for the Falcon 10X is underway and assembly of the first airframe is proceeding apace. A prototype of the aircraft’s all carbon-fiber wing is currently in the final stages of static and fatigue testing and a series of unique multi-system test benches—by which the maturity of the 10X’s constituent systems will be demonstrated prior to the prototype’s taking flight—is reportedly up and running. Several novel design features, including the 10X’s controversial Smart Throttle, have entered testing on a full flight-deck bench at Dassault’s Saint Cloud facility.

The 10X’s 18,000-plus lbf thrust Rolls Royce Pearl engine has completed an extensive ground-testing campaign, including operations on one-hundred-percent Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF). The engine is expected to be further vetted by way of mating to a Boeing 747 test-bed later this year.

FMI: www.dassaultfalcon.com