Also Notes Accomplishments In Push Towards Full Production

It's two steps forward, one step back for Eclipse Aviation. As the company continues to make progress in ramping up towards full production, and finalizing performance modifications to the aircraft, Eclipse also acknowledged a new problem with the aircraft's pitot and angle-of-attack probe system.

In its latest Customer Technical Communication (CTC) -- which is not a service bulletin -- Eclipse states the issue, which involves heating elements in the pitot/AOA probes, currently means all flight operations are limited to visual conditions, accompanied by an Eclipse company pilot, or Eclipse-trained mentor pilot onboard. Pilots cannot fly in instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) in their planes under any circumstances, although pilots may still file IFR, and operate in the flight levels.

"Eclipse 500 aircraft have experienced three in-flight events in which pitot pressure was lost on both left and right primary air data sources, resulting in the loss of airspeed indications on the Primary Flight Displays (PFDs)," states the Eclipse CTC. "The standby airspeed indication was not affected, and continued to function properly. All aircraft regained the function of both air data systems upon encountering warmer temperatures."

"Only three instances of this failure have been recorded in over 4,400 fleet hours, making this a rare occurrence," Eclipse goes on. "The Eclipse engineering team is currently investigating the cause of failure and working with the system supplier to determine the most expedient method of correction."

Eclipse tells ANN the company plans to implement a new system design that fixes the problem, and will communicate the results to customers in the next two weeks.

Despite the setback, in a separate customer communication Eclipse CEO Vern Raburn recounted all the company was able to accomplish in the past month -- including progress on performance modifications to the aircraft (which will be retrofitted throughout the fleet once finalized), and development of the Avio NG avionics suite. Eclipse also celebrated its first multi-aircraft delivery, with three planes delivered to DayJet... and released a draft version of Section 5 of the AFM.

Raburn also notes one of Eclipse's established competitors has encountered its share of issues, as well, in bringing its own light jet to market.

"I hope that you are seeing and feeling our strong commitment to provide more frequent and transparent communications on all aspects of our progress," Raburn tells customers. "I have to admit that the recent revelations from Cessna about only delivering one of their new Mustangs since its FAA TC has provided me with some perspective, and, if just for a brief moment, some solace. It reinforces to me that even experienced companies like Cessna are not immune to problems when bringing a new product to market."

"Here is an 80-year-old airplane company with arguably well-established production processes encountering issues with suppliers and they went five months without saying a word about any problems," Raburn continues. "At least with Eclipse you know what is going on in the production and development process, both good and bad."

FMI: www.eclipseaviation.com