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By Steve Hall |
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May 4, 2010 — The
Gulfstream G650 flew at its proposed Mmo of 0.925 for the first time on
Sunday. The ultra-large-cabin, ultra-long-range flight-test aircraft
(S/N 6001) took off from
The aircraft
reached its top speed of Mach 0.925 while at 42,500 feet. The business
jet returned to
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"It’s very responsive to pilot input with
fantastic maneuver capabilities. Turns can be initiated and
completed without any onset of buffet. The engine performance is
extremely smooth. At the conditions flown today, the entire
operation was flawless. The aircraft’s capabilities and
state-of-the-art technologies make it very easy to fly and will
enhance our customers’ experience with their G650.”
Gulfstream announced the G650 program on March 13, 2008, indicating that the clean-sheet aircraft – Gulfstream’s first since the GII – would be capable of flying Mach 0.925, making it the world’s fastest transport-category aircraft in the sky. The G650 rolled out under its own power – another Gulfstream first – on Sept. 30, 2009. Its first flight was on Nov. 25, 2009. The second flight-test aircraft – S/N 6002 – followed on Feb. 25. As of mid-April, the two aircraft have completed nearly 50 flights and approximately 140 flight-test hours. The five G650 aircraft involved in the flight-test program are expected to perform an estimated 1,800 hours of testing. Each aircraft is used for a specific series of tests with S/N 6001 focused on performance and flight controls, S/N 6002 on systems and S/N 6003 on avionics, including communication and navigation. The two production aircraft in the test program – S/N 6004 and S/N 6005 – will be used to evaluate interior systems and be part of the reduced vertical separation minimum (RVSM) testing. |
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