Diamond Aircraft has again delayed certification of the single-engine D-Jet and is now planning for approval early next year. At the EAA AirVenture show last July, Diamond announced that certification was going to take place this year. Meanwhile, D-Jets number two and three continue flight testing in Texas, which offers a much more benign climate than London, Ontario (Canada), where Diamond’s North American division is based.
Diamond D-Jet
December 31, 2008 - 3:38am
In many ways, last year was an extraordinary year for business aviation, with a record of more than 1,000 jet deliveries but also a large number of new jet programs launched. Last year, Cessna kicked off the Citation Columbus, a more than three-quarter billion dollar program that brings Cessna into the large-cabin long-range jet market. Dassault is upgrading the Falcon 900 with winglets to make
November 10, 2008 - 6:40am
Very light jet. Super-midsize. Ultra-long-range. These are just some of the names that manufacturers, analysts and aviation journalists use to try to pigeonhole business jets into market niches. But with so much fragmentation in the field and a blurring of traditional lines, such attempts at classification are becoming harder than ever.
October 31, 2008 - 6:15am
Diamond D-Jet S/N 003 made its first flight on October 5 with the upgraded Williams International FJ33-5A engine. S/N 003 is now in the final configuration for certification, with the new engine, new engine inlets and fairings, aerodynamic changes and production winglets. The new engine will be derated to match the power output of the previous FJ33-15, but Diamond plans to offer a higher-thrust D-Jet later in the program.
October 27, 2008 - 11:42am
SwiftJet, an aspiring air taxi operator in Canada, has placed an order for five single-engine Diamond D-Jets, along with options for 10 more. Deliveries are scheduled
to begin in 2010, making SwiftJet the first charter customer in Canada slated to take delivery of a D-Jet.
October 6, 2008 - 2:23pm
On Sunday, Diamond Aircraft (Booth No. 4707) flew its D-Jet for the first time with the new Williams International FJ33-5A engine (formerly designated FJ33-19), the production powerplant for the single-engine personal jet.
October 6, 2008 - 11:54am
On Sunday, Diamond Aircraft flew its D-Jet for the first time with the new Williams International FJ33-5A engine (formerly designated FJ33-19), the production powerplant for the single-engine personal jet. D-Jet S/N 003–the first production-conforming copy of the airplane now that the -5A has been installed–was flown by chief test pilot Daniel Ribeiro and flight test engineer Gerard Struthers.
October 2, 2008 - 5:10am
Very light jet. Super-midsize. Ultra-long-range. These are just some of the names that manufacturers, analysts and aviation journalists use to try to pigeonhole business jets into an increasing number of market niches. But with so much fragmentation in the field and a blurring of traditional lines, such attempts at classification are becoming harder than ever.
May 1, 2008 - 1:17pm
Diamond Aircraft is delaying the D-Jet program to install an engine with greater power output. The new engine is the -19 version of the Williams International FJ33-4A, delivering 1,900 pounds of thrust compared with the original -15’s 1,564 pounds. Coincidentally, that is almost the same engine change made by Spectrum Aeronautical with its S-33 Independence VLJ, switching from the FJ33-4A-15 to a 1,750-pound-thrust version of the -19.
April 29, 2008 - 7:34am
The third flight-test D-Jet completed a one-hour 25-minute maiden flight April 15 from Diamond Aircraft’s London, Ontario facility. S/N 003 will be used for performance and handling quality refinement, and to develop avionics, fuel, autopilot and anti-ice systems. The airplane will be retrofitted with the Williams FJ33-19 engine later this year, but it won’t be the first D-Jet to fly with the uprated engine.
