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Honda Aircraft Launches HondaJet Elite
- maxxxxx 8y agoOh cool. This is good news for a lot of us who have been waiting for such a jet.
- throwahey 8y agoCan't tell if you're being sarcastic but I genuinely have loved this plane ever since I heard of it. Primarily excited because I'm a huge fan of Honda, secondarily because the price-point, it is fairly affordable for what it is and I can hope to own one by my 50's when the price comes down a bit.
- sologoub 8y agoAt $5.25 mil, how far are you hoping they’ll depreciate?
- maxxxxx 8y agoI was sarcastic. There is just nothing in this that's interesting in any way for this site unless I didn't see what makes this jet in any way novel. Otherwise we'll have to start posting all press releases for the latest Porsche, Ferrari or Lamborghini.
- greglindahl 8y agoIntroducing a new plane from a new company in a stagnant market is slightly different than another model from companies already in the car market. But thanks for coming here to tell us all how uninteresting it is for you!
- arijun 8y agoFTA it looks exactly like what you describe, a new model from a company already in the market. Is it disrupting the industry in a way that those of us less versed in the aircraft industry don't see?
- scrumper 8y agoVery light jets are somewhat disruptive, having the altitude, speed, range, and reliability benefits of jets with turboprop/piston-engine single pilot capability and costs. There was nothing equivalent in general aviation prior to their arrival. The HondaJet is an innovative leader in this fairly hot space. There is a potential for air taxi services opened up by these VLJs as well.
- gscott 8y agoInstead of buying a 2.5 million dollar tear down house in Silicon Valley you rent for $800 a month far away and fly in every day.
- therein 8y agoI'm genuinely asking... what plane can one rent for $800 a month, and that's with payments for ground services aside?
- tlrobinson 8y agoI know you were joking, but I was curious so I looked it up: the HondaJet can get about 4MPG (though presumably less for short trips), jet fuel currently costs about $2.20 per gallon (not sure if that’s retail or wholesale), and let’s say Stockton to SJC which is about 84 miles (though I’d probably go somewhere up or down the coast, or maybe Tahoe). That’s only 84/4*2.2 = $46 each way, in about 20 minutes. Plus maintenance, storage, airport fees, pilot if you can’t fly it yourself, probably other stuff I don’t know about. Still, that’s a less fuel than I thought it would be.
- oceanswave 8y agoAnd, in at least one revision of the tax bill you would have gotten to write all those maintenance expenses off.
- gscott 8y agoInstead of buying a 5 million dollar house in Silicon Valley you rent for $800 a month far away and fly in every day.
- mseebach 8y ago> Otherwise we'll have to start posting all press releases for the latest Porsche, Ferrari or Lamborghini. Or... Tesla? Or any other car that is technologically novel, typically along some axis of self driving and/or electrical.
- segmondy 8y agoLook for the cirrus vision jet, it's about $2million.
- oh_sigh 8y agoNot for me - last week I signed a contract on the now-deprecated HA-420. One thing that made me giggle is that in the elite they threw a seatbelt in the lavatory, meaning you can legally carry one more passenger now. Who's the lucky person that get's strapped in the shitter?
- roman_savchuk 8y agoThat's clearly for customers who are carrying captives in their jets.
- oceanswave 8y agoUncle bob, who’s a bit “leaky” shall we say
- oh_sigh 8y agoBut still want to stay on the good side of the FAA.
- bigtones 8y agoThe price for the new model is around USD $5.25 Million in case you were wondering... https://corporatejetinvestor.com/articles/honda-reveals-hondajet-elite-variant-321/ https://corporatejetinvestor.com/articles/honda-reveals-hond...
- ttul 8y agoOh. So my tiny SaaS company isn’t quite there yet.
- SenHeng 8y agoI don't believe real elites actually use things named elite. That's often something reserved for the more l33t among us. The Japanese really need to learn how to create better product names.
- mc32 8y agoTell that to Boom! But seriously, at the price point for this machine, name, branding is not that relevant. They could call it flying basket and if it delivers on TCO, people who use these things will buy them.
- exikyut 8y agoMaybe whoever worked in the Commodore marketing department sold really expensive things in a past job then? http://bash.org/?3763 http://bash.org/?3763
- asafira 8y ago"With a range of 1,427 nm..." Hm...I'm calling shenanigans.
- ggg9990 8y agoI feel like a big part of having a private jet is looking and feeling like a baller and I can’t see how that happens with those corny engine pods sitting way above the wings.
- perilunar 8y agoFor those curious about the unusual overwing engine pods, Wikipedia says: "The HondaJet’s overwing engine mount configuration was designed to maximize cabin space,[5] and achieve lower wave drag at a high Mach number." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_HA-420_HondaJet#Design https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_HA-420_HondaJet#Design The source document has more discussion of the issues involved: http://www.hondajet.com/Content/pdf/FlightInternational_CoverStory.pdf http://www.hondajet.com/Content/pdf/FlightInternational_Cove...
- pritambaral 8y agoThe source document is especially helpful. The overwing engine configuration is unusual because it has been an industry-accepted fact that flow interference (specifically, the conversion of the flow from laminar to turbulent) from the wing as the angle of attack increased beyond a few degrees — which happens during take-off, climb, and landing with wing-aerodynamic braking — would have significant-to-catastrophic effects on the engine's intake. Honda says they managed to find a sweet spot amidst the interference, using computational analysis and wind-tunnel testing. Computational analysis of turbulent flows is much more difficult than laminar flows, and wind-tunnel testing has been traditionally favoured over computational analysis for this reason. Honda also says they made their own airfoil and made the upper-skin extra smooth to keep the flow more laminar between the wing and the engine. This is impressive engineering. EDIT: Just noticed, the document claims the wing had to be made of metal instead of composites " to maintain the contour required for laminar flow".
- cup-of-tea 8y agoIs it normal to talk about a "high Mach number" for a subsonic aircraft?
- mseebach 8y agoYes. At high (sub sonic) speed and high altitude, you get close enough to the speed of sound that this starts to matter a lot. https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/35408/what-is-the-reason-for-changing-the-speed-reference-ias-or-mach-number-with-al https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/35408/what-is-t...
- ams6110 8y ago> The speakerless sound system ... the speakers are integrated into the side panels. So NOT speakerless, then?
- toomanybeersies 8y agoWhat's the target market for these kinds of jets? Millionaire private pilots, who want to sometimes fly their family and friends? Companies needing to fly an executive around? I don't quite see the practicality of a jet like this, it seems too small and short range to be economical to use in a business setting. Obviously there is a target market because they're making them, butI don't know what it is.
- starpilot 8y agoSame as Ferraris, except wealthier. No one needs a private jet. A turboprop is much more efficient. This is faster though, and there's a certain cachet to being able to say, "We took my jet."
- geff82 8y agoUsing a turboprop or a jet (should be) is a result of the specific requirements of a client. If it requires rather short trips on short runways, multiple landings a day and maybe the need to carry some larger items, a turboprop such as the Pilatus PC-12 or a Beech King Air 250 might be a better fit than some private jet. Then again, private jets come in all sorts of variety: if you have rather short runways and short trips, one of the smaller Cessna Citations might be the perfect fit. If you want to travel in comfort across the oceans, an Embraer Legacy or a Gulfstream have no competition from Turboprops at all. There are different planes for different needs.
- davidwihl 8y agoJets are able to fly higher than turboprops avoiding weather which be otherwise dangerous or uncomfortable
- ridgeguy 8y agoMaybe companies with execs who need to fly around. In high school, the father of a best friend was a VP of Circle K grocery stores. They had stores all over Arizona and New Mexico, many in very out-of-the-way locations. He was very much a hands-on manager. He got his private pilot's license, his twin engine and IFR ratings so he could fly the company's twin Baron on inspection tours of their stores. He did this two days/week, knew every one of the couple of hundred store managers by name and what their particular stores needed. No way he could have done that without the plane.
- Maarten88 8y ago"To continue enjoying the free content made available to you on this website, you must indicate that you understand and accept Bonnier Corp.’s use of cookies by selecting the "Allow all cookies" button below." If you click the "view details" there's a list of over 500 (!) cookies that you must consent to, with hundreds of companies, and not even an opt-out. Blatantly non compliant with GDPR, can't wait for the first warnings and fines to be served on these types of websites.
- ggg9990 8y agoIf the site isn’t offering any paid services to EU citizens how will the EU fine them?
- Maarten88 8y agoYou are seeing it wrong. Many of hose marketing companies are selling to European advertisers. So of course they have paid European customers. I am their product, and what they do with my data is illegal. How they'll be fined is another matter, of course. But let me say that as a EU citizen, I would not dare violate US law in any mayor way. And they do mention GDPR in their privacy statement (even if they lie about compliance) which is hopeful.
- tlrobinson 8y agoOh boy. I suspect “This website isn’t GDPR compliant!” will join the ranks of classic Hacker News rant comments like “Piping curl to bash is insecure!“, “Why does this website hijack my scrolling / autoplay videos / use 150% of my CPU?”, etc.
- blub 8y agoThese kinds of small rants play their small part in ensuring that the world stays in equilibrium. If no one complained, sites would use 800% of the CPU by now, every install procedure would be completely insecure and autoplay would become mandatory. Probably.
- jcims 8y ago
- headmelted 8y agoI don't get private jets. Even if I had Bezos money, I still don't understand why a private jet would ever work out an objectively better experience than flying first class except in very limited circumstances with lots of people. You'd need to have air crew, storage, fuel, maintenance and I would assume (I know nothing about how this works) a raft of permissions and clearances for every takeoff and landing. Even if you could easily afford all of the above with your skyscraper-sized cash piles, would it ever be worth the hassle to organize and maintain? Maybe you have someone handle that for you, but you have to hire them - or hire someone to hire them. When does it end? I really don't get the appeal.
- ricardobeat 8y agoAs an owner, you don’t really get to see or feel any of that. You walk into the terminal, use your pre-screened security pass, so no lines or x-ray, step into the plane and you’re off. Depending on the airport you might be able to drive up to the runway and step directly into the aircraft. You pay a commercial operator for the pilot, hangar and maintenance of the plane. How does that sound compared to flying coach? Source: none, I don’t own a private jet.
- TheSpiceIsLife 8y agoThe obvious answer to this is: because who doesn't want to own a private jet!
- dogma1138 8y agoA private jet allows you to be anywhere you need to be in the world on a whim. And more importantly it allows you to build your commute around your schedule not the other way around first class or not they won’t wait for you on the tarmac for 3 hours because a meeting is running late nor will they care if you need to be in Tokyo or not when you try to rebook the tickets and the next flight is completely full. If you can’t understand the value of this if you are making Bezos scale decisions then there isn’t anything more I can say. Also for Bezos nor for anyone else is it a hassle to manage this by the time you fly on your own jet your personal life is already run as a corporation.
- AnnoyingSwede 8y agoBeing a huge fan of Honda since 10 years this also sparked my interest. Do they develope their own jet engine and if so where can i get my hands on one for my CBR1000rr? :) Added info: 1,437 nm ~ 2,661 km Engine: Twin GE Honda Aero Engines HF120 turbofans
- davidwihl 8y agothey designed the engine first but since no one chose it, they then decided it build the plane too.
- AnnoyingSwede 8y agoI remember a friend who got the Honda Fireblade CBR919RR in 1997. The bike was amazing and i dreamed of it for close to 2 decades before i had my license. 6 years ago i finally got my first superbike, the 919RR. Let's see when the prices falls on one of these engines made in 2003, who knows, this might also be one of those belated dreams coming through.
- Gravityloss 8y agoIt's a sure sign of a bubble when there's a big swing up in bizjets. :)
- bigpoppa 8y agoDo they accept Bitcoin????