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Lusso ByJeffreyDecker
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TAKING GREAT LUXURYTOTHE NEXT LEVEL: TECNAM’S GRAN LUSSO
By Jeffrey Decker
What makes high-performance even better? Great luxury. Gran Lusso, as Tecnam names its new P2010 variant. The Italian manufacturer’s four-seat high-wing started its American tour at Oshkosh, showcasing a hand-stitched leather interior even more opulent than the prototype that first appeared in April at Aero Friedrich shafen. That aircraft is now flying over Europe, one of three sold to customers with high expectations.
It’s elegance and innovation in a sleek, powerful package, says U.S. Sales Director Dave Copeland. “Lamborghini, Ferrarri, those are code words for us, what people expect from the most luxurious sportscars,” he says. “They’re famous for clean, sleek innovation.”
Every touch surface is leather. “We’ve doubled the carpet in this aircraft. It’s a wool and silk blend.” Suede on the ceiling, extra storage compartments, a third door, new entry steps and standard metal paint... all those amenities add 39 pounds of weight over the previous P2010 certified just last year.
“We’re on a weight loss program,” Copeland adds. Swapping steel for aluminum and carbon fiber, plus a new battery, will drop 15 pounds.
Useful load is 805 pounds. Today’s endurance is up to 13 hours and with a 1,000 nm range and fuel capacity of 63 U.S. gallons (240 litres). A typical flight at 140 knots burns eight gallons per hour. At 120 knots its six gallons per hour in Continental’s Jet/diesel powered 170-hp engine. It’s turbocharged, the newest and most powerful engine of the CD-100 family. FADEC manages the fuel under redundant safety features and constant power up to 10,000 feet.
In back, the storage compartment can only be unlocked from the inside. “It’s more secure and it just makes more sense,” Copeland says. Seats rated to absorb 26Gs were tweaked for extra room. At six feet tall, Copeland fits easily in the back and has room to stretch up front with a fancy armrest at each side. Redesigning the center console leaves room for phones to charge up just behind the new trim control and parking brake, which formerly sprouted from the floor.
Francesco Sferra, sales and business development manager, lists how the control panel improved. “We redesigned it from the glare shield down,” he says. Standard FMS accompany the Garmin NXI touch-screen avionics suite. Its Tecnam’s Gran Lusso embodies elegance and innovation in a sleek powerful package. (Courtesy Jeffrey Decker)
Every surface touched by the pilot in Tecnam’s Gran Lusso is leather. (Courtesy Jeffrey Decker)
Tecnam’s Gran Lusso features a singleframe composite fuselage. (Courtesy Jeffrey Decker)
AFCS Control Unit GMC 707 autopilot with ESP has ample safety features. “If you get disoriented you just hit the button and level out.” Sferra explains.
No leading edge and no cuffs distract from clean aerodynamics. “It’s a very smooth aircraft because of its single-frame composite fuselage,” he says, though the wing is aluminum in case it gets dinged. “We decided not to go full composite because any problems you may have, a metal wing is much easier to fix.”
Sferra says Cirrus and Cessna customers are switching over, seeing value worth $626,750 per aircraft. Between 60 and 80 models of P2010s are produced
