Posted on 06/06/2006 4:54:17 PM PDT by G. Stolyarov II
Honda has built and ultraefficient vehicle that goes 1300 miles between fill ups. It carries 6-8 passengers - 8 Japanese and 6, sometimes 5 or 4 Americans.
Of course, there is always a catch.
The vehicle costs $1.5 million and the fuel is 80 cents a mile. Let's see, that's about a $1000 for a fill-up.
The vehicle of course is a Hondajet...a super efficient light jet that weighs about the same as an SUV.
And you thought that Honda only made cars, and motorcycles and lawnmowers and.... didn't you?
Great job, Honda.
What do you think?
The price needs to come down a bit.
Doesn't sound ready for prime time!
Guess a car seat and a booster seat would count as a full sized American? Otherwise, it might be worth looking into. The biggest problem I often have with fuel efficient SUVs is that they often only have room for five people, not seven and a dog.
We had a car that did that, but we put an engine in it and sold it.
At $2.80 a gallon, that would equal 3.5 miles to the gallon.
Given the large down payment, and let's not even mention insurance, I think I'll pass.
I haven't been to Japan recently but have been to Korea. The image of a short asain is gone. The younger generation (<30) are just as tall as any american. I've seen many that are packing on a few extra pounds which is something you never saw before.
LOL
Come on over to Fred's tdiclub.com http://www.tdiclub.com where you can read about our real world cars that get 750 miles to a fill up. That is 50 mpg on a 15 gallon tank - some better than that.
My neighbors ten-ton truck can do that. He delivers heating oil, and it works in the engine as well as it does in the furnace.
On the other hand, let's say you're going 2500 miles (across the country).
$ 0.80 per mile x 2500 = $2,000 to make the trip
Divide that by five people and you're talking about $400 per round trip.
That's less than a last-minute commercial air fare and I'm sure it's a lot more convenient and comfortable. I know that when I flew private (I had a friend who was a pilot), it sure was a lot easier to go out of VNY [Van Nuys Airport, used by private aviation] than LAX. And no tiresome TSA people - those guys are getting paranoid and it's easy to be sick of them.
I know that running a $50m Gulfstream IV is roughly competitive with first-class airfare to the equivalent destination for the capacity of the plane. This looks quite a bit cheaper than a Gulfstream.
You could do pretty well doing a timeshare - few people need a jet 24/7. Purchasing 1/20 of a jet would cost less than some cars. We'll see how running costs are. Aviation regulations are (quite rightly) pretty anal.
D
Sounds like my houseboat. It sleeps four, f***s eight.
It's a neat lookin' jet.
Divide that by five people and you're talking about $400 per round trip.
Might wanna check your math before you start selling tickets.
The Eclipse 500 puts it to shame and is not only proven with over 2500 advance orders but will start delivery this year.
Engines on top of the wings is the first for a light jet. The idea is to get the noise behind the passenger cabin, and the vibration isolated out on the wing, rather than the fuselage. They did a similar arrangement on Beech's Starship ( except the power was turboprops ). So they say, in the Starship you could hear the Hobbs Meter clicking from the pilot or copilot's seat. That's pretty quiet.
Your 5% of the plane will run you about 75K. Sounds good, right? that will only allow you a few hours per yer, which you pay an houly rate for, plus monthly fees, plus, plus. Condo jets are popular, but it still takes a bunch of bucks to play in the game.
The engine pylons on that rice rocket, unless the photo is decieving, look like nothing but drag.
BTW, I was in Bakersfield when Rutan came in with the 3/4 concept Starship and it was something to behold.
He took off with a King Air headed back to Mojave and the Starship climb rate was at least 4 times that of the King and was out of sight when the King was still climbing.
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