CESSNA 414 CHANCELLOR - CESSNA'S BEST TWIN?

The piston twin is making a comeback. In the 1980s, under the pressures of high maintenance and high Avgas prices, the demand for piston twins collapsed in the face of Cessna Caravan and Pilatus PC-12 turbines. But now, the value proposition of a 40-year old piston twin is once again hard to beat.

- Guy Leitch

CABIN-CLASS PISTON twins used to be the planes of choice. Cessna was the leading producer of big twins, with more than a dozen models on the sales floors. Arguably the best of Cessna's big twins was the 414A Chancellor.

These big 400 series twins have it all: pressurisation, wide comfortable cabins – and twin engine redundancy.

Critics snidely comment that in a piston twin, if you lose an engine, the remaining engine is only there to take you to the scene of the crash. But in the hands of a well-trained pilot, a piston twin will happily fly on one in all flight regimes – except perhaps that brief minute or two after takeoff with a max all up weight when the gear and flaps are still hanging out. For 99.9% of a flight a piston twin’s second engine will get you home - whereas lose the engine of a single engine turboprop at any time in a flight and you're going down.

And then there's the price - a good used Pilatus PC-12 or TBM 700 will set you back R50 million and up. For that price you could have ten really great piston twins. Sure the performance may be 180 knots and not 260 knots but the lower fuel burn and maintenance more than y fly on make up for the slower cruise engine speed. And the difference in block time on a typical 200 nm sector is surprisingly small.

The Cessna piston twins peaked with the 421 Golden Eagle - which demanded so much of its engines it needed geared Continental turbos to get 375 horses. In response to criticism about the Golden Eagle’s geared engines, Cessna gave the 414 the fuselage, empennage, pressurisation and fuel system of the 421, but with 310 hp Continental TSIO-520 ungeared engines.