Tecnam P2006T - the lightest twin-engine

italian technology is always something special a combination of puppy delight from the grace of some solutions and complete confusion from the insanity of others this concerns many types of vehicles including of course aviation and our today's hero is as italian as it gets since today we are getting acquainted with the brainchild of not some eminent giant for a start i think it will be useful to find out what kind of company is this technam kostruzioni aronatike teknam was founded in 1986 by brothers luigi and giovanni pascal yes the letter p in the aircraft indexes comes from their last name initially the company was engaged in the production of spare parts for large aircraft manufacturers such as boeing and atr but over time the capabilities reached such a level that they made it possible to think about their own aircraft fortunately the founding brothers already had experience in creating winged machines the teknam aircraft have long been fairly close to each other light two-seater monoplanes powered by different variations of their favorite rotax engines in the early 2000s one of the representatives of this design became a hit the aviators loved the p2002 sierra and the tecnam plant was producing two to three dozen of these flying marbles every month having firmly occupied the niche of lightweight single-engine pistons technem decided to take the next step the next step was the p-2006t their first twin-engine aircraft so we are at the magikov airfield in the moscow region the base of the aero region training center from the park of which today i am temporarily commandeering to drive around our today's hero the teknam p2006t is a twin-engine high-wing aircraft with a single tail fin these are all dry facts just look at this candy from the point of view of design most of the counterparts next to it look like tractors this likability has a practical meaning as it is not the goal in itself but techno's desire for aerodynamic quality meanwhile i will note that in spite of its cute appearance the plane is far from being as delicate as it might seem its airframe is predominantly metal this was done firstly so that the price tag would not be absolutely crazy the plane is not cheap anyway and secondly to simplify maintenance the p2006t can work not only from slick concrete runways but also from the ground high engine placement and an easily repairable metal airframe come in handy here the wing of the aircraft is straight direct along the leading edge and along the rear the console narrows slightly towards the tip mechanization is classic ailerons and flaps no slats in the front only light and a couple of aerodynamic elements integrated engine the cells two 100 liter or 53 gallon tanks in the consoles and large winglets in fact in comparison to the dimensions of the aircraft the winglets actually seem huge but they work the vortices on the tips are handled quite well and at high angles of attack stability is maintained the tail of the p2006 is not raised up and the fin is not very large it can for example go into the shadow of the fuselage during landing the horizontal stabilizer is also straight all turning with a trimmer simple but beautiful the landing gear of the p2006t is one of its features tricycle with a front swivel leg one small wheel on each support despite its modest appearance the landing gear is quite strong and easily holds the plane both on concrete and on the ground and a nice bonus of the p2006 t of course is that the landing gear is retractable just like the big guys this significantly improves aerodynamics and makes the plane even more attractive in flight the plane stands on the concrete of the airfield not bothering anyone at first glance if there are no comparable objects nearby the 2006 seems much larger than it actually is as if it is well slightly smaller than some dash 6. because of this small illusion the p2006t is often compared to more powerful and heavier aircraft but it is actually a baby 8.69 meters or 28 feet and 6 inches long and 11.4 meters 37 feet and 5 inches wingspan for example the cessna 172 which on the contrary seems to be quite small is smaller in both dimensions by literally 40 centimeters or 1.3 feet and here for a layman who is accustomed to economic logic the fewer engines the better an obvious question may arise a four-seater airplane with a maximum weight of about 1200 kilograms twin-engined do you have nowhere else to put these engines this question is a topic of eternal debate on the one hand the single engine concept is clearly successful 44 000 cessna 172 planes are proof of this but technem also has a couple of tricks up its sleeve and so to the power plant [Music] the tecnam 2006t is powered by two 100 horsepower rotax 912 s3 engines each equipped with a variable pitch 2 blade propeller first thought 100 horses is not enough some kind of budget option in fact it is and this is one of the features of our hero that distinguish it from the classics the rotax 912 is a horizontally opposed 4-cylinder engine with a displacement of approximately 1.2 liters compared to popular engines it is very modest and this comparison is somewhat reminiscent of comparing some four cylinder turbo from a volkswagen golf with a roaring v6 from a ford mustang the same comparison can be made in terms of power rotax engines are low powered but yielding in power and displacement this baby is gaining in other parameters rotax 912 in comparison with its colleagues is a rather young engine and it is in a number of solutions more technologically advanced not to say that it is straight up the newest but let's be honest many of its colleagues frankly are dinosaurs in addition it was originally created for low power which removes some of the reservations of modified and derailed engines which were originally more powerful as a result we have a light motor weighing about 60 kilograms quite cheap to buy and to maintain and having a fuel consumption of only about 20 liters per hour moreover rotax runs on ordinary gasoline not on the 100s f gas or kerosene ordinary gasoline from a gas station which is obviously much more affordable and cheaper in such a scenario over a long distance it may turn out that two rotaxes 912 could well compete with one classic aircraft engine in addition unification of systems from the manufacturer itself is added here technam has been familiar with rotax for a long time the guys clearly know how to handle them and the mass application can slightly reduce the cost by the way since we have a twin engine aircraft one might wonder about safety the plane can fly if one engine fails but with reservations if the load is small for example one pilot and a minimum of baggage the flight continues but if the plane is loaded it will still fly but with a slight loss of altitude not critical under normal conditions the pilot will have enough time to find the airfield and land you can't fly 90 minutes on one engine but i don't think technum applies for etops these capabilities made rotex very popular among light aircraft weighing about half a ton but in heavy airplanes their low power requires some compromises after all 200 horsepower on two motors is not a huge figure the p2006 t has a speed of 145 knots approximately 269 kilometers per hour and a ceiling of 4300 meters 14 000 feet not bad for a light single engine but not too much for a twin although again initially it seemed that a couple of small rotaxes won't be able to pull it at all lightness and aerodynamics help a lot but the load does not help the norm is 4 people or 280 kilograms 618 pounds under such conditions the range reaches 1200 kilometers 650 miles and the flight duration jumps over 4 hours the maximum payload is 411 kilograms 906 pounds decent but it is achieved as you understand due to the half empty tanks and heavily cut range [Music] [Music] the combination of these advantages and disadvantages makes the p2060 a very good patrol and observator or which is quite popular a trainer aircraft not very demanding in terms of flight performance and at the same time still remaining a full fledge to an engine aircraft with a very modest costs at least for fuel however in personal and business aviation passenger or cargo transportation i think you can find better options well enough about fiery hots it's time to see what this beauty has inside and at the very first attempt to enter the plane we notice a nuance which still needs to be thought of the teknam p2006t is a four-seater aircraft two rows but there are two doors for sitting on the front row there is one door on the left side and for seating on the back row there is one door on the right in fact it is quite practical and allows you to reduce the weight of the aircraft but intuitively at the first moment it is very strange now finally the cabin it is designed for four people including a pilot two seats in the front two in the back and behind them a pretty decent empty space to which the luggage goes the designers did a very good job here the cabin is surprisingly spacious and comfortable and it looks great a bonus is the location of the engines on the wing the absence of a buzzing propeller on the nose makes the front view prettier and the plane itself wouldn't need fairing on the nose more elegant under the fairing by the way it is completely empty except that at the bottom there's a niche for the front landing gear the air conditioning system of the aircraft is an overstatement it is represented by several channels from the surface of the airframe to the deflectors which work due to the incoming flow in flight there are no anti-icing systems either this would add a lot to the cost and it would be too much for an aircraft weighing 1200 kilograms the onboard equipment is hybrid combining a small number of analog instruments for critical systems and a glass cockpit the glass here is part of the garmin g950 with a high degree of automation of on-board systems control including a full-fledged autopilot functionally this is already a serious machine with which it is quite easy and comfortable to work again for educational purposes an excellent option in addition aviators are already cheerfully starting to put a fresh g1000nxi here and with it this is no longer general aviation but some kind of airbus the p2006t prototype was assembled at technem's capoeira plant and made its first test flight in 2007. in 2009 the aircraft passed easa certification and in 2010 received documents from the faa by that time the p2006t had already managed to show itself at air shows in europe and the united states so by the time serial deliveries began people already knew it the aircraft's capabilities and relative versatility allowed technum to make several modifications fairly quickly the p2016 is a standard civilian version in fact the one we are driving today the t2006a is a training version modified to meet the requirements of the italian air force the p2006 mri and mma versions are airplanes that push for more than four hours of flying the first is for naval patrols and the second is engaged in a variety of work in the sky such as aerial photography now tecnam offers a universal platform the version p2006 smp special missions platform which can do all kinds of work the aircraft has modifications to the cockpit and some of the equipment plus it has a slightly higher speed and range but otherwise it is identical to the base there is another interesting modification however it is made not quite by tecnam as part of the leap tech program nasa is exploring the concept of an electric aircraft and now is creating a flying lab with as many as 14 engines two of which work as conventional pistons and 12 more are switched on at high thrust modes and have an interesting design the x57 flying lab is being created yes precisely on the basis of the p2006 t and now we can touch upon probably the main drawback of the aircraft which however concerns not the flight performance and engineering the tecnam p2006t is pretty expensive european flying machines in general are not known to be especially cheap but six hundred thousand bucks is painful yes many other twin engines may be more expensive but our twin is not quite their direct competitor the secondary market here is even more contrasting but mainly because unlike the same cessna of which i repeat there's just an insane amount of all stripes and ages the secondary market of the p2006t is very modest the plane is quite new you can get a 20 year old 172 pretty cheap but a 20 year old twin you obviously won't find right now this especially affects the position in the american market where the decent cost of the aircraft is added by import duties while the price tags of local competitors are relieved of this burden and here arise questions like what is the strategy of technem in general the main production sites of the company are located in italy in naples and in kupla and they are establishing another production together with shenyang aircraft in china this gives an impression that their priority markets are europe and asia i will note that there are local offices and support centers in the usa and australia but given that large markets often require localization of production we can say that italians behave a little lazily there although who knows it is quite possible that over time we will also see the p2006 of the american assembly and then it will start pushing there much more actively but this is all prediction and sales strategy and the company knows how to do it by 2021 technem has delivered over 5 000 aircraft of various models worldwide yes these are not indicators of the giants of the industry but i must admit that for a small company with a couple of hundred employees this is very impressive and out of this flock about 600 units are precisely our twin engine p2006 ts and for its niche given the certain specificity of the aircraft 600 is quite a worthy figure pascals by the way still rule there the founding brothers alas have not survived to this day but instead of them their sons now cousins are in charge excellent flying thanks to the aero region training for providing the aircraft thanks to tecnam for creating this aircraft for us and thank you aviation enthusiasts for watching the video like and subscribe to the channel all the fun continues and if you want to watch the videos early see some exclusive behind the scenes content or just support the channel consider joining our patreon community fast flights and soft landings to you you

Channel: Skyships Eng

Views: 209,150

Keywords: tecnam, tecnam p2006t, tecnam twin, tecnam aircraft, p2006t aircraft, tecnam rotax, rotax engine, rotax 912, tecnam p2006t plane, p2006t plane

Id: daEnrRekd30

Length: 17min 13sec (1033 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 25 2021