A Cessna CitationJet equipped with Active Winglets by Sandpoint, Idaho-based Tamarack Aerospace Group has beaten the aircraft’s published climb performance to 41,000 feet by significant margins and confirmed the kit’s potential to save fuel, the company said, citing flight-test data.
During a recent 1,100-nautical mile test flight from Dallas to Jackson Hole, Wyo., a test aircraft saved 800 pounds of fuel over the route by being able to make the flight nonstop under “realistic operating conditions that included a 50-knot headwind,” Tamarack said in a news release.
Those and other test results are “validating” the fuel-saving potential of Active Winglets, expected to be available for the CitationJet in 2014, the company said. The winglets are expected to increase range and useful load, improve short-field performance, and lower the aircraft’s carbon emissions.
Winglet kits for the Cirrus SR22 single-engine aircraft are expected to become available in spring 2013, Tamarack said.