Monday, February 4, 2008

Mustang Wish List

Mustang Wish List

The most up to date version of the Wish List can be found at Mustang Wish List.

The Cessna Citation Mustang is a wonderful airplane, especially for a brand new design. I'm sure it, or its derivatives will continue to improve over time. This wish list was created to keep track of potential improvements. It is not a critique of the Mustang, but rather practical feedback to provide to Cessna in order to improve the product for every one's benefit. Thanks to various contributors for your ideas and suggestions.

If you have additional ideas or suggestions, email me at the address listed at the bottom of this page. Let me know if you would like credit for your suggestion.

See also my Mustang Review.

G1000 / Avionics:

  1. The G1000 should definitely preset V speeds on the PFD, rather than the manual error-prone process. It has all the necessary information.
  2. When entering an airway on a flight plan, the intermediate waypoints are not displayed. When ATC clears you to a later waypoint, the only option is to take out enroute charts and figure out the waypoint manually even though the G1000 knows. Perhaps there could be a manual "Expand / Collapse airway" menu item on the Flight Planning page.
  3. There is no way to do any "What If?" route planning. On a plane with two separate 430 or 530s, you can use the second to plan alternates for time, fuel or on-course heading / DTK. There is no way using the G1000.
  4. VNAV Planning:
    1. Show Top of Descent (TOD) distance. Right now, it is shown graphically and by time, not distance.
    2. Planning +x / -x miles from a waypoint is less intuitive than the 530/430 VNAV planning where plain English "Before / After" is used.
  5. The METAR graphical display flags are too large, obscuring too much information when zoomed out.
  6. EICAS: have more text available for the messages. There are too many obscure messages to memorize. At least allow highlighting an EICAS message and have a "More..." softkey to get an expanded description or suggested action in case an unfamiliar message appears. Obviously significant messages should be memorized by the pilot.
  7. Why does the "Go-around" button turn on the Flight Director, and the Autopilot FD button turn it off? Couldn't either one flip the state of the FD?
  8. A little tone or beep crossing 18,000' would be useful.
  9. Checklists should be available on the MFD.

Cabin / Comfort:
  1. Like any modern car, allow cockpit and cabin temperatures to be set by thermostat, rather than manually. The plane has a tendency to get warm during descents.
  2. At least a chemical toilet, instead of just a bag. Anyone have a good source moisture absorbing crystals as found in diapers? There have to be some good aftermarket solutions for this already.
  3. The cabin has too much plastic, like a mid-market American car, rather than the luxury details you'd expect from a private jet.

Entertainment / XM Radio.
  1. Passengers should be able to view the current XM channel in addition to changing it.
  2. Crew should have XM output in the cockpit that is muted automatically by ATC.
  3. There should be a external input for an MP3 or DVD audio available in the cabin that would be sent to all cabin headset outputs.
  4. Ideally, the XM radio should be detachable for use outside the plane.

Public Address:
  1. A real intercom should be available between crew and at least one cabin area, as found on some Caravans.
  2. The PA button should be a useful cabin announcement via the two cockpit speakers, which are already clearly audible in the cabin. This is worse if passengers are actually using the XM headphone jacks, since there's no way to break in for a PA announcement.

Headphones:
  1. Tip power should be sufficient to power other brands of headphones, such as Sennheiser, etc. besides just the Telex.
  2. LEMO plugs should be added for Bose or other types of powered headphones.


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