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Embraer has cut metal on the first pre-series Phenom 100 and revealed that delivery positions have once again been sold out until 2010, despite the manufacturer’s decision earlier this year to increase the very light jet’s production rate.
The first Phenom 100 component, produced at Embraer’s Sao Jose dos Campos plant, was digitally machined from a block of aluminium and will be mounted in the fuselage and connected to one of the aircraft’s engine pylons. Final assembly of the six-seat Phenom 100 will be performed at Gaviao Peixoto and the first customer aircraft is due to be delivered in mid-2008. Order backlog figures will be published at the end of the first half of this year, said Embraer senior programme manager executive aviation market Rodrigo Fanton, speaking last week at the company’s Paris office. The price of the Phenom 100 was raised to $2.85 million at the end of May, up from the introductory offer of $2.75 million.
Embraer last week convened a second meeting of its pilot and aircraft-owner “man-machine interface advisory group” in Brazil to evaluate the Phenom’s Prodigy flightdeck (above), which is based on Garmin’s G1000 integrated glass cockpit.
Source: Flight International
