Quote:
Originally Posted by hackish
The biggest limiting factor with GA aircraft is the old engines they use. The PA31 we use (Piper Navajo) has two LT540's. That's 540ci (8.8L!!!) turbo and they make 350hp. We're talking like worse than the average american V8 there! The turbos keep the power up as you climb.
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Google says that the PA31 gets about 1,016 miles on 182 gallons of gas, or 5.6 mpg. I don't know of many cars that can get that kind of mileage at 211 kts. Do you measure your mpg, and does it go down even further at lower speeds?
Heck, even a fully loaded 737-700 gets 2,759 miles on 6,965 gallons. Southwest crams 137 passengers into that space, so that's about 54 passenger miles per gallon. A fully-loaded Suburban will beat that, but not at 400+ mph.