Hier ist ein Pilot Report von einer Atlantiküberquerung mit einer grünen Falcon 2000LX, die zum Completion Center nach Little Rock in Arkansas überführt wurde.
Sehr interessant und informativ zugleich! 
The Flight Plan
I arrived at the Dassault factory delivery center in Bordeaux on an early June morning ready to make the leap across the Pond. I was lucky enough to fly with Dassault Aviation’s chief test pilot, Philippe Delehume and his first officer, Herve Laverne.
Philippe and Herve filed the flight plan for our aircraft–FWWGS (S/N196 in the 2000 line)–with JetPlan.com, a subsidiary of Jeppesen. After a little data churning,the JetPlan computer spit out a suggested routing that would burn the least amount of fuel. The numbers showed seven hours and 52 minutes at Mach 0.80 and aninitial cruising altitude of FL400. Afterburning off some fuel, we planned to climb to FL430. All aircraft flying the Atlantic that are CPDLC-equipped (controller pilot datalink communications) are reporting outside air temperature and upper-level winds back to
flight planning organizations hundreds of times each day to maintain the accuracy of the flight planning process. I’d be watching those numbers closely to see how well the 2000LX performed. Since the traditional North Atlantic tracks sandwich airliners between FL310 and FL390, we would be above that congestion and have the freedom to take a more direct route.
Score another one for business aviation.
The flight plan took us west northwest from Bordeaux to a point over the eastern Atlantic where we’d enter oceanic airspace for the longest portion of the flight. Because the forecast winds were light, our course would take us unusually south for an oceanic crossing. I had originally thought we might see the tip of Greenland, but we wouldn’t pass even close. We’d be carrying maximum fuel for the trip, just over 16,600 pounds, and planned to land at TEB with an hour’s reserve. Jetplan also computed our Equal Time Points (ETPs), to help us decide where to head if we experienced an engine failure or other critical emergency. When one engine quits, that is not the time to determine which way to go. With only a single operating engine, the 2000LX would also be unable to remain at FL400 and would inevitably drift down to FL300 to complete the trip. Should we experience a cabin depressurization, we’d need to drop down quickly to approximately 10,000 feet because of the lack of oxygen. At 10,000 feet, flight planning in a jet becomes a serious challenge because fuel burns can easily be double those at high altitude. Early in the trip an engine failure or shutdown meant a turn toward Shannon, Ireland. A bit later in the journey, we would transfer our option to Keflavik, Iceland, and farther west, to Gander, Newfoundland.
In the old days–or just a few years ago–there was an art of manual arithmetic needed to accurately calculate ETPs. Now the JetPlan provides them as part of the service. We all carefully examined the ETPs before takeoff to be certain they made sense. The weather said we’d see some undercast along the way across the Atlantic, but no convective activity of any kind. The weather at Teterboro was forecast to be slightly less than VFR for our arrival.
The Dassault ground crew at Bordeaux had already covered most of the major preflight items, such as fuel and oil. About the only job left for the pilots was the walkaround.
Since the aircraft was green and unpainted, it was easy to see how all the bits of metal were woven together to build the 2000, especially the winglets. The installation and certification of the winglets devolved for a time from a great idea into one with a few sticking points that emerged during flight testing. The winglets added more twist to the wing than regulators felt comfortable with, so much so in fact that at the extremes of testing the twist interfered with the operation of the leading-edge slats. The problem demanded a redesign of a portion of the
wing to more effectively handle the wing flex issue. The new design is now also standard on the 900LX, the Falcon 900 with Aviation Partner winglets.
A Green Machine
Climbing aboard a green airplane, you see plumbing and wires everywhere and little else in the cabin. Turn left at the top of the stairs and the cockpit is completely outfitted, but look tailward and bare metal and the potty way in the back are all there is to see. Loaded on board FWWGS was a
three-foot-square emergency kit with the cold-weather immersion suits and a liferaft, just in case. A closer inspection showed flare guns and radios, all items we hoped we’d never need. The cabin also held a considerable amount of ballast–on the order of 500 pounds–in the form of 22-pound lead plates placed just opposite the main cabin door to adjust the cg for the lack of an interior.
The 2000LX has the standard control wheel and yoke, something I must admit I frowned at slightly upon making my way to the left seat. Sorry, Dassault, but you spoiled me when you let me fly the sidestick- equipped 7X. The Airbus A380 I flew (see pilot report in July AIN) was also sidestick controlled, and it is the only way to fly. The 2000LX seats offer a wide range of powered positions that even tall folks should find comfortable. Philippe took me through the flow checklists before we lit the engines. On the Falcon everything works through the center multifunction display (MFD),
although each pilot has a cursor control device–the airplane version of a mouse– and a multifunction keyboard to enter datato the system. I found the 2000LX’s uncluttered panel very pleasing, even as it extends to the system’s layout on the board above our heads. I’ve never been in a 2000 before and it was pretty simple to figure out how things worked just by looking at them.
The 2000 has a single start button just below the center MFD that works for both engines. We turned on the two battery switches and the APU master to
initialize the APU computer and automatically open the system’s doors. The APU provides the source of high-pressure air to start the big Pratt & Whitney Canada motors. We needed only to confirm our position for the FMS before we started the engines.
Once we selected APU air, engine starts were more or less a nobrainer. Open the fuel cock and rotate and hold the starter switch for about two seconds. N1 settled in at about 22 percent with N2 at 51 percent.
On the ground we burned about 700 pounds total per hour. FWWGS was equipped with two GPS and two IRS systems for the trip. Before departure, we also ran through the FMS speeds page. Today we set up for 200 knots initially, until we’d eave low-altitude airspace, increasing during the climb to 260 knots (Mach 0.76) up through cruise altitude, where the temperature looked like it would be about 15 degrees C warmer than standard. We manually checked each point of the flight plan from Bordeaux to Teterboro. The large displays made adding waypoints and visually verifying the route easy from Bordeaux, like direct CAN (Cognac–yes, like the drink) to UN470 (the first airway) to SEPAL (the intersection where we would enter oceanic airspace). Philippe typed as Herve read the elements to make sure there were no errors. It took about seven minutes to enter the cyan-colored (not-activated) data. Flight plan activation changed all cyan data to white as confirmation.
