Delivery Figures show SR22 King of GA

The General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA) yesterday released aircraft shipment figures for the 2017 year that show Cirrus Aircraft's SR22/T as the most popular general aviation aircraft made.

The 309 SR22s shipped to customers last year more than doubled the volume of the next most delivered aircraft, the 129 Cessna C172SPs. The Cirrus figures are the best reported in the last five years, and eclipse the combined deliveries of all Textron's single-engine piston range by a massive 23%.

"Our goal remains revolutionizing the personal flying experience for the pilot and passenger through innovation in performance and safety,”said Cirrus Aircraft Co-founder and CEO, Dale Klapmeier. “Our strong results in 2017 are a direct result of how our mission resonates with our customers. The SR Series, and now the Vision Jet, continue to reinvent personal aviation around the world.”

Cirrus also shipped 46 SR20s and 22 SF50 Vision jets, to take the company total to 377, a recent performance record.

Overall, manufacturers delivered 2324 aeroplanes to customers in 2017 compared to the 2268 of 2016, an increase of 2.5%. Helicopter shipments were up  7.5% world-wide.

Piper Aircraft delivered a very healthy 72 Archer IIIs, the best result in the past five years and a 50% increase over the previous peak of 48 in 2013. However, Piper failed to report any sales of the venerable Warrior and delivered only one twin-enigned Piper Seneca for the year. Despite that, the Vero Beach manufacturer still had a good year on the back of the Archer III and solid demand for the Piper Meridian/M500/M600, sales of which also reached a five-year high.

The Meridian was not the only solid performer in the single-engine turbo-prop (SETP) market, with Daher's TBM range also reaching a five-year personal best of 57 aircraft, six airframes above the average of 51 per year.

"The 2017 results confirm the continued appeal of our very fast turbo-prop for the owner-pilot population," commented Nicolas Chabbert, Senior Vice President of the Daher Airplane Business Unit, "with TBM 910s and TBM 930s acquired by current TBM owners and new customers alike.”

Conversely, demand for the Cessna Caravan range continued to soften, with the SETP recording shipments in 2017 of 69 aircraft, a drop of 18% on 2016 and the lowest sales performance in the past five years. With the Pilatus PC12 leading the category with 85 shipments, the SETP market seems to be holding up, but shows a move away from the utility aircraft towards the high-speed passenger transports.

In the twin market, Tecnam's P2006T wrested the market lead away from Diamond's DA42 for the first time since GAMA stared reporting Tecnam's figure. The 39 deliveries was 22% up on the 32 of 2016, but only three more than the DA42's 36 airframes.With Diamond also selling 33 of the seven-seat (in Australia) DA62 twins, the Chinese-owned Austrian company is still the Number One seller of twin-engine piston aircraft in the global GA market.

As well as the poor result for the Seneca, Textron's G58 Baron returned figures of 23 aircraft for 2017, which is 21% below the five-year average. However, the G58 did record a 43% increase in sales for the last quarter of 2017.

The award for best performer in the single-pilot jet market went to Honda's HA420 Hondajet, of which 43 aircraft were sent to customers in 2016. That is an 87% increase in sales over 2016, and reflects the rising output of the company's US plant. The HA420 performance seems to have come at the expense of perennial market leader Embraer, who's Phenom 100/300 range has seen demand decline gradually over the past five year. The 72 Phenoms delivered was 12% down on the five-year average of 82 aircraft.

Major Aircraft Shipments Q4 2017

Major Aircraft Shipments Year End 2017 vs Year End 2016