Textron Aviation Introduces the King Air 260 – Featuring Innovative Cockpit Upgrades – to its Renowned Turboprop Lineup
Textron Aviation has unveiled the Beechcraft King Air 260, enhancing the legendary 200 series turboprop. Key upgrades include the IS&S ThrustSense Autothrottle, a new digital pressurization controller, and the Collins Aerospace Multi-Scan weather radar, aimed at easing pilot workloads. Production has commenced, with certification and deliveries slated for early 2021. This follows the King Air 360's FAA certification achieved in October. Textron emphasizes customer feedback in these advancements, reinforcing its commitment to innovation in aviation.
- Introduction of Beechcraft King Air 260 with advanced features.
- Production and delivery expected in early 2021, indicating strong market momentum.
- Customer-centric enhancements based on user feedback.
- None.
WICHITA, Kan.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Textron Aviation is launching an exciting new era for its renowned Beechcraft King Air 200 series aircraft with the introduction of the Beechcraft King Air 260 turboprop. Featuring the latest technological advancements to the cockpit and improvements in the cabin, the King Air 260 reflects the company’s continued commitment to making substantial investments to its current industry-leading products. Assembly production for the King Air 260 is already underway, and certification and deliveries are expected in early 2021.
The Beechcraft King Air 260 turboprop is designed and manufactured by Textron Aviation Inc., a Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT) company.
The announcement comes on the heels of the recently introduced Beechcraft King Air 360, which features the latest enhancements to the cockpit and cabin. The King Air 360 achieved FAA type certification in October, and customer deliveries are underway.
The King Air 260 combines the platform’s rich history of rugged reliability and versatility with state-of-the-art upgrades and next-generation capability, offering a greater ease of flying. Key enhancements to the aircraft are the addition of the Innovative Solutions & Support (IS&S) ThrustSense Autothrottle, along with a new digital pressurization controller. The cockpit also offers the Collins Aerospace Multi-Scan weather radar system as a standard feature on every King Air 260.
“These investments reflect our commitment to providing superior upgrades and engineering innovation that create the best flying experience for Beechcraft King Air 260 owners and operators around the world,” said Ron Draper, president and CEO. “We place an immense value on our conversations with our customers, and the investments we make in our aircraft are a direct result of listening to their input. I’m proud of the impressive effort by our team for taking a legendary aircraft and adding technological advancements that will allow customers to achieve their varied missions.”
About the King Air 260
With an occupancy of up to nine, a maximum range of 1,720 nautical miles and a top cruise speed of 310 ktas, the Beechcraft King Air 200 series aircraft has long been the aircraft of choice for customers around the world. The latest upgrades offer even more reasons for choosing the aircraft.
The ThrustSense Autothrottle supports pilots in their critical mission of delivering people or cargo by automatically managing engine power from the takeoff roll through the climb, cruise, descent, go-around and landing phases of flight. This enhancement reduces pilot workload and is designed to prevent over-speed or under-speed, over-temp and over-torque conditions.
Another key update in the cockpit is the new digital pressurization controller, which automatically schedules cabin pressurization during both climb and descent, reducing pilot workload and increasing overall passenger comfort. The pressurization gauges have been integrated with the powerful Collins Aerospace Pro Line Fusion flight deck.
The Collins Multi-Scan RTA-4112 weather radar provides pilots with a fully automatic system that it optimized to detect short, mid and long-range weather. The system is designed to present an accurate picture of the weather around the aircraft, further reducing pilot workload.
“The Beechcraft King Air lineup is the most popular business turboprop in the world,” said Rob Scholl, senior vice president, Sales and Flight Operations for Textron Aviation. “It’s essential for us to continue exploring ways to bring innovation to such a renowned aircraft, and these enhancements will allow owners and operators to accomplish their various missions with greater comfort, technology and ease.”
The IS&S ThrustSense Autothrottle is also available as an aftermarket upgrade through Textron Aviation Service facilities on all Pro Line Fusion-equipped Beechcraft King Air 200 series aircraft.
The cabin, meanwhile, features newly designed seats created through an innovative pressure-mapping process that identifies ways to provide a more comfortable, relaxing journey for passengers, especially on longer flights.
King Air leadership
Nearly 7,600 Beechcraft King Air turboprops have been delivered to customers around the world since 1964, making it the best-selling business turboprop family in the world. The worldwide fleet has surpassed 62 million flight hours in its 56 years, serving roles in all branches of the U.S. military and flying both commercial and special mission roles around the world.
About Textron Aviation
We inspire the journey of flight. For more than 90 years, Textron Aviation Inc., a Textron Inc. company, has empowered our collective talent across the Beechcraft, Cessna and Hawker brands to design and deliver the best aviation experience for our customers. With a range that includes everything from business jets, turboprops, and high-performance pistons, to special mission, military trainer and defense products, Textron Aviation has the most versatile and comprehensive aviation product portfolio in the world and a workforce that has produced more than half of all general aviation aircraft worldwide. Customers in more than 170 countries rely on our legendary performance, reliability and versatility, along with our trusted global customer service network, for affordable and flexible flight.
For more information, visit www.txtav.com | www.defense.txtav.com | www.scorpionjet.com.
About Textron Inc.
Textron Inc. is a multi-industry company that leverages its global network of aircraft, defense, industrial and finance businesses to provide customers with innovative solutions and services. Textron is known around the world for its powerful brands such as Bell, Cessna, Beechcraft, Hawker, Jacobsen, Kautex, Lycoming, E-Z-GO, Arctic Cat, Textron Systems, and TRU Simulation + Training. For more information, visit: www.textron.com
Certain statements in this press release are forward-looking statements which may project revenues or describe strategies, goals, outlook or other non-historical matters; these statements speak only as of the date on which they are made, and we undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, the efficacy of research and development investments to develop new products or unanticipated expenses in connection with the launching of significant new products or programs; the timing of our new product launches or certifications of our new aircraft products; our ability to keep pace with our competitors in the introduction of new products and upgrades with features and technologies desired by our customers; changes in government regulations or policies on the export and import of our products; volatility in the global economy or changes in worldwide political conditions that adversely impact demand for our products; performance issues with key suppliers or subcontractors; difficult conditions in the financial markets which may adversely impact our customers’ ability to fund or finance purchases of our products; and demand softness or volatility in the markets in which we do business.
