AFSCME 3357-HOF'S BLOG

Honda flies Business Jet

For a half dozen years, Toyota has been making a big stink about entering the general aviation market. There was talk of modified Lexus passenger car engines for small aircraft. Last year, Toyota flew its own small aircraft design, but with an engine from another supplier. Since then Toyota has been quiet about its aircraft plans.

That's why it was a surprise to me to find out that Honda has two announcements on the aviation front. The most surprising of those was the announcement that Honda has test-flown it's own home-grown 6-seat business jet. This jet is Honda from the ground up, including twin 1700 lb jet turbines. The test flight was in North Carolina of all places.

Honda, in its usual quiet way, has not yet released any photos. The link below includes a sketch.

Honda denied any plans to market the jet, but come on, why develop a 6-place business jet unless you plan to do something with it? Most likely Honda is waiting for the right deal from a potential manufacturing partner.

The development of gas Turbine technology fits with a growing segment of Honda's business - small scale electrical generators and cogenerators. Honda has good market share for small generators with piston engines, but gas turbine technology is more efficient the larger you go. In addition, gas turbines could possibly be the engine technology of the future for hybrid cars. Volvo had a turbine-electric hybrid a decade ago that looked promising. When Chrysler test-marketed turbine cars in the 1960s, the lack of torque was a big problem. With electric motors turning out tons of torque, lack of torque would not be a problem for a hybrid.

Gas turbines have a number of advantages over piston engines. For a given power output, turbines can be made lighter, and potentially with fewer parts (but some parts must have high heat tolerance.) They can run on just about any type of fuel. When optimized and operated within their target output range, turbines can be more efficient.

In separate news, Honda has developed a piston engine for the broader light aircraft market. This engine, co-developed by Continental, has not been a secret, but has not been touted. It looks like the Honda piston engine may be on the verge of being marketed.


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