Stuttgart’s Eisele Flugdienst has acquired a second CJ2, courtesy of a private owner. The managed aircraft takes the company’s tally of CJs to four, with two CJ1s also on its

charter books.

Said md Fred Eisele: “We got the aircraft roughly six weeks ago and it fits into the fleet perfectly. It’s very economical, its price/value relation is very good, it has advanced technologies in regard to the cockpit, has a nice cabin, is very quiet like the CJ1 and is reasonably fast.

“Overall, it’s a top addition and we’re planning about 500 hours a year on the aircraft.”

Eisele says this latest CJ2 will differ in appearance from the company’s other CJ2 in that it has undergone a CJ3 paint scheme, on the request of the owner. He said: “The first one, which is my personal one, is pretty much customised. I did the design myself, together with the Cessna designers, and made a very special and unique job of it.”

It is Eisele’s guess that the owner will use the aircraft 90 per cent of

the time, with other charter customers taking up the other 10 per cent at weekends.

As a dedicated operator of Cessna aircraft, Eisele is in a good position to evaluate the potential usefulness of the in-production Cessna Mustang in its fleet.

The company’s owner said: “We have a lot of flights with only one or two passengers so the aircraft could fit into our game-plan. However, we are a very fleet-oriented company and we do not know if the Mustang will get the same type-rating as the CJ1 and 2 at the moment.

“Our fleet concept is that any pilot should be able to fly any aircraft. This is very important to us in order that we keep costs down. If you have two models in your fleet, it just raises the costs. So it’s a tricky question – perhaps we would be better buying a new CJ1 for say 2.6 million dollars than a new Mustang.

“The aircraft’s shortfield performance is very desirable, but our number one priority is to operate economically.”

It is no secret that Germany is still suffering from the effects of the world economy slump and indeed its own internal problems. Said Eisele: “It’s been bad, yes, but we are pretty lucky because we have regular customers who have solid businesses.

“We expect that from the beginning of next year, we will begin to see old customers coming back. In the past one and a half years, we have been more or less dependent on a few very good customers but in the future, I guess it will be shared among a bigger number of clients.”

In Eisele’s opinion, Germany has not emerged from its recession sooner because the country did not get the change of government it expected last year.

“It was a big disappointment,” he said “and we lost out on the psychological kick a change of government brings in boosting the motions of investment.”

At present, happy with its fleet of CJs, Eisele has no plans for further aircraft additions.