Eclipse puts Eclipse 500 jets to the test as flight hours accumulate towards FAA certification

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND — May 02, 2006 — Eclipse Aviation, manufacturer of the revolutionary Eclipse 500 very light jet (VLJ), today announced that the Eclipse 500 test fleet has amassed 1,700 total flight hours on the path to FAA certification, with 700 hours accumulated in the last three months alone. Completing testing at an unprecedented rate, the company projects it will achieve FAA certification by the end of this quarter and EASA certification by the end of the year.

“It’s amazing to see the Eclipse 500 excitement build as we near certification and first customer deliveries,” said Vern Raburn, president and CEO of Eclipse Aviation. “Certification testing is progressing exceptionally well, and the Eclipse 500 is proving out the robust design, reliability and performance that it was built to deliver.”

Eclipse has put the flight hours to good use, flying its five test jets through their paces to achieve a series of significant testing milestones. Recent accomplishments included:

-Flight flutter compliance tests demonstrated that the Eclipse 500 was free from flutter, divergence, and control reversal within the aircraft’s dive speed envelope.

-Flight strain compliance tests collected in-flight strain gage data to validate the Finite Element Model used for structural analysis strength compliance.

-Induction system water ingestion and FOD ingestion compliance tests demonstrated that no hazardous quantities of water or foreign objects were ingested into the Eclipse 500 engines or static pressure system during aircraft operations.

-Air data performance compliance tests calibrated the aircraft’s installed air data system.

-Electrical power distribution flight tests validated the aircraft’s ability to descend from altitude and land safely within the jet battery’s endurance.

The company has also completed a series of ground tests including ground vibration testing, aircraft High Intensity Radiated Fields (HIRF) tests, aircraft lightning tests, fuel flow and pressure tests, landing gear ground operations and engine firewall tests.

The Eclipse 500 test fleet is comprised of seven aircraft, including five flying aircraft, one static test airframe and one fatigue airframe. The static airframe successfully completed certification static testing last September. Eclipse’s five flying aircraft have now amassed more than 1,700 flight hours in 1,250 flights. The highest utilization jet, N506EA, has proven the reliability of the Eclipse 500 design by completing almost 600 hours in just seven months with a demonstrated dispatch rate of over 99.50 percent.

About Eclipse

http://www.eclipseaviation.com.

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Andrew Broom
Original Release