With new aircraft sales soft, buyers who really need business transportation are finding Cessnas older CitationJet 525s to be an alluring value. Theyre about to get even more attractive, now that Garmin and Cessna have announced a program to upgrade these legacy airframes to full glass cockpits with the popular G1000 suite. As configured for the CJ, the G1000 will be fully WAAS and RVSM capable and will include such features as synthetic vision, datalinked weather, SafeTaxi and traffic displays. Garmin will also certify the system with the GFC700 digital autopilot.
Garmin says it expects to receive STC approvals by the second quarter of 2010, with conversions to begin short thereafter. Since this upgrade represents a major mod, theyll be done by Cessnas Citation Service Centers. Owners should contact those centers for scheduling and pricing.
