Florida: Bravo or Ovation 2? -I opted for the Bravo, will fly over mountains each summer... high and low power settings???

[TLWM-21]

I'm in Florida. I fly a lot of 1 hour trips to the keys, jacksonville, Tallahassee, etc.   But I also fly to Atlanta, NC, and around 400 mile+ flights.     **I have 102 hours in a 1989 J model within the last 11 months.     I do plan to fly each summer to California, Montana, Colorado, British Colombia, etc., and to the same places on good weather days in the winter to ski.    In my business I will have clients all over the country, and I plan on flying to see clients through the country during the year. Because of my widespread travel aspirations, especially trips out west in the summer in mountainous regions, I opted for the Bravo instead of an Ovation 2; a Bravo with long range tanks....   The Ovation 2 may be better suited for the 60-90 minute hops around Florida, but the Bravo is most likely better suited for 4-5 hours flights across the country; Montana, Idaho, mountains etc. 

Fuel burn on the Bravo?   What will the fuel burn be at 160-170kts at 8,000 ft?

 

What are your 17,500 ft fuel burns at different power settings?

[NickG]

I have an Ovation (310 HP) based in Las Vegas. My mission is flights to LA, Houston, Oregon and Denver. There’s no route the Ovation cannot fly - I’m usually at between 12 and 16k, have on occasion gone to 18k plus but no full face mask so sort of capped there (I could get one tho…) Las Vegas to Houston in about 6 and a bit hours.
 

My O is 170-180 KTAS in 11.5-12.5 GPH LOP at those altitudes. There’s also flaming dragon mode if you want to kick it up closer to 190 KTAS and burn 17+ GPH (I don’t ). I have a useful load of #1100. I was seriously considering a Bravo but decided for the O after running through multiple scenarios (east to west, west to east) and my mission and useful load requirements. The O will outperform the Bravo at mid altitudes and do so sipping a lot less fuel. The Bravo will shine in the Flight Levels.

You’ll love the bravo but I couldn’t think of a better cross country bird for me than my Ovation. 

[FlyingScot]

9 hours ago, NickG said:

I have an Ovation (310 HP) based in Las Vegas. My mission is flights to LA, Houston, Oregon and Denver. There’s no route the Ovation cannot fly - I’m usually at between 12 and 16k, have on occasion gone to 18k plus but no full face mask so sort of capped there (I could get one tho…) Las Vegas to Houston in about 6 and a bit hours.
 

My O is 170-180 KTAS in 11.5-12.5 GPH LOP at those altitudes. There’s also flaming dragon mode if you want to kick it up closer to 190 KTAS and burn 17+ GPH (I don’t ). I have a useful load of #1100. I was seriously considering a Bravo but decided for the O after running through multiple scenarios (east to west, west to east) and my mission and useful load requirements. The O will outperform the Bravo at mid altitudes and do so sipping a lot less fuel. The Bravo will shine in the Flight Levels.

You’ll love the bravo but I couldn’t think of a better cross country bird for me than my Ovation. 

My experience exactly - and I do have a mask, although I hate wearing it so I rarely go above 18 (which would be the case in a Bravo as well ). The O is an amazing cross country machine and the speed+burn performance at mid-altitudes is phenomenal. 

[exM20K]

16 hours ago, TLWM-21 said:

Fuel burn on the Bravo?   What will the fuel burn be at 160-170kts at 8,000 ft?

 

What are your 17,500 ft fuel burns at different power settings?

Good choice of plane for the mission. You’ll want a FIKI bird, too.

Foreflight performance plus subscription has a variety of performance profiles. Adjust cruise down by 5% for the TKS drag, and you should be spot on.  Fltplan.com should have some free profiles as well. Cruise speed and fuel consumption alone are much less useful than the full flight performance profiles including climb and descent.

-dan