RAYTHEON AIRCRAFT COMPANY B200CT

The B200, introduced in 1981, is the developed Super King Air 200 with PT6A-42 engines that hold their power better at altitude, giving a higher cruise speed and a genuine 35,000-foot ceiling. It is the most numerous business turboprop ever built and the default aeroplane for air ambulance work, corporate flight departments, government agencies and charter operators worldwide. The airframe and engines did not change under this designation; the panel did. Aircraft up to the mid-1990s have conventional instruments and Collins Pro Line II radios; from late 1995 Beech offered an EFIS flight deck, and from late 2003 the Collins Pro Line 21 glass suite, which is what every late B200 has. The B200GT of 2008, with different propellers and engines, carries its own designation.

What a buyer gets is capability and support: it will carry eight people 1,500 miles, operate from short and rough runways, fly in ice, and be serviced almost anywhere. What it costs is two PT6s — hot sections, eventual overhauls, and around 100 gallons an hour — plus pressurisation, deice, a cabin-class annual and, for most operations, two pilots. Older B200s frequently need substantial avionics investment to remain legal in modern airspace, and that is a six-figure exercise. At exactly 12,500 lb no type rating is required, but formal initial and annual recurrent simulator training is universal and effectively mandatory for insurance.