Diamond Owners Gather In Ontario For Second Annual Event

Despite the last minute cancellation of the airshow that was supposed to be a sister event for this year's DiamondFest Owner's meeting in London, Ontario; DiamondFest 2005 is off to an impressive start. 

With advance registrations already well ahead of last year's event, it's obvious that Diamond flyers are a dedicated flock. The second time around for this event is showing great promise as a cooperative venture between Diamond Aircraft and the Diamond Aircraft Pilot's and Owner's Organization (under the dynamic and exuberant leadership of Lance and MaryAnn Dietz).

Starting Thursday, June 23rd and proceeding through Saturday (the 25th), this year's event includes a number of owner assistance/education seminars, factory tours, demo flights and instructional programs, as well as an impressive array of door prizes, a number of quite pleasant social functions and a special opportunity to see and meet the Canadian Snowbirds.

Other outdoor events include flight demonstrations of the CF-18 Hornet and a Veteran's Flying Salute featuring some military aviation favorites. While the main airshow that was originally scheduled for the same weekend as this event was a casualty of finances, there remains plenty of exciting action to be seen in the skies over the London Airport.... especially Saturday.

Flying technologically advanced aircraft like the G1000 equipped DA40 and (soon) the DA42 and upcoming D-Jet make tech seminars a big deal at this event. In addition to official briefings on various pieces of equipment and technologies, there are several presentations scheduled with Diamond's North American boss, Peter Maurer (one of the best in the business) on the company, DA42 and D-Jet. Product seminars from Garmin, Hartzell, Cleveland, Honeywell, Jeppesen, Lycoming, Continental, Tanis, L3, and others expect to be well-attended events along with topical briefings from ANN Sponsor AirFleet Capital, Advocate Tax Consulting, ANN Sponsor Avemco Insurance, and XU Aviation (whose presentation, last year, on composite repair was a "Can't Miss").

The first day started busily with Garmin's Bob Cusick (above) answering questions from people who are starting to learn the nitty-gritty of the G1000 and are DYING to play "stump the tech-rep," and when we looked in, a few times, Bob was holding his own fairly well. It helps that there are a number of demo systems on display -- for current customers to check out solutions and techniques, while erstwhile purchasers find them an opportunity to get familiarized.

An early afternoon briefing from Peter Maurer (the first of several), brought the crowd up to date on Diamond, as a company. Maurer reported that Diamond DA20-C1 production was scheduled to be increased (they're obviously having no problem moving that product, based on the most recent GAMA report), while he also promised a future resumption of motorglider production after the birds receive an 'update.' He noted that there are now over 600 DA40s in owner's hands, while the addition of the Garmin G1000 is proving to be a "good long-term choice." Unfortunately, Peter noted that Diamond has no six-seater plans for the moment, but that they were, indeed, considering a novel aerodynamic retrofit kit (for flight training operations) that will allow the fixed gear DA40 to serve as something of a complex trainer via a series of mods that will simulate the effect of extending and retracting a retractable gear... including the possibility of partial gear failures and the like -- something you just can't do with real RG birds. Hmmm...

In response to a number of other questions, Peter (above) noted that there was no effort, as yet, to increase the allowable Gross Weight for the DA40 (explaining that they do have a pretty full plate at the moment), and that Diamond Aircraft is expected to stay a privately owned company, with no ambitions of "going public." He also allowed that Diamond had looked at air conditioning options for the DA40, but that its 180HP powerplant made such a power-hungry option problematic. Maurer did note that Diamond's growth has been steady and quite aggressive... and that with both the DA42 about to hit the market in serious numbers and the novel single-engine D-Jet on the horizon, that he expects Diamond to grow to become a 200-300 million dollar company employing over 1000 people -- and within five years. We don't doubt that for a second...

Next... more details from the tech seminars and Maurer's eagerly awaited briefing on the state of the DA42 light-twin program...

FMI: www.dapo.org, www.diamondair.com