Mark Patey requires no introduction to the aviation world. The engineering-minded entrepreneur is one of the most prolific aircraft homebuilders and owns a 2001 Pilatus PC-12/45, which he is continually making refinements to.
The journey to owning one of the highest-performing PC-12s on the planet began several decades ago. Patey recalls that he and his twin brother randomly found themselves dreaming about aviation at the same time.
“Twenty-five years ago, Mike went to an air show in California with his father-in-law, and I found myself wandering around an airport in Provo, Utah. Neither of us knew the other was doing anything aviation-related that day,” he said.
“I found an airplane for sale on the ramp and thought that I should call my brother to tell him that we’re going to buy it. Then he told me that he was at an airshow and was going to call and tell me that we should find an airplane. That twin moment was the start of it. We bought an airplane, found an instructor, and started building airplanes. We’ve built fifteen in the last 25 years and I’m lucky enough to hold several national and world records in aviation.”
The two brothers have owned nearly 50 aircraft between the two of them since learning to fly. The PC-12 is the capstone of a cabin-class journey which includes a collection of turboprops and jets.
“This particular Pilatus was bought by a friend of ours in 2001. It has been on our field and within our close circle of influence, so we thought that it could be the aircraft that threads the needle on everything,” Patey said, advising that he had co-owned the aircraft for a while after determining it would be a good fit for his mission.
“The Premier didn’t have the range to come back to Utah with a full load of people from Galveston Island, where we have a home. You could either have range or payload with that jet and you struggled with both. It also had real trouble with short fields. Then the Eclipse jet was too small. The Meridian didn’t have the range or payload. We had always kind of said, ‘You know, one of these days we just need to stop playing and go to something like the Pilatus.”
Once Patey acquired full ownership of the aircraft four years ago, there was a laundry list of things he aimed to accomplish in the name of efficiency and performance enhancement.
“We bought [our former partner] out and then that’s when we went all out and decided to strip weight, update avionics, increase horsepower, and do everything humanly possible within the law to get a PC-12 to get more performance,” noting that an engine swap came first.
“Some of the things we did to the aircraft didn’t require STCs, and some did. One was the Finnoff engine conversion, where we went from the PT6A-67B engine to the -67P engine. On the Bravo motor, you’re limited to torque for five minutes, and then you have to pull it back to 36.9, whereas on the Papa motor, you can go to max torque, which I want to say is around 42, and carry it all the way through climb. So, your primary limitation becomes temp,” he said.
“I typically like to fly a little more conservative, about 40 degrees back of max temp which would be 720 degrees on the Bravo motor and 780 on the Papa. The ability to run continuous temp higher, especially at altitude, made such a difference. Instead of climbing at a gross weight up at 24,000 feet and doing 350 feet per minute, where you decide to stop because it’s not worth climbing anymore, now you are still doing 800 or 900 feet per minute. Now day-to-day you’re flying at 27,000 to 28,000 feet, above the weather and with a much higher true airspeed with a similar fuel flow because you’re higher.”
Another one of the forward-facing improvements in the head-to-toe makeover was the propeller. Patey’s choice reduced weight, as well as increased performance.
“We went to the five-blade composite propeller from Hartzell. I believe that it pulled about 50 pounds off the airplane, and it gave better takeoff performance during our flight testing. We were able to see a ten-percent shorter takeoff roll, which is a big deal because we fly our airplane into short runways in the backcountry. Between the new prop and engine, it was a net weight loss.”
With two projects completed, the PC-12 had grown stronger and slimmed down a little. It really started shedding weight during the following shop visits.
“The next thing we did was pull the Honeywell avionics out and added an entire Garmin panel. People would be shocked to see the kind of weight that comes out with all of the old computers and boxes that fill up the floor underneath the passenger cabin area. Not only did all of those boxes completely disappear and weren’t replaced with anything, but we also pulled the two massive wire bundles that went from the avionics all the way to the back of the airplane. We said to the shop that every single wire had to go instead of cutting and terminating them. I believe that just in the wires that were pulled, it was like 78 pounds. The whole project was responsible for around a 200-pound net loss.”
Weight savings aside, Patey appreciates the newer avionics suite for other reasons as well. There are several features that he feels are superior to other platforms and help ensure his family’s safety when in the air.
“And of course, now we have things like Smart Glide and a much more reliable autopilot. Our old autopilot was like many PC-12s where every time you hit really bad turbulence, it would give up and hand the plane back to you. A pilot should be able to fly the airplane in IMC while in bad turbulence without an autopilot, but unfortunately, we’ve seen accidents where the autopilot kicked off. And it always seems to stop at the time you need it most,” he said.
“I’ve now got almost 800 hours on the new panel, and it’s never once kicked off on me. When you’re flying a bumpy, windy, and rainy approach, I no longer have anxiety that any second the airplane’s going to hand the controls to me halfway through a turn or after a wing has dropped. The autopilot disconnect anxiety has been removed and I think that’s a big safety factor.”
“Perry,” as the aircraft has been nicknamed, sports a newer paint job as well. The distinct blue, black, and white livery travels down to the aircraft’s tail, which is adorned with the logo for Patey’s company, Best Aviation Products.
“When we build out Cubs, we always say that every gram counts. And when we built our race planes, we’d say that every ounce counts. The bigger the plane gets; it seems people tend to care less and less about weight. But when you come from racing airplanes, you understand that every pound you take out of the airplane is a pound that’s gone forever,” he said.
With this fact in mind, Patey stripped the airplane down to bare metal and formulated a game plan.
“We had all the paint stripped off the airplane. Usually, what people do is two to three coats of the base and then two to three coats of a clear to protect it. The Pilatus arguably has one of the largest wings out there, so on that surface we went with a single stage paint with two coats. By doing that on the wing and the main white areas of the airplane, we figure we saved probably 130 to 140 pounds of weight in paint by going to a single stage.”
But wait, there’s more! Patey figured there was a way to optimize the cabin of the aircraft as well. He removed a considerable amount of weight without trading the passenger seats in for lawn chairs.
“It’s so easy to get caught up looking for just a color and not thinking about the material. We found an artificial leather that is really thin, flexible, and as durable as the thick stuff and wrapped all ten seats in it. This cut the weight in half, and then we pulled the original carpet out. The roll was so heavy that I thought I was going to hurt my back picking it up,” Patey recalled.
“There’s an argument to be made for carpets being part of your soundproofing. But for me, it was performance over soundproofing, and I also knew there was soundproofing within the floor and the walls. So, we took the gamble and went with the thinnest, lightest-weight carpet we could find and saved another significant amount of weight. Then, there was a table in the back that was never used because a seat was in the way. So, we took that out completely and then had the side panels done with really thin, lightweight materials. In the end, we can measure no notable difference in the decibels in the cabin during flight with the lighter weight materials.”
Patey explained that just about everything that can be completed on the aircraft has been incorporated. The final result is an improved legacy PC-12 costing a fraction of a new NGX model.
“We now have a Pilatus with the more powerful Papa motor that comes in at 6,020 pounds. I’d argue this is the lightest Pilatus on the planet with seats in it. It takes a freight dog to get that light,” he said.
“The newer Pilatus has gotten heavier and heavier. There are improvements and things they’ve done, but for me, none that make up the extra weight. I’m sitting at 800 pounds lighter than another Pilatus on the field, and I have a 300-pound higher payload, even though he has a gross weight that is 500 pounds higher. Weight is speed. Weight is time to climb. Weight is short field takeoff and landing performance.”
The aircraft comfortably meets most of Patey’s demands, especially the frequent route taken with the seats and baggage area full to the brim. Many times throughout the year, 10 family members will fly aboard Perry enroute to Galveston, which is about a 1,050 nautical mile flight. Stopping for fuel on the way back when fighting westerly headwinds is an extremely rare occurrence.
“We have a range of around 1,650 nautical miles with an IFR reserve. This is not a whole lot different from other PC-12s, except if we are comparing it to the legacy Pilatus – we are doing that at a true airspeed of about 12 to 14 knots higher.”
