Cessna CitationJet / CJ1 / M2 (C525)

The Cessna CitationJet, Model 525, is the aircraft that made jet ownership practical for pilots who flew themselves. Cessna's original Citation I of 1972 had pioneered the straightforward, slow-but-sensible light jet, but by the late 1980s it was outdated and out of production, and the company set out to replace it with something smaller, cheaper and easier to fly. Announced at the 1989 NBAA convention, the CitationJet paired a new laminar-flow wing with two tiny Williams FJ44 turbofans, an engine developed with Cessna that produced 1,900 lb of thrust each and weighed less than 450 lb.

The prototype flew on 29 April 1991 and deliveries began in March 1993. Certified for single-pilot operation and priced well below any competing jet, it found a market Cessna had hoped for and then some: 360 CitationJets were built before the upgraded CJ1 of 2000 added a Collins Pro Line 21 cockpit and a higher weight, the CJ1+ of 2005 brought FADEC engines, and the Citation M2 of 2013 modernised the airframe with Garmin G3000 touchscreen avionics, winglets and 1,965 lb FJ44-1AP-21 engines. The M2 Gen2 of 2022 refreshed the cabin again.

The Model 525 also spawned a family. The stretched CJ2 (525A), CJ3 (525B) and CJ4 (525C) each added cabin length, range and power while keeping single-pilot certification and much of the original's handling, and together the CJ series became the best-selling light-jet line in history, with more than 2,000 built across all variants.

The original-length 525, in its M2 form, remains in production in Wichita more than thirty years on, an owner-flown jet that cruises at 400 knots on a modest fuel bill and lands on 3,000 ft runways.

The CitationJet's design brief was simplicity. The wing is a natural-laminar-flow aerofoil developed with NASA, unswept and with a T-tail above it to keep the stabiliser out of the jet exhaust, and the straight wing gives docile low-speed handling and short-field performance at the cost of a cruise speed around Mach 0.70. The two Williams FJ44 engines are mounted on the rear fuselage; their small size and low fuel burn, about 130 US gallons an hour combined, are the heart of the aircraft's economics.

Successive versions have changed avionics more than airframe: the CitationJet's analogue panel gave way to Pro Line 21 in the CJ1, and the M2 carries Garmin's G3000 with three large displays and touchscreen controllers plus winglets that add a little range. Maximum take-off weight has risen from 10,400 lb to the M2's 10,700 lb. The cabin seats five to six passengers in a club arrangement behind the crew, with an externally serviced lavatory and a modest baggage compartment in the nose and tail.

The Model 525 family flies mainly for owner-pilots, small companies and charter operators in North America and Europe, with the M2 popular as a first jet for pilots moving up from turboprops. Fractional and jet-card programmes use CJs for short trips, air-ambulance operators fly them, and the type trains many pilots in their first jet type rating. Typical missions are 300- to 1,000-mile trips with two to four passengers into smaller airports, including the kind of 3,000 ft strips a larger jet cannot use.

A CitationJet is a small jet and feels like one: a cabin about 1.47 m wide and 1.45 m high, so you duck to board and sit in a club of four seats with one or two more at the rear, legroom that depends on who is opposite you, and large windows with the sky very close. It is pressurised, quiet for a light jet because the engines are far behind the cabin, and smooth at its 41,000 ft ceiling, above most weather. There is no cabin attendant and the lavatory is a belted seat with a curtain. Trips are short, which suits it. For the best seat, take the forward-facing club seat on the left, which has the view and the door nearby.

The CitationJet family has a straight wing (no sweep at all), a T-tail, and two small Williams engines on the rear fuselage with the characteristic Citation nose and a single-piece windscreen. The original 525/CJ1/M2 is the shortest member: a cabin with four windows per side and no winglets on early aircraft, winglets on the M2. The CJ2 adds a window and length, the CJ3 and CJ4 more still, with the CJ4 gaining a swept wing. Telling an M2 from a CJ1 on the ramp comes down to the winglets and the M2's slightly reshaped nose.