AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2017 - 62

between a 910 and a 930 are the panel, and
the price. The standard 910 lists for $3.683
million; the standard 930 goes for $3.979 million. The speeds, runway performance, fuel
burns, range, and all the rest are identical.
That includes what Daher calls its
"e-copilot." This is a standard system that
protects against under- and overspeeds by
using the Garmin GFC 700 autopilot servos.
Get too slow or too fast? A voice alert, not a
simple chime, sounds off. Get so slow that a
stall is imminent, and a stick-shaker physically vibrates the control column.
Either way, too slow or too fast, the servos will automatically lower or raise the
nose to correct. If you fight the controls in
these situations, the servos will fight back.

THE MULTIFUNCTION DISPLAY

(above) features larger engine
information and crew alerting
system graphics and text, and
SiriusXM datalink weather (facing page) and Garmin's GWX
70 airborne weather radar are
standard.
62 | AOPA PILOT October 2017

An angle of attack sensor and display is
also onboard, as is an emergency descent
management (EDM) feature. EDM monitors cabin altitude and, using the autopilot,
will automatically turn 90 degrees, squawk
7700, then descend the airplane to 15,000
feet. Meanwhile, a "use oxygen mask" voice
alert and PFD annunciation are invoked.
It's all designed to combat emergencies
such as pilot incapacitation caused by
hypoxia or other events.
Since June 2016, TBM 910s and 930s
have been fitted with a new go-around
feature. Let's say you're on an instrument
approach. You're on autopilot, past the
final approach fix, and have set the missed
approach altitude in the altitude preselect. You descend to minimums, and sure
enough, you don't see the runway. To activate the go-around function, press the
go-around button on the power lever and
power up. The command bars will automatically pop up to the correct climb pitch
attitude for your flap setting, guide you to
the missed approach altitude, and give you
cues to level off. Of course, these e-copilot
features are specifically aimed at making
the single pilot's workload and procedures

safer when things get challenging.
But the 910 isn't just about avionics. By removing the two aft-most seats,
the standard four- or five-seat cabin layout of the 910 or 930 can be rearranged to
make space for what Daher calls a "privacy compartment," which contains a
flushing toilet. And what a setup it is! No
cat-litter trays and fabric partitions here.
Instead, with the press of a button, what
looks like a standalone side-facing seat is
transformed into an enclosure sealed by
multiple hard doors that emerge from a
corner of the beefy seat structure. In what
must go down as one of the most ingenious toilet installations ever, an electric
motor deploys a sliding array of three carbon-fiber panels, one of which is equipped
with a mirror.
Go ahead and laugh, but the $36,635
option has proven popular. "Before this,
anyone wanting a turboprop single had
to buy a [Pilatus] PC-12 to get a flushing
toilet with a hard door," a Daher official
said, adding that three airplanes had been
sold on the strength of the "compartment"
alone. By the way, the compartment is retrofittable to TBMs with serial numbers
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2017
