TWIN & TURBINE

Quest KODIAK An Aircraft with a Mission

Courtesy of Twin and Turbine 2009
 
By Steve Seibel
 
As a single-engine turboprop aircraft purposely developed for mission aviation, the Quest Aircraft Kodiak played a starring role in this year's EAA AirVenture 2009 "Fly4Life" celebration of humanitarian flying. The Fly4Life theme proved to be a perfect venue to display the Kodiak, which is in full production after eight years of design and certification work.
 
To date, of the 20 or so Kodiaks Quest Aircraft has manufactured from its Idaho factory, seven of the utility turboprops have been delivered to mission aviation organizations destined for New Guinea, Indonesia, Alaska, Borneo and other remote locations around the world.
 
"While the driving force behind the development of the Kodiak was to serve mission and humanitarian aviation needs, we also wanted to produce an airplane that would serve backcountry commercial needs," Quest Aircraft Chief Executive Officer Paul Schaller said. "We've been very please with the market acceptance of the Kodiak. Several Kodiaks have been delivered to customers for personal use as well as Part 135 operations and government organizations."
 
From its very conception, the Kodiak was designed from the ground-up, so to speak, to be specially suited for mission use. Tom Hamilton, founder of the kit plane manufacturer Stoddard-Hamilton Aircraft, and Dave Voetmann, a veteran mission pilot, teamed up to create the concept design.
 
"From the basic parameters put forth by mission aviators, first and foremost the Kodiak needed turbine power to burn jet fuel, since aviation fuel is fading away fast in the remote areas in which the aircraft was to operate," Schaller said. "Secondly, there were and still are very strict airstrip requirements. Many of the strips used by mission aviation are literally carved out of a jungle or situated at the edge of a cliff. So the directive was to create an airplane to burn jet fuel, get in
and out of short fields and spin on a dime basically in order to turn around on some of these runways. And, by the way, the aircraft need to carry a lot more."
 
With its discontinuous, cuffed wing and 750 statute horsepower Pratt & Whitney PT6A-34 turbine, the Quest Kodiak offers a most impressive power-to-weight ratio of nine pounds per horsepower. Topped with 320 gallons of Jet-A and at gross takeoff weight of 6,750 pounds, the Kodiak can take off in less than 700 feet, climb at 1,500 feet per minute, cruise more than 1,000 nautical miles at a round 180 knots, and land within the same 700 feet.
 
As an indication of the continued market development of the Kodiak, Quest Aircraft is now offering three different interior packages to meet individual customer requirements. In addition to the basic cargo/passenger "Tundra," with up to 10 seats, customers can select the "Timberline" or "Summit" configurations. The Timberline offers what Quest Aircraft calls "rugged comfort" with room for all sorts of gear, while the Summit features executive-style club seating and upscale cabinetry. The base price of a Kodiak is $1.45 million. 
 
By its very appearance and mission capability, the Quest Kodiak quite often is compared with the Cessna Model 208 Series Caravan. According to Quest CEO Schaller, any sort of Caravan/Kodiak side-by-side comparison is unwarranted, nor does the upstart Idaho company consider its product to be a direct competitor to Cessna's big turboprop.
 
"The Caravan has a very different design point," Schaller said. "That is, being a secondary feeder cargo hauler for FedEx, operating mostly off of asphalt. This is fine, but doesn't really work all that well in the jungle. What we have is a more powerful engine, with 750 horsepower instead of the Caravan's 675-horsepower PT -6, but in a smaller airplane. So the design thinking that went into the Kodiak was just a little different."
 
Designed for Mission Work 
 
Just as the Kodiak was a clean-sheet designed aircraft for mission aviation, partnership arrangements with mission organizations have formed the unique business model of Quest Aircraft. The company has financed development and production of the Kodiak with funds from various mission groups. As a return on this investment, the organizations receive discounts on the aircraft, and every 10th Kodiak is paid for by the sale of the other nine airplanes sold at retail.
 
"By design, the Kodiak is an aircraft for missionary aviation. By the same token, Quest Aircraft was founded to develop a new-generation aircraft to serve humanitarian and mission aviation needs, and we've worked very hard to see that vision achieved," said Schaller.
 
Mission Aviation Fellowship and JAARS are two mission organizations that have Kodiaks hard at work for their far-flung work. MAF is the transportation backbone for hundreds of humanitarian, missionary, and other organizations world wide, transporting missionaries, doctors, medical and crisis relief supplies throughout Africa, Asia, Eurasia, and Latin America. JAARS is a North Carolina-based organization that provides technical support and resources for Bible translation worldwide. Appropriately enough, these two mission organizations are members of a unique partnership arrangement that has produced the Kodiak type certificate and a fleet of turboprop aircraft that already is serving the Third World.
 
"These mission organizations basically helped us get started by buying airplanes to be delivered to them later," Schaller said. "And these organizations, our first customers, are continuing to help us grow the company. We have 50 airplanes now that are destined for delivery to the mission field."
 
The cooperative arrangement between Quest Aircraft and mission organizations has carried beyond certification of the Kodiak to deliveries of the airplane to a laundry list of foreign nations.
The JAARS Kodiak, Serial 008, is headed to Papua, New Guinea, while the Mission Aviation Fellowship Kodiak will go to Indonesia. Both organizations have been instrumental in working with overseas regulators for delivery of the aircraft.
 
"To get an airplane into these places requires a lot of cooperation with the local civil aviation authorities," Schaller said "Mission aviation organizations are doing the ground work for us as we
are getting set to place airplanes around the world. So, the partnerships from a financial standpoint, or even getting the specifications for the aircraft, have actually helped us grow the business internationally. It's a good cooperative relationship."
 
JAARS has four Kodiaks scheduled for delivery to New Guinea. The organization's long-term goal is to convert its aircraft fleet entirely to the turbine-powered Kodiak.
 
"We plan to move away from using Islanders and King Airs toward standardization with the Kodiak," JAARS Chief Pilot Bruce Powell said. "Besides the better availability of fuel, this will streamline our training program in that pilots will train and be familiar with only one aircraft."
 
Working toward the transition to a Kodiak fleet, JAARS already has begun training its pilots while
they are in furlough in the United States. "Most all of the pilots have considerable bush flying experience in piston aircraft, with limited turbine time," Powell said. "Ultimately, as we get more Kodiaks in the field, we'll start new pilots flying right seat for a year or so to get them up to speed."
 
As technical representative from JAARS to Quest Aircraft, as well as the organization's Kodiak Team coordinator, JAARS Assistant Director of Flight Standards Steve Ottaviano has been directly involved in development and certification of the Kodiak. Ottaviano admits that after 34 years of working with more than 70 types and models of aircraft, he's never met an airplane he didn't like, the Kodiak included.
 
"What separates the Kodiak from the rest," Ottaviano said, "is that this is a company and an aircraft with a mission. The Kodiak is a tool that will be a delight for both the servant and the served. It's a fine machine with excellent attributes for its mission. And it's only a start. The Kodiak will get even better as its creators make improvements."
 
As a Quest Aircraft board member since 2003 before becoming chief executive officer a year later, Schaller has extensive business experience at the senior executive level. He remains current as a Private Pilot flying his Piper Malibu, and before coming to Quest Aircraft he was chief executive officer of BrightLink Networks, a network equipment supplier. In his new and somewhat different role with Quest Aircraft, Schaller isn't reluctant to relate the goals of what essentially is a
faith-based initiative.
 
"We've never been shy in talking about what the company stands for," Schaller said. "This brings up the question: 'What's GE's goal?' It's earnings per share. What's Quest Aircraft's goal? Well, it's to save souls. That is, to help more unfortunate people in the far corners of the world to be saved and to live healthy lives."
 
Besides its partnerships with mission organizations, Quest Aircraft is isolated enough geographically at Sandpoint, in the northern panhandle of Idaho, to do some free thinking as to how to conduct its business. First of all, the company deals directly with customers, with no dealer network. Secondly, Quest Aircraft has countered conventional wisdom of aircraft manufacturers by developing and conducting its own pilot training program.
 
"We looked at the dealer network model, the way that it works, and determined it really isn't a very positive way of having a business operate," Schaller said. "We've been able to work directly with our customers in determining their needs, which actually is one of the benefits of being a small company, to distinguish ourselves in the marketplace."
 
Instead of contracting with an outside training provider, Quest Aircraft has developed its own FAA/ Industry Training Standard (FITS) approved Initial Training Course. The Kodiak flight deck features a Garmin G1000 avionics system with two primary flight displays, a central multifunction display and S-Tec 55X autopilot, making the airplane a Technologically Advanced Aircraft suited for the scenario-based FITS training regime.
 
"In many cases, hiring an outside training organization takes into consideration the liability question," Schaller said. "After examining this further, we've come to the conclusion that liability isn't that much of a factor in regard to a manufacturer's training program. I would much prefer to have us build a relationship with the customer by sharing the training experience."
 
While the Kodiak Initial Training Course is designed for a pilot who has no previous experience with Technologically Advanced Aircraft, many of Quest Aircraft's customers find it helpful to rent and fly smaller G1000 aircraft such as a Cessna Model 172R with the G1000, in order to learn the glass cockpit first.
 
"An essential objective of our training program is to have the customer know what they're capable of doing and what they're not capable of doing," Schaller said. "So we've developed a tool called the Personal Competency Outline that is a sort of informal agreement that the pilot signs on completion of factory training. This helps in determining personal limitations when they think back to that piece of paper they signed back in class."
 
To facilitate the Kodiak Initial Training Course, Quest Aircraft is partnering with Spokane Turbine Center, which operates a full-featured Kodiak flight simulator.
 
Among this Kodiak support base at the grass roots level is the "Kodiak Kids Program," sponsored by the International Association of Mission Aviation. The program began with a class of third graders in Indiana becoming inspired by missionary aviation stories. The kids decided to get involved, and thought they could somehow raise enough money to perhaps buy tires for a new Quest Kodiak. For seven months, they sold donuts, lemonade and buttons, along with giving some small change from savings and birthday gifts. The class became the original Kodiak Kids, ending up raising $375,000 – enough to secure a delivery position for a new Kodiak.
 
"At the end of the day, the overall objective is to establish a positive relationship with the customer," Schaller said. "Developing this airplane and building the customer base with our partners has been quite an adventure, but then again it's a lot of fun. The challenges of the aviation business are well known, however we've tried to innovate some things that you can do when you're small, but you can't do when you're big. And it's all very humbling to know that so many people around the world are praying for Quest, and giving their financial support, some of them by way of a pledge of only $10 a month for five years."
 
 ------------------
 
Steve Seibel started his career at Cessna Aircraft as a technical writer in the flight manuals group. Over the years, he has edited numerous Cessna publications and has written for trade and environmental magazines. A certified flight instructor with instrument and commercial ratings, Steve owns and flies a vintage 1963 Cessna Model 150-C.