The Phoenix CRJ baseline specification assumes an aircraft with 20,000 airframe hours. Why?
Project Phoenix decided to use 20,000 hours as a benchmark. As the aircraft has an airframe life of 80,000 hours and cycles, at 20,000 hours the airframe is at only 25%of its design life. Bearing in mind that the average VIP aircraft will do less than 1,000 hours per year, the theoretical life remaining of the aircraft is over 60 years. In addition, Project Phoenix put all the CRJ’s through an extensive maintenance program prior to delivery.
