Originally Posted by
cardiomd
I like to "know" how much performance I can get out of my plane. If I have to do a steep bank into an accelerated stall, I can feel by the flight controls and the buffeting exactly how my plane will react, it talks to me before I will ever spin. The Cirrus really doesn't. I didn't really like flying the plane other than "Point A to Point B on auto most of the way" which is fine, but not the plane for me, nor for any of the numerous people who crashed.
I could fly it completely fine treating it like an airliner (like the person above said "never spin.") But for example I like to make short approach often just for fun, which I would never even consider doing in a Cirrus.
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If your dividing line between "an airliner" and GA is a spin, I guess I'm guilty as charged. We used it as a primary trainer with zero time students. Steep turns, stalls, etc. I didn't like the feel of a stall, not a crisp onset indication. With the stall warning computer I don't know how you'd get into a stall, that thing would wake the dead. While I didn't like the stall characteristics, I found it easy to avoid inadvertent stalls.
I don't know your definition of a short approach so I can't speak to that.
Personally, I didn't like it much. I found the sidestick intuitive, but I hated the spring loaded flight controls. But while I didn't like it, I never felt it was unsafe. And we solo'ed lots of folks in it.
The last report I had read on safety record was in avweb a year or so back. Perhaps the report was wrong, I was under the impression it had a pretty good record over last few years.