A nerdy parlor game for aviation obsessives is to ponder how much further Mooney can stretch its decades old tube-and-sheet design into yet another new product. In this report, we’re looking at the M20V Acclaim Ultra, and that leaves four more alpha designators for something new.
Although it’s really an incremental upgrade to the long-body M20 series, the Acclaim Ultra was a major certification project for Mooney at a time when we’re not seeing many of those—from anyone. The results inarguably make the Acclaim Ultra the fastest four-place certified single-engine piston airplane and not just by a little. The Acclaim goes head to head with both its normally aspirated sibling, the Ovation Ultra (see February 2018 Aviation Consumer) and both Cirrus models, the SR22 and SR22T which, together, constitute the current market leaders. That puts the Acclaim into a niche within a niche—a slice of buyers who want speed, but care less about cabin size or payload. Pricewise, at $789,000 base, the Acclaim invoices below the typical Cirrus models.