Cessna Citation 501 Enters Turbine Disassembly at BAS

Some business jets entered the market trying to win the speed argument.

The early Citation family arrived with a different question: could a business jet be practical enough to use more often, at more airports, without turning every trip into a major-airport production?

The Cessna Citation 501 belongs to that first generation of answers.

It paired a straight wing with aft-mounted Pratt & Whitney Canada JT15D turbofans and built its reputation around practical turbine travel. It was not trying to be the loudest airplane in the brochure. It was trying to make the trip work.

Now one of those aircraft is in the BAS turbine hangar for disassembly.

The complete-aircraft mission has changed. The engines, avionics, landing gear, cabin equipment, and systems still have work ahead.

Cessna announced the Fanjet 500 in 1968, and the prototype first flew the following year. By 1971, the aircraft had been certified as the 500 Citation.

The airplane entered a market where turboprops offered useful airport access and established light jets offered significantly more speed. Cessna saw room between the two.

The company wanted turbine performance in an aircraft that could reach smaller airports, use shorter runways, and feel more approachable to operators moving up from high-end piston aircraft and turboprops. That meant making different design choices.

The early Citation used a straight wing instead of chasing the higher-speed advantages of a swept-wing design. Two JT15D turbofans were mounted at the rear of the fuselage. The result was an aircraft built around useful handling and practical airport capability rather than a single impressive cruise-speed number.

Speed mattered.

It just did not get the only vote.

As this Cessna Citation 501 moves through BAS disassembly, the supplied equipment list identifies the following components and systems for recovery. Final listings will reflect actual identification, available traceability, photographs, condition notes, pricing, and item-specific terms.

 

• X2 Pratt and Whitney JT15D-1A Engines
• X2 23080-001-1 Starter Generators
• X1 3-1418 Goodrich Nose Wheel
• X1 3-1490-1 Main Wheel
• Brakes
• Nose and Main Gear Struts, Oleos, and Actuators
• Sperry/Bendix Avionics Suite
• Sperry Autopilot
• Garmin GTN-750 (NON-XI)
• Garmin GTN-650 (NON-XI)
• X2 ED551A Electronic Displays
• Rosen Visors with Monorail system
• 5 place interior, 1 Pilot seat, 1 Copilot Seat, gray leather
• X2 MC10-16-101 Oxygen Masks
• 9912069-21 Refridgeration Package
• JBS5002-2 Parker Compressor Condenser Package
• Inlets, thrust reversers
• Blowdown Bottle

Need something from this Citation?
Call BAS Part Sales before the high-demand Citation parts move into someone else’s maintenance plan.
970-313-4823 or sales@baspartsales.com

Cessna continued refining the original Citation through the 1970s, adding wingspan, increasing gross weight, improving the engines, and expanding the aircraft’s performance envelope.

The Citation 501 sits in that early chapter of Citation development, before the family expanded into larger and faster aircraft. The basic idea was already established: build a light jet that could handle real business travel without demanding the longest runway or the most complicated operating environment available.

That formula became the starting point for the Citation II and the broader Citation family that followed.

Later Citations would add more cabin, more speed, more range, and more capability. The early aircraft established the working personality.

Get people where they need to go.

Do it without theater.

The 501 Citation:

THIS 501 BROUGHT A BROAD SYSTEMS PACKAGE

This particular Cessna Citation 501 brings more than one headline component into BAS recovery.

The supplied equipment list reaches across propulsion, electrical generation, avionics, autopilot equipment, landing gear, wheels, brakes, oxygen equipment, cabin furnishings, environmental systems, engine installation hardware, and thrust reversers.

That breadth matters.

A turbine disassembly creates the most fleet-support value when the recovery reaches beyond one marquee item. Operators and maintenance shops do not all arrive with the same requirement. One may be searching for a navigation unit. Another may need a wheel, actuator, seat, oxygen component, environmental-system part, or piece of engine installation hardware.

This aircraft gives the BAS parts team several systems to work with.

Citation 501

The recovery package includes two Pratt & Whitney Canada JT15D-1A engines.

The first engine is identified as PCE-7711, with 8,976.6 TT, 9,014 cycles, and 2,833.6 TSO.

The second is identified as PCE-76223, with 10,308.6 TT, 18,002 cycles, and 3,323.9 TSO.

Both engines are noted with fuel control unit issues.

Those notes matter. The available time figures help identify the engines and establish what is known, but they do not turn an as-removed engine into a condition promise. Individual listings will need to carry the available records, actual-item details, photographs, condition notes, and applicable terms.

The propulsion and electrical package also includes two 23080-001-1 starter generators, engine inlets, and thrust reversers.

That gives the recovery useful depth around the JT15D installation, not just the engines themselves.

The Cessna Citation 501 belongs to the generation that established Cessna’s light-jet formula.

Practical airport access. Straightforward business transportation. Turbine capability without unnecessary drama.

This aircraft has now moved into a different part of that working life.

As BAS disassembly progresses, the engines, avionics, landing gear components, cabin equipment, and systems will move from one complete airframe into individually identified inventory for Citation operators and maintenance shops.

The complete-aircraft mission has changed.

The useful hardware is heading back to work.