If Continental Motors ever had any doubts about the aerodiesel market, it erased them in July with the stroke of a pen with the company’s acquisition of the bankrupt assets of Thielert aircraft Engines GmbH. Despite a rocky ending for Thielert culminating in the jailing of its founder, Thielert (and Diamond) put aircraft diesels on the map during the last decade. With its own in-house Jet A TD300 and the addition of Thielert, Continental instantly becomes the market volume leader in aircraft diesel.
The Thielert buy gives Continental four diesel products—the 135-HP and 155-HP Centurions, the 230-HP TD300 and the certified but not-yet-produced 350-HP eight-cylinder Thielert-developed Centurion. Continental and its Chinese parent, AVIC International, also inherit an installed base of some 1800 engines from a company that has manufactured about 3500 engines in total.