Sabre, since I get neither block-or-better nor bonuses for getting in under block, I am not feeling particularly sorry for you right about now... Jealous, yes, but not sorry.
Can't speak for the motivations of Eagle Saab drivers, but this Saab A-model driver has absolutely no reason to fly more slowly than necessary (SCHEDULED block time only), except to ensure we don't cook along so quickly that we routinely beat block times and end up with SHORTER block times on the same leg in future months. In any case, tearing along at near-light speeds is not the forte of our Saabs or ANY Saabs for that matter... But they are hardly "slow" in cruise. Slower than an ERJ? Sure. Poking along thirty knots slower than other TP's? No way. Unless you are talking about a Dornier, of course.
The A-model, at least, is heavily dependent upon the OAT to figure its' cruise speed (and ESPECIALLY climb performance). In winter months, you can easily hit the barber pole at any altitude from 10k on down in level flight. A few days ago I did an engine trend at 15k, at ISA-10, at "charted torque" minus four, and was still getting 229 in cruise with half a boatload of peeps. Now it won't do that in summer, not by a long shot... Lop off about 10kts IAS and you get the idea. Throw on the anti-ice and 33 pax and you can kill off another 5kts. Not a hot rod, but I know that other similar craft have similar capabilities. Also keep in mind that we (or should I say I) fly only at charted torque, even if the ITT allows a higher power setting. Our company manual describes any setting higher than that as "emergency power", and I for one don't feel like doing the "rug dance" later if I'm doing charted-plus and get caught... Even if it will shave a minute or two off the leg and give me more time to drink coffee at the destination airport.
Climb performance is another story. In recent weeks, the climb performance has been astonishing by comparison to the same airplanes in the summer months... 20pax, 3800lbs of fuel and 800lbs bags/cargo, doing over 1500fpm in the climb through the low teens at 180KIAS. Nice. And it's only astonishing to me because that same airplane with the same load in ISA+20 with the anti-ice engaged won't do 500fpm in the climb at 160KIAS. EEEEK!! More than once have I had to make the required "Center, unable to maintain 500 feet per minute in the climb" call. It's a little embarassing, but hey, at least I'm not WORKING for a living.
In any case, I rarely hear of anyone being slowed down behind us if we haven't been slowed down first. I can, however, relate to being slowed down going into and out of BOS behind a Dash (when I was in a 1900, not a Saab). Seemed like one time out of five we had to throttle back to keep from running them down. I always assumed it was a "block-or-better" thing and the Dash guys were padding their paychecks... Not that the Dash was inherently slow. But never having flown a Dash, I can't say one way or another. Perhaps a Dash driver with time in and out of BOS can help us out here?
