Piper Turbo Arrow IV .. Am I nuts??

[3 Point]

Wasn't comparing it to an Arrow but it does stack up well in the payload department. Why would you want wheels down without flaps - no reason I can see. You're either taking off, cruising or landing - only two configurations needed, up or down!

To wind the gear without causing the aeroplane to porpoise just trim LOL!

Anyway, my point was that aeroplanes are more than a list of performance measurements and statistics - you go to like them too. I like my Horizon!

[M-ONGO]

The Horizon flew nicely but just does not do it in the looks department. The only decent looking French aircraft are the Falcon 2000 series, CAP 10's, Robin/Jodels and the venerable Broussard. I had a share in G-AZAW many moons ago. The turbo Arrow is IMHO a fantastic bird. Many schools use them for JAA CPL training. This has kept demand for good examples high.

[peterh337]

The only decent looking French aircraft are the Falcon 2000 series, CAP 10's, Robin/Jodels and the venerable Broussard

Really?

[Pace]

Peter

What a lovely picture of the TB! I don't know that much about the Arrow 4 other than many considered the more conventional arrow 3 to be better?
I used to fly a Grumman Tiger which I rated highly as a fixed gear fixed prop single which would do 130 kts with nice handling, good visibility and loads of Character.
I also used to love the rolls Royce of singled the Commander 114 which had superb looks , spacious cabin great build quality and an undercarriage built like a tank.
What range do you safely get on your aircraft and what is the difference on the Gt as I know someone interested in
Buying a Gt.

Pace

[thing]

and an undercarriage built like a tank.

You haven't seen the one at Fenland....

[M-ONGO]

Really?

In my humble opinion, yes. I'm not a fan of the TB series for the following reasons:

The doors - not the best for emergency egress in a forced landing.

Relatively high best glide speed (as does the Arrow 4)

The instrument panel looks like Renault designed it (granted, older Pipers are not much better but have you seen a TB10/20's after years of student use?)

From your excellent website

Construction was mostly aluminium, with a curved composite roof and a lot of car-type plastic (a little like a 1970s Renault - apparently they designed the interior)

Not so fantastic visibility from either front seat

Plus sides of the TB series that I can contest to:

Comfy seats relative to other SEP's

Fairly decent rear seating position

Despite its 1970s design, the aircraft looks a lot more modern than most other GA types

to that, I will agree.

It's all a matter of personal opinion Peter, horses for courses. I've instructed on both TB's and the Piper range. Most students seem to prefer the Piper range, certainly most instructional/rental operators do.

[thing]

Must say I was looking at a TB10 yesterday and the windshield seemed very narrow in depth, whats the view out like Peter?

[peterh337]

What range do you safely get on your aircraft and what is the difference on the Gt as I know someone interested in Buying a Gt.

The zero-fuel range, assuming a climb to ~FL100, is about 1350nm at a TAS of 140kt. This is at peak EGT and is well above the book figure which is at a higher power setting.

The GT changes are numerous, with the ~2-3" extra headroom (composite roof) and the retracting footsteps being the most visible. Many small changes e.g. beefed up gear relays. However I have never seen an exhaustive list. The GT is well worth going for if you can afford the extra cost (a good one is about £140k, though some advertisers are asking silly money) and anyway a privately operated hangared 2002/2003 GT should be close to new in terms of general condition.

The doors - not the best for emergency egress in a forced landing.

Why? They seem to work just fine, unlike e.g. the Piper door which is held by two locks and potentially much more likely to jam. To use a metaphor, all the single door planes are death traps. If you have an obese person in the front RHS, nobody is getting out in a hurry.

Relatively high best glide speed (as does the Arrow 4)

That goes with aerodynamic efficiency. The designer will always aim for Vs to be just below the max permitted for SE (61kt IIRC) which is why all the IFR tourers have a Vs of 59-60kt, and Vbg follows directly from that.

The instrument panel looks like Renault designed it (granted, older Pipers are not much better but have you seen a TB10/20's after years of student use?)

I agree; you cannot stick a jackboot into it too many times, whereas you can into a steam boiler panel. I don't see a solution however, you will have the same issue with modern glass cockpits. One cannot just throw a headset on it, like so many people do. One has to show people where to put stuff, and where to grip to adjust the seats, etc.

not so fantastic visibility from either front seat

I don't see that. It is much better than anything "old" I have flown (PA28, C152, C172, etc). Other pilots comment similarly.

It's all a matter of personal opinion Peter, horses for courses. I've instructed on both TB's and the Piper range. Most students seem to prefer the Piper range, certainly most instructional/rental operators do.

I don't think the TB is suitable for kicking around the school scene. But there are other factors. Few operators want to train ab initio in a retractable (I believe TB20s were/are used in Indonesia etc) which leads to the TB10 etc and they were hugely overpriced during most of their manufacturing life. If you looked at the deals Cessna were offering on C172s, the TB10 was about 30% more.

But a TB20 cannot be compared with a TB10. They share only the similar looks. The TB20 totally outclasses the TB10, and every C172/182/PA28.

Must say I was looking at a TB10 yesterday and the windshield seemed very narrow in depth, whats the view out like Peter?

Not sure I understand you... narrow in depth? The view out is very good. Great for flying tight circuits to land.

[mmgreve]

To use a metaphor, all the single door planes are death traps. If you have an obese person in the front RHS, nobody is getting out in a hurry.

I have often wondered about this. I can understand structural reasons for only having one door, although I am sure they can be overcome even by Piper (look at the rear doors in a Saratoga !).

If you decide only to have one door however, why not have it in the pilot side? It is not only Piper, also Mooney, Beech and others, so surely there is a good reason!

The only reason I can see is the "gentleman argument" of the pilot not leaving the airplane in a crash before all passengers are out, but as Peter points out, I can also imagine situations where it would be good to have the pilot out first to be able to pull/ break glass from the outside, etc.

In daily use (i.e. when we are not in a crash, which after all is most days), it is a real pain. My wife hates having to stand freezing on the appron while I do the walk around, etc.....and the time I wanted to double check if the luggage hatch was properly closed, she was thorougly unimpressed.

why, oh why?

[Pace]

Peter

All these aircraft have plus and minus points so it usually comes down to what someone is looking for and what turns them on
I have flown a few TB20s and something did not work for me in the concept of the design which was to make an aircraft feel more like a car in its interior layout.
That is ok but as in a car the interior design can quickly look dated as new materials and mouldings come into play.
The strong point appears to be the range.

Pace

[peterh337]

I agree the TB interior is easily "dated" in the way that a lot of today's cars will look awfully dated in 5 years' time. But you get a very ergonomic layout in a GT



which beats most Piper/Cessna layouts which tend to be rather haphazard, especially by the time they have been upgraded to something from the 1990s

TB20 strong points are

- great looks
- great range
- best MPG for the cockpit size
- human-friendly cockpit
- great performance - 155kt TAS at FL080-140, ceiling FL200 which gets you above 99% of non-frontal weather
- easy to work on
- easy to obtain parts (some are pricey but that is true for most "advanced" planes)
- the most reliable gear on the retract scene
- good short runway capability for the type (500m tarmac is easy)
- a very stable IFR platform
- normally-aspirated engine, 250HP, makes TBO in most cases

Downsides will depend on your usage. Avionics installers hate the hard to get to centre stack (especially those who don't know where the screws are). For night ops on unlit taxiways, the LH-only taxi light is near-useless for turning right; an added RH light is possible but involves a lot of paperwork.

But there is a reason why, after 10 years of ownership of a TB20GT from new, I have no desire to change. And I could buy an SR22 anytime, which goes a bit quicker, burns quite a bit more juice to do it, and has a chute But I actually prefer the TB20, for my "mission profile" which is UK messing about with an occassional long foreign trip. The only realistic upgrade is a Jetprop but one would not be doing the messing-about in that, so a more long range mission profile would be needed, and that is why I don't have a Jetprop already.

[M-ONGO]

Hello Peter

[QUOTE][Why? They seem to work just fine, unlike e.g. the Piper door which is held by two locks and potentially much more likely to jam. To use a metaphor, all the single door planes are death traps. If you have an obese person in the front RHS, nobody is getting out in a hurry./QUOTE]

The fact of the matter is that gull wing/swing doors on aircraft, despite normally there being two of them, are dangerous in the event of a forced landing on a rough or ploughed area. If (very likely) the aircraft were to invert, I'd rather take my chances with an unlatched before impact single entry Piper door. God forbid a ditching... Forgetting the kick out 'exits' in the rear of course.

[peterh337]

I agree re the inverted aircraft scenario. Then you have to kick out the rear windows.

But this seems very rare. The POH procedure for a rough landing is gear-up, and from my reading of accident reports very few of those end up inverted.

I also don't see a special issue with ditching. A number of TBs have been ditched, successfully. One quite recently as it happens, and he was in the raft with just his feet wet (I know him).

If you decide only to have one door however, why not have it in the pilot side? It is not only Piper, also Mooney, Beech and others, so surely there is a good reason!

I suspect the reason is to enable passenger(s) to get in and out without the pilot having to do so as well. Historically, many years ago, these types would have been used for a lot of paying passenger transport ops. But that's only my guess - it goes back to at least the 1940s.

[M-ONGO]

The POH/QRH procedure for most retractables is to land gear up in that event. Winding up inverted is not uncommon in many scenarios! I stand by my last - i'd rather be in an aircraft with conventional doors in that scenario. Even worse in a TB9 or 10 though!

What caused the ditching of your friend? Again, I'd rather not ditch at all... If I had to, give me conventional door(s) again.

[thing]

Not sure I understand you... narrow in depth? The view out is very good. Great for flying tight circuits to land.

The distance from the top to the bottom of the windshield. I haven't sat in one so can't comment about the view from the inside.

[flyinkiwi]

That TB20 dash looks like KITT from Knight Rider in a cool retro kind of way.

[flyinkiwi]

Cows getting bigger: you said that the Arrow gives you:

A 'feeling' that the aircraft really doesn't want to fly when taking-off.

Can you elaborate? You have a lot more Arrow time than I do but I've never felt they were sluggish or unresponsive, just a little nose heavier than your average Cherokee.

[maehhh]

Well in my (limited) experience with a T-tail arrow

Even after reaching Vr u still need a scary lot of force to pull the stick back and eventually get the nose off the ground. For a second I was wondering if I messed up to read the airspeed indicator! To me it feels like the Arrow just doesn't want to leave the ground and even on the first seconds of initial climb-out the stick needs brutal force (compared to others) to keep the nose where u want it ... any other C182 or TB20 would have stalled within seconds if u'd pulled the stick like that


However i don't have experience on a Cherokee or any other P28 so i can't compare it to that...

[peterh337]

That TB20 dash looks like KITT from Knight Rider in a cool retro kind of way

That is the layout which came on the last TB20GTs made. Production wound down c. 2001, with deliveries continuing into 2002 and a few in 2003. It is basically very good reliable 1990's avionics - with the exception of the KFC225 autopilot which performs extremely well but continues to give sporadic trouble with its "smoking" servos. The panel is factory standard except for the KI229 RMI which I got installed in place of an ADF, and the Sandel SN3500 EHSI which I put in to replace the original KI525.

I am loathe to do any more but a number of people have ripped it all out and put in a Garmin 500 which costs, with the "mandatory" GTN650 and other messing, best part of £40k. The finished job looks nice. Lower down, you can install the Aspen EFD-1000 but almost everybody has had problems with those; a colleague of mine is on his 4th one in 3 years.

[Genghis the Engineer]

Originally Posted by maehhh

Well in my (limited) experience with a T-tail arrow

Even after reaching Vr u still need a scary lot of force to pull the stick back and eventually get the nose off the ground. For a second I was wondering if I messed up to read the airspeed indicator! To me it feels like the Arrow just doesn't want to leave the ground and even on the first seconds of initial climb-out the stick needs brutal force (compared to others) to keep the nose where u want it ... any other C182 or TB20 would have stalled within seconds if u'd pulled the stick like that


However i don't have experience on a Cherokee or any other P28 so i can't compare it to that...

So you didn't trim it correctly for take-off, and it's very reluctant to stall.

I do find the forces in the Arrow a little higher than the Warrior, but not unacceptable at-all. Both are very hard to stall, which is hardly grounds for criticism.

G