Is there a place for piston twins?
This is something I've thought about for a while. Is there a need for a replacement Piper PA31 type aircraft, or is that market completely dead?
What would you use instead?
It seems these days everyone is focused on single engine TPs or jets, but are they actually ecnomical to operate on shorter "Navajo country" routes?
Considering the amount of PA31 type aircraft still in operation there must be a shortage of replacement types. If you were to start with that type of operation today what aircraft type would you select?
What are you using if you replaced your Pipers?
Nope, I don't plan on building an aircraft, but I can't figure out what to use instead of a PA31 for shorter routes and with limited pax, short-ish fields and not all paved. Taxi/charter operation so requires twin engines and flexibility as well as decent speed and load hauling capacity from a variety of airstrips.
Normal flight times in the 1 hour range (at 180 kts) but up to 3 hours max.
tnx.