By the way, how isn't a Chipmunk a North American "spam can" - the engine? We can fix that, they're STC'd with Lycomings!
What! A Chippy with a Lycoming is NOT a Chippy! The look, sound, and character of the aeroplane are completely ruined by such a carbuncle! Would you fit a vintage Bugatti with a modern VW diesel engine just because it would be more oil-tight? And of course the DH
C 1 is Canadian!
I have hundreds of hours in C172s, a 205 and 180 (the latter two meat bombing - the 180 was almost OK), several tens in the C150 and PA38 and a handful (I'd have died of boredom were it more) in the PA28, including the Arrow. And many, many more in the Chippy, Cub, Yak52, Citabria and others, even the Tiger Moth with its awful ailerons and poor control harmony but bags of character that more than make up for that!
Brian Lecomber in one of his wonderful books described these spammy sort of aeroplanes as 'having the airman's art designed out of them'.
If you don't know what that means, or think 'so what?', I can never explain it to you.