Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review
The six-seat Piper singles deliver a lot of utility for the price on the used market.
By
Ian McNeilly
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March 8, 2010
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
Saratoga
It's been 45 years since Piper stretched the Cherokee fuselage to create the Six, and the much refned version of
the airplane remains in production as the Saratoga II. That kind of production longevity is proof that Piper
found an enduring market niche for the PA-32 family, and solid demand on the used market even in today's
depressed conditions is additional evidence that the airplane can do what others can't.
The original four-seat Cherokee had been in production for only three years at Piper's then-new Vero Beach,
Florida, factory when the frst Cherokee Six was delivered in 1965. The Six fuselage was stretched more than
four feet compared with the original PA-28 Cherokee, and engine power was increased from 160 to 260 to pull
the heavier load.
Piper, however, added less than three feet to the wingspan of the Six, making the broad constant-chord
"Hershey bar" wing look even chunkier. The extended span was mostly at the tips, where the Six had an
additional fuel tank on each side, plus at the standard Cherokee tanks near the wing root.
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
The four-tank arrangement is one of the few pilot annoyances in the Six because your fuel reserve can end up
spread over all four tanks. The only way to concentrate your reserve in one or two tanks is to run the others dry
before switching. I can tell you that takes nerves of steel, particularly when fying in the clouds, because it can
take an eternity of seconds for the engine to catch again after you switch from the empty tank.
Another fuel system quirk of the Six is a handbook requirement to burn down the inboard tanks frst when
fying at higher weights. The reason is to reduce the wing bending moment. With the weight of fuel
concentrated at the tips, the load on the wing is spread a little more evenly than if both fuel and fuselage weight
are at the wing root. All larger airplanes have zero fuel weights that require all weight above that limit to be
fuel, not payload in the cabin. The Six was among the frst light airplanes to have a fuel weight limit. Many
larger airplanes have fuel systems that drain center tanks frst, but those systems are usually automated. In the
Six, it's up to the pilot to keep track. And the fuel selector is mounted down below the seats on the forward edge
of the wing spar where you can't easily see it, so tank switching is done mostly by feel.
Since the beginning the PA-32 family has had a passenger door on the left side of the fuselage in addition to the
standard entry door over the wing on the right side for access to the pilot seats. The passenger door is aft of the
wing's trailing edge, making it one of the easiest of all piston singles to enter and exit.
In a stroke of design foresight that pilots have praised for decades, Piper also put a baggage door on the left
side. The baggage door is about half the size of the passenger door and is hinged at the top, while the passenger
door has forward-mounted hinges. But when you open the passenger door and lift the baggage door, there is an
immense amount of room to load long and bulky objects. The door arrangement, probably more than any other
feature, has made the PA-32 a favorite for cargo haulers and, for obvious reasons, was the No. 1 choice for
fying funeral directors before steep insurance requirements stopped them from routinely transporting the
departed.
Many years ago Flying columnist Gordon Baxter wrote about fying funeral directors and their work to comfort
the living and hit upon the idea of why, in a fight plan or at the request from controllers, we always say "souls
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
on board," not persons. Most of us had never thought of that before.
The PA-32 cabin is the roomiest of the popular six-seat singles. Most of the series have club-style seating with
the center row of seats facing aft, and there is plenty of room for full-size adults to fnd space for their knees.
The cabin is wide enough that there is an option to add a third seating position in the middle row. It's tight for
adults but ideal for adding children to the payload. Most of the airplanes have a storage container or cooler
between the middle seats instead of the third belted position.
The original Cherokee Six had a six-cylinder 260 hp Lycoming with a fxed-pitch propeller as standard. The
fxed-pitch prop produced barely enough thrust to lift the Six off the runway, but the weight savings allowed
Piper to claim a useful load greater than the empty weight for the basic model. Few, if any, Sixes few with the
standard fxed-pitch propeller, which was replaced by the optional constant-speed prop. The engine also has a
carburetor, so carb ice is always a threat. By the second year of production, the Six was offered with a fuelinjected 300 hp version of the Lycoming 540 engine with a constant-speed prop standard.
The Six 300 turned out to be much more popular than the 260 version. The original price difference was $3,000.
That doesn't sound like a lot, but it did bump the base price from $18,500 for the 260 to $21,500, a signifcant
percentage increase. The Six 260 remained in production until 1978, and surprisingly, the price difference
between it and the 300 on the used market is about the same as it was when the airplanes were new. Most of the
difference in performance is in takeoff and climb, with higher weights amplifying that difference. Both models
were approved for 3,400 pounds maximum takeoff weight.
Most of the Cherokee Sixes have 84-gallon fuel capacity. At maximum cruise, the Six 300 on a good day can
make 145 knots, and the 260 around fve or six knots less. More typical cruise speeds are around 135 knots true,
and the 300 will consume around 15 gph while the 260 burns a gallon or two less. With full fuel the Six is a
fve-hour airplane with minimal reserve, but four hours is very comfortable.
In 1976 Piper retracted the landing gear on the Six and renamed the airplane the Lance. The Lance was built
with only the 300 hp engine. The fuselage and cabin were unchanged from the Six, and the wing was essentially
the same except for the structural mods necessary to create the wheel wells for the main gear to retract into. The
fuel was also contained in only two tanks in the Lance, one per wing mounted farther outboard than in the Six.
Eliminating the drag of the fxed landing gear added 10 or maybe even 15 knots to typical cruise speed, not as
much as many expected. There were rumors around Piper at the time that an aerodynamic cleanup and new
streamlined landing gear and wheel pants cut the drag on the Six enough that it matched the cruise of the Lance.
In the used market the Lance carries no price premium over the Six of similar vintage and condition, even
though the Lance cost around 25 percent more when new. The weight of the retractable gear system in the
Lance cut into useful load, which helps explain the market pricing, because most PA-32 buyers are very
interested in available payload.
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In 1978 Piper made what many believe is the only misstep in the progression of the PA-32 family — it put a Ttail on the Lance. Piper management was in love with T-tails at the time and claimed that the high position of
the horizontal got it out of the propeller slipstream where it could operate more effciently. To take advantage of
this hoped-for effciency gain, the tail was smaller than on previous models. The result was a loss of pitch
control authority at low airspeeds that was most noticeable during takeoffs. The T-tail Lance has to accelerate to
a higher airspeed before it will rotate nose-up, and even at that point it has a less satisfying response than the
Cherokee Six or frst Lance did with the conventional tail.
Piper also used the T-tail Lance as the launch platform for the frst turbocharged PA-32. The engine uses
updraft cooling with a huge oval opening in the lower part of the cowling to scoop in air and force it upward
over the cylinders. Updraft cooling has some theoretical advantages in lower drag and higher cooling effciency,
but the theory didn't deliver well in actual practice, and the turbo had signifcant cooling problems. Also, the
gaping hole in the cowling makes the turbo T-tail Lance the most unattractive airplane to roll off Piper's
assembly line.
What About Engine Time?
The Lycoming 540 engine in all models of the PA-32 carries a recommended TBO of 2,000 hours, which is at
least 300 hours more than for the engine in some other six-seat singles. Higher TBO is a good thing, but you
can't take it to the bank.A TBO recommendation is negotiated between the engine manufacturer and the
airframe maker and is only an estimate of how many hours on average the engine can operate before major
overhaul if fown regularly. Most pilots think only of the fight hour component of the TBO — 2,000 hours in
this case — but there is also a calendar time consideration. The TBO hour number is typically based on fying
the airplane 40 hours per month, or 480 hours a year. That means a 2,000-hour engine reaches its calendar TBO
in less than fve years.None of these numbers has any regulatory signifcance for pilots who fy under FAR Part
91 rules, which are those that govern personal and business fying not for hire. All that matters under Part 91 is
that an FAA-authorized inspector (IA) examines and signs off the engine during an annual inspection. Some
IAs become concerned when an engine is operated beyond its hourly TBO, but as long as oil consumption,
compression tests and other checks are within limits, the engine remains legal to fy. There are also no insurance
implications for fying an engine beyond its hourly TBO, because as long as it is signed off at the annual
inspection, the engine is airworthy by defnition.On the other hand, if problems are discovered at inspection, it
doesn't matter how little time is in the logbook. So TBO neither damns you nor saves you during the annual
inspection. Only the condition of the engine matters. The engine in the PA-32s costs an average of around
$30,000 to overhaul, with the turbocharged version costing as much as $20,000 more on average. So admire the
Lycoming's 2,000-hour TBO, but bank your engine reserve, not the number of fight hours, in the engine
logbook.
The T-tail Lance was not a hit with pilots, and Cherokee Sixes of the same vintage sell for at least a little more
in the used market even though the Lance was priced many thousands more when new. After two years of Ttailing — 1978 and 1979 — Piper corrected the situation by introducing the Saratoga, the biggest improvement
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
in appearance in the entire PA-32 history.
The Saratoga has the same basic fuselage and cabin as the Six and Lance, but the fat constant-chord wing is
replaced by a slender tapered wing with more than three feet of additional span. The wing taper begins where
the fap ends, providing space for a longer-span aileron that improves control effectiveness and, most pilots
report, makes control feel and harmony better. I could never decide for certain whether the Saratoga is that
much nicer to fy, or if I imagined it is because the tapered wing just looks so much more attractive and
aerodynamically pleasing. The Saratoga proved to be a sales success even though the general aviation market
was starting a long swoon when it was introduced in 1980.
Piper built the Saratoga in both fxed- and retractable-gear models, and turbocharging was available in both. The
horizontal tail was back in its traditional position, and the cowling on the turbo used the standard downdraft
cooling. The retractable model is called an HP to insinuate high performance. The Saratoga proved to be fve
knots or so faster than the Six, and the turbo HP could hit 165 knots at the top end. The Saratoga pulled ahead
of Cessna's six-seat 206 in cruise performance, and the turbo got within shouting distance of the six-seat A36
Bonanza.
Over the years, the Saratoga was refned in many ways, particularly in the quality of materials and ft-and-fnish
in the interior. In 1994 the Saratoga II was introduced with tiny, axisymmetric cooling air inlets in the cowling.
The size of the inlet is a fraction of the previous cowling, but the conical shape of the base of the inlet and its
precise position on the cowling proved to be as effcient as, or even more effcient than, the larger openings. The
Saratoga II gained a little speed from lower engine-cooling drag and also gained some panache with the hightech look of the new cowling.
The Saratoga II was the last signifcant external change in the PA-32 family, but all aspects of quality in and out
of the airplane continued to improve, along with avionics advances. The big change in the panel came in the
2005 model, in which Avidyne's Entegra fat-glass displays replaced conventional instruments. Garmin GNS
430s handled navigation and communication, and the Entegra system contained the nonmoving electronic
AHRS that replaced the standard gyros.
Piper tried to pump up PA-32 sales in 2004 with introduction of the 6X model, a stripped down version offered
with both naturally aspirated and turbocharged engines. The base price was $100,000 lower than for the
Saratoga II, but there were not a lot of takers. New airplane buyers wanted the glass avionics and other
advances the 6X lacked.
Single-Engine Airliner
As I taxied the airplane onto the runway, the nose-high attitude of the long snout was still giving me cause for
concern. I turned my head and glanced behind at the four other passengers seated comfortably in two separate
rows. I offered a sheepish grin to the man sitting beside me in the copilot seat. Six people. Six standard-size
adults. Would the airplane really fy? I had been methodical in the weight-and-balance calculation. The dot on
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Six Seat Stalwart: Used PA-32 Review | Flying Magazine
the chart put the airplane well within CG limits. I drew in a deep breath as we rolled down the 3,000-foot
runway at the Skaneateles Airport in upstate New York. Using barely half of the runway, the Cherokee Six leapt
into the air. I was impressed.The year was 1976. I was a 19-year-old fight instructor. My passengers, like
myself, were employees of a local FBO in Syracuse. We were bound for Vero Beach, Florida. Our mission was
to ferry fve brand-new airplanes back from the Piper factory. As far as I was concerned, my PIC assignment on
that day might as well have been the cockpit of a 747. My fondness for the Cherokee Six has remained ever
since.For countless years I had threatened to buy an airplane. My friends had rolled their eyes wondering when I
would shut up and get it done. Although most of my window-shopping extolled the virtues of twin-engine
redundancy, the Cherokee Six always seemed to creep back into my thoughts. Why?Granted, my airline
mentality is more comfortable with at least two of everything. I agonized over the never-ending single vs. twin
debate. But two of everything is expensive. Could I mitigate the risk with new parts, proper maintenance and
well-equipped avionics? The answer was yes.With that rationale in mind, there was no better or more
operationally affordable airplane for me than a Cherokee Six. It is my single-engine airliner. Although the
airplane has seven seats, the useful load allows four adults and their baggage to ride in comfort with full fuel
tanks. And if I choose to stuff more people into the airplane, the aft entry door makes climbing aboard easy. A
forward baggage compartment and an aft baggage compartment keep cabin clutter to a minimum. Stability,
even in choppy air, is never an issue.Is it slow? Yup. I move along at only 145 knots. But I get there in style.
And the gear is always down. Once the approach is stabilized, as in a good Boeing, it's hard to make a bad
landing.I am positive that no one has found the perfect airplane, but for this airline pilot's wallet, a Cherokee Six
comes as close as it gets.—Les Abend
During the past few years, the number of Saratoga sales has tapered off, particularly with introduction of the
Matrix, which led Piper's six-seat sales. But there are hundreds of PA-32 models on the used market to choose
from, and their prices, well down substantially from a year or two ago, are holding up as well as any piston
singles. The cabin room and ease of loading through the big doors that made the original Cherokee Six a
success continue to be major assets for the airplane. The Lycoming 540 engine is highly regarded by many
pilots, and the PA-32 airframe has proven to be durable with no unusual maintenance issues.
Prices for early Cherokee Sixes are down around the $50,000 mark, while the earliest Saratogas are in the
$100,000 vicinity. Of course, when considering airplanes 30 and even 40 years old, there is no way to
generalize, because condition and equipment make enormous differences in value. But no matter what you pay,
you won't fnd more cabin room and utility than in a member of the big PA-32 family.
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