CNN's Jim Campbell sure loves doing flight tests... The more exciting and interesting, the better. However; one of the highlights of his recent trip to the Sun and Fun Aerospace Expo for 2021 was actually a humble aircraft whose type he's flown hundreds of times over the course of 19000 hours of flight time -- Many of it spent as a flight instructor.
It's a bit of a surprise that Jim's acquaintance with the latest generation of the PA-28 series brought such a smile to his face. Why? Because the Piper 100i, something of a highly dedicated training version of the Piper Archer, does more than a little bit of everything right. It gets rid of accessories and accoutrement that have little bearing on the flight training environment, and adds both creature comforts, as well as technology, to make the flight training environment more powerful, safer, and suited to the task at hand.
Mind you, flying the better part of an hour the day before the Sun n Fun Aerospace Expo, in airspace inhabited by way too much traffic, is hardly the best way to test a trainer... But this flight proved that Piper is very much on the right track. Jim came away impressed with the airplane and the addition of envelope protection that makes this airframe -- one that has heretofore proved itself to be one of the safest in history -- a little bit safer. Come along with ANN’s Chief Test Pilot Jim Campbell, and see what this old-time flight instructor thinks of the latest generation of PA-28...
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