Cheyenne II - Business Jet Traveler

[Joseph]

Cheyenne II - Business Jet Traveler

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The 1932 Piper Cub sold for $1,300 and embodied everything Bill Piper thought an airplane should be: affordable to own and operate, simple, rugged and fun to fly. You can land it in a short farm field, a small lake or a tiny patch of gravel in the middle of a river. For many a bush pilot today, the Piper Cub remains the ride of choice for these reasons. There’s no drama here.

The same cannot be said for the company itself. It has been battered by multiple bankruptcies, fire, flood, hurricanes, questionable management from time to time and chronic undercapitalization. Most recently, Piper abandoned its plans to build a single-engine jet and laid off hundreds of workers because of that and weak overall demand for some of its products. The company still employs 700 and is holding distressed-debt talks with Florida governments that gave Piper millions to maintain minimum employment levels it can no longer afford. Never mind that Piper is currently owned by the oil-rich sultan of Brunei (technically, by that country’s Ministry of Finance). The sultan reportedly expects his investments to make money and be self-supporting. Apparently a new $200 million jet-development program did not fit into that financial model.

Nevertheless, Piper has made some terrific airplanes over the years. As a neophyte pilot, I was amazed–and grateful–to discover just how much ice you can carry on the “Hershey Bar” wing of a single-engine Piper Cherokee.

Another fine Piper is the twin-turboprop Cheyenne, particularly the Cheyenne II. These models are great because they hold true to Bill Piper’s philosophy of what an airplane should be. Like the lowly


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