Hi,

I'm a PA28-180 owner and fan of the V Tail Bonanzas.

I would be curious to understand the real cost of ownership of a M/S35 ( or any fast Bonanza ), the ADs and problems with the V-Tail, the typical issues with the planes from end 50s to end 60s...

I do owner assisted maintenance and appreciate the smart conception of the PA28. From what I read, the Bo is far superiorly built, may you give me a couple of examples ?

My PA28 is from 1966 and looks and flies like new ( in fact better due to speed mods, but the best speed mod seems to trade it for a faster plane ). I'm not afraid by old planes and I know maintenance and owner behavior do more than years... despite corrosion, what goes wrong on poorly maintained Bonanzas, or any Bonanzas ( for example due to hidden corrosion you can't avoid, like main gears on the PA28 )

I have plenty of time ( not in position to trade now ), so I would like to take advantage of that time to learn to now better those planes. 4m based in Europe ( France ).

Typical mission is 800lbs pilot + pax + baggage, 280 to 380 NM

Thanks in advance to the community!

Francois

Hello Francois, welcome.
Lots of information here in the forums about V tails!

Welcome Francois!

I moved from a '78 Archer to a '64 S35 Bonanza within the last year. The archer was a great plane for me to build time in. It had speed mods and I routinely got 125-130 TAS.

The move to the Bonanza was unbelievable. The Bonanza just feels so solid and after some practice is very simple to fly. I had to get used to slowing it down, which was never a problem in the Archer. :-) First time I did steep turns in the Bonanza, I was sold. So much more solid of a feel than in the archer.

From an efficiency standpoint, the Bonanza is much more efficient than the Archer. The Bo as a IO550 and I average 170 TAS LOP at 13.9GPH. This compares to 130 TAS at 11GPH. Of course, the insurance and annual are going to be more expensive, but I wouldn't go back for anything.

Joe

Thanks Joe,

I also fly 125, and that's really slow for long legs. We would like to get < 2h for the short trips ( 270NM ) and < 2h30 for the longer ones (380NM)

Is the annual much much costly ? What's your ratio with Piper about the part prices ? Hard to figure out the difference. For example the Piper gear parts are quite expensive ( fork almost 2k, main leg cylinder 2k with new head, ... ) but if properly pre-buyed, you only change that in case of landing problem, so it's an insurance cost. PA28 being very simple, they are simple to buy, not many traps.

Anyway I'll do my search in the forum

Francois

Francois,

Welcome to BT. Ther are a few threads on costs of Bonanza; but a lot of it very location dependent and initial purchase luck. I would suggest you start a thread in the Singles forum asking for comparisons. e.g. Subject line should be something like (Looking for cost comparison of PA... vs M35...)

Where are the pics of the current plane?

Good luck in the hunt,

Tim

Couple of pics here:
https://flows.yobidrive.com/flow#PA28FELM