Piper’s first try at an all-metal airplane was ûsuccessful, but the years have caught up to ûsome of the components.

To a pilot, flying presents huge demands that vary in both breadth and depth. More complicated airplanes and more demanding flight profiles increase the load.

Pilots who own airplanes compound the situation. In addition to the demands of piloting, owners must also manage aircraft maintenance – and those stakes also go up as for more complicated airplanes, particularly as they age.

Sometimes the owners of older, high performance airplanes own them because they love the vintage and take pride in owning a piece of history. Sometimes, however, they own them because they wanted the performance but didn’t want to pay for an airplane that was newer and perhaps therefore less…