Pilots interested in an economical, fun-to-fly four-place aircraft should consider this 1957 Piper PA-22-150 Tri-Pacer, which is available for $64,000 on AircraftForSale.

Derived from the PA-20 Pacer taildragger, Piper’s PA-22 Tri-Pacer adds tricycle gear for surefooted handling in crosswinds and notably less expensive insurance premiums. Purists love Piper’s robust, fabric-covered tubular steel airframe, reasoning that it is superior to the stressed-skin aluminum fuselage construction utilized by Cessna and Beechcraft. The steel cage is said to provide better protection to occupants, and the fabric covering can make both inspection and repair easier than aluminum counterparts.

Equipped with a 150-horsepower Lycoming O-320 and a left-side rear door, the Tri-Pacer is equally happy bringing friends and pets along as it is toting camping equipment for weekend adventures. Although this particular example doesn’t have a rear seat installed, Piper parts are plentiful and not overly expensive compared to many other types. Beefy bungee-cord-equipped main gear holds up well to rough runways, and vortex generators provide crisp, responsive handling.

With only 2,650 hours on the airframe, 815 hours since the major overhaul of the engine, and only 355 hours since new cylinders were installed, this Tri-Pacer is poised to provide its next owner with many years of economical flying. Perhaps best of all, the fabric was replaced with Ceconite in 2003 and repainted in a classic scheme—a job easily worth over $40,000 alone.

But the owner didn’t stop there! A look inside reveals a completely new interior that was installed in 2016, including fresh soundproofing for a quieter, less fatiguing cabin environment. In addition to fresh carpet and upholstery, the panel is in outstanding shape, free from the ugly cracked and weathered plastic trim pieces that are so commonly found. A set of AV-30 digital gauges replace the heavy vacuum system, a Stratus ESG transponder provides ADS-B out, and a Garmin Aera 660 GPS is neatly installed in its recessed panel mount.

At $64,000, this Tri-Pacer is more expensive than many examples, but with over $40,000 in new paint and fabric and many thousands of dollars in new cylinders, updated interior, and advanced avionics, it seems to be an exceptional value that will likely provide decades of economical, trouble-free ownership.

You can arrange financing of the aircraft through FLYING Finance. For more information, email info@flyingfinance.com.

The post Bargain Buys on AircraftForSale: 1957 Piper PA-22-150 Tri-Pacer appeared first on Plane & Pilot Magazine.

The unit itself is about the largest portable Garmin has produced. At 7 inches diagonally, it’s not as big as an iPad mini, but it’s a good deal more sizable than all but the most comically large phones. The display, says Garmin, is very bright and easily dimmable to a low level. The battery life, at four hours with a lot of backlight and a lot more with it dimmed down, is workable for most flights, though we’d keep it plugged in. It charges via a USB C jack, so charging will be fast, and it boasts built-in Wi-Fi, which seems basic these days given the ubiquitous nature of Wi-Fi devices, but as far as aviation portables are concerned, it’s a relatively recent advance.

The newest aera can do everything you’d expect it to and then a lot more. It has 3D synthetic vision that can be hooked up to a source of attitude information to back up its built-in GPS-derived data or hooked up to a compatible Garmin attitude source. There’s a plethora of charts, of course, including instrument procedures—a number of different database packages are available for it—and for pilots who fly into previously unknown airports regularly, its SafeTaxi utility, with a rich database of airport ground features, could well be worth the cost of admission. Also available are terrain awareness, traffic (when connected to a compatible Garmin ADS-B receiver), including Garmin’s TargetTrend and TerminalTraffic utilities, and weather, both FIS-B and from SiriusXM, when connected to a compatible Garmin receiver. There’s fuel price info (which will pay for the price of the databases if not the unit itself) and more.

And seemingly like all of Garmin’s products these days, the 760 can be connected to compatible Garmin products, like navigators, though a serial or wireless connection, and it features the company’s Connext wireless transfer and data-sharing capabilities. The aera 760 can even be connected to a compatible Garmin autopilot to drive VFR procedures, including vertical nav.

So the question is, what can the aera 760 do that an iPad can’t? Well, as you just read, a lot. And because it’s ruggedized for the cockpit environment, optimized for pilot use—its user interface makes use of standard Garmin symbology—and made to work specifically with existing Garmin avionics that might already be in your panel, it has a number of features that no iPad will ever have.

Will this be enough to drive strong sales of this latest Garmin aviation portable? We’re guessing it will.

Other Great Portables

The area 760 joins a host of portable solutions for the flight deck, including the now ubiquitous iPad running the latest version (16.1.1.) of ForeFlight. But that’s not your only choice.

Aircraft Spruce offers the AvMap, an interesting alternative to the Garmin series and ForeFlight. The EKP V handheld GPS features a 7-inch display, with a built-in battery, and it’s only 8.8 inches thick. With a special docking station the EKP V can connect to a range of avionics on board, including the autopilot, Sirius XM Weather, or an EFIS. It’s worth a look at $1,815.

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