Less Gloom

In article om,
Jay Honeck wrote:
Wow -- just when I thought that *I* was the most cynical, hard-headed
******* out there, you guys go and prove me wrong. Thanks!

:-)

Seriously, I think you're being too hard on them. Piper has been
forced to respond to what we heard Bass say in that speech last
weekend. They are publicly denying that there are any plans to cut
off support for older planes -- which, unless they are REALLY being
diabolical, can only be good news for those of us who are flying
around in "antique" planes. (What *is* the defininition of "antique"
now, anyway? My plane is now 33 years old -- where's the cut-off?)


I'm not being cynical, I'm just trying to be a realist. Though I'm not
intimately familiar with the aircraft industry, I doubt that Piper can
sustain themselves as a new airplane manufacturer on a piston-engine
parts business. They were late to the game with modern avionics in
their airplanes, all of which are 30+ year old designs. They could
innovate in the piston market and compete with Cirrus and Cessna, but is
there really that much room? My guess is that Piper is staking the
future of the company on moving away from pistons (and ditching the high
liability, low return associated with them) to focus on the young VLJ
market. Honestly, I can't say that I wouldn't consider the same if I
were running the company.



JKG