Renewal of a Classic
It’s not until you fly a new Archer TX that you understand how old Australia’s legacy Archer fleet really is. That much was obvious to me as I strolled out to VH-XHE parked under humid skies at Bankstown in early January. The aeroplane was gleaming-new on the outside, crisp and unscuffed on the inside and had that warming, delightful smell that comes only with new-born upholstery.
When I thought about the time-worn and weary Archers still plying Australian skies after anything up to 50 years and then seeing XHE close-up, it was like finding a sepia photograph of a grandparent that shows them young, energetic and way cooler than you thought they could ever have been.
With only eight Archer TXs in Australia, the type is in the embryonic stage of its flying career here, and finding one will prove elusive. Six of those have only recently entered service at Sydney Flying College (SFC), so I was very pleased to receive an invitation to get up to Bankstown and fly one.
What I found was not a new version of an old aeroplane, but rather a re-born airframe that is finding a new niche for itself as an advanced trainer and tourer rather than the carry-all workhorse it has traditionally been.
In context
Piper Aircraft went through some soul-searching in the mid 2000s, which resulted in the Warrior disappearing from the range and the Archer becoming the standard offer to the training market. Four new models
