Mooney_Driver wrote:
some numbers of the P210. Could you share some of them?
Sure, I just posted it in the 210 thread for forum tidiness
Antonio wrote:
I am indeed an expert on the 210, at least the “smaller-space-version” the P210.
I never managed to get my hands on some numbers of the P210. Could you share some of them? Eg, empty weight, MTOW, max fuel capacity and some typical cruise figures for 55/65/75% power? If you want per PM as well, I’d like to put the P210 into my database.
Certainly the 210 is a very good family airplane. I’d say both of them, the normal one and the pressurized one. Maybe the best there is.
boscomantico wrote:
I have never been a fan of these small 6 seaters for 4-person + baggage missions. It implies that pax 3 and 4 are sitting the club seating area, with piles of baggage chucked onto seats 5 and 6 (most nose baggage compartments are small and can’t carry much weight). I mean, how awful is this?
Unfortunately this is what most pilots with families are faced with. Maybe that is why pilots with kids disappear for 20 years before they come back.
But as usual, a lot of the problems with WnB faced by pilots is caused by the lack of RTFM and overly optimistic calculations prior to starting to fly.
According to IATA Weights it is relatively easy to determine your typical necessary payload.
A standard family of 2 adults and 2 kids with IATA type baggage weighs 332 kgs.
4 Standard Adults with IATA standard baggage weighs 424 kgs.
These are 83 kg adults (including 6 kg handluggage) 38 kg kids and 23 kgs luggage per person, in other words, what they can take along in the airlines.
Families grow exponentially. Kids will grow up to become adults, particularly their baggage will. So all in all, a family of 2 50+ year old parents and 2 teenage daughters may well end up weighing 500-550 kg. Adults today way between 80 and 150 kg easily, kids come up to 60-70 kgs as teenagers and their baggage demand explods into Business class dimensions, where each adult can carry 46 kgs of baggage. Even if they fit all their “neccessary items” in IKEA bags, this is not something GA can accomodate.
A few figures out of my database for our common airplanes:
Type Seats Fuel Payload Full fuel Payload Payload available for 2 hours.
USG kg kg kg
Piper PA28.-180 4 50 460 324 385
Grummann AA5 4 51 439 300 364
Piper Arrow II 4 50 471 335 396
Mooney M20C 4 52 408 267 333
Mooney M20J 4 64 404 230 329
Mooney M20K 4 78 472 260 386
Mooney M20M B 4 123 426 92 314
Piper Seneca 1 6 93 562 309 425
Piper Seneca 2 6 123 649 314 500
Beech Travel Air 4 106 503 215 361
Piper Twinco 6 136 600 230 488
Just a few examples.
With full fuel, not many can carry even that standard family. The only ones who can in this list are the PA28-180 and the Arrow II. The others are 2 or even 1 seaters with full fuel.
However, more interesting, how many can carry this kind of weight for an average 2 hour flight?
Standard family: Almost all of them.
4 IATA Adults: Only the Arrow II and the twins without the Travel Air.
Anything above that? You want to look for a cabin twin like a Cheyenne or an AN2.
So my advice to any prospective owner: Do your WnB before you even look at an airplane. How is it in 5 years, how in 10? One thing is sure, if you live in the delusion that your family will travel with 5 kg of luggage each, think again. Not many can. Not even for a weekend.
In my case it has been practical for years, but I do not think this is the realistic requirement of the OP or most people.
boscomantico wrote:
But loading and unloading to/from there, with all seats installed (to carry 4 pax) is some pain.
That is true, but if you really need to carry that much baggage it is an option (very rare in my family of five experience), otherwise, everything without arrow does fit in the baggage compartment outside the cabin with easy access on the ground (although not in flight).
For more details you can see pics of this situation in the one occasion when we needed to carry that much and five POB.
I know that 210s are the best, and yours in particular, but I was mostly thinking of 6-seaters with club seating arrangement, like most PA32s, PA46s, and 36 Bonanzas. And yes, the context was 4 POB. In a 210, you can obviously use the third row for luggage, which keeps the “pax area” tidy. But loading and unloading to/from there, with all seats installed (to carry 4 pax) is some pain. I prefer a proper aft baggage area, preferably with a big door, as in late model 35 and 33 Bonanzas.
boscomantico wrote:
It implies that pax 3 and 4 are sitting the club seating area, with piles of baggage chucked onto seats 5 and 6 (most nose baggage compartments are small and can’t carry much weight).
What? It seems you are omitting the Cessna 210 and possibly the PA-46.
There is always the debate of club vs fwd facing seating. My impression is for 6 POB club is more comfortable. For 4 POB the aft pax prefer to sit facing fwd
Yes the fwd luggage compartment in the PA46 is limited in weight, but although I am no expert (perhaps @Sebastian can chime in?) there is significant space aft of the rear row, inside the pressure vessel.
I am indeed an expert on the 210, at least the “smaller-space-version” the P210. You must have forgotten this picture
with explanations in my posts herein
Of course you can fit four standard trolleys and way more in the baggage compartment outside the cabin in a P210. Even more in a non “P” 210. Bear in mind our P210 is additionally carrying the weight and volume of a 30USG aux tank in the baggage compartment and still eveyrthing you see in the picture without an arrow fits in it (admittedly not with the aft tank full).
I have never been a fan of these small 6 seaters for 4-person + baggage missions. It implies that pax 3 and 4 are sitting the club seating area, with piles of baggage chucked onto seats 5 and 6 (most nose baggage compartments are small and can’t carry much weight). I mean, how awful is this? I also really hate the looks of the PA-32.
Either way you turn it, in SEPs, you can’t have four persons and one big piece of luggage each. Everybody can take one medium-size softshell type bag and they do more or less fit into the baggage compartment of any PA28. Such luggage is usually ok for up to a week of travel (for males at least).
Re the 235/236: not all of them are Dakotas. You must divide these ones into three groups actually.
1) The original -235 Cherokee (1963-1972): these are great load haulers (ca. 550kgs). Big downside: the cabin is short and the legroom for the rear pax is poor. Not really a nice four person aircraft.
2) The -235 Cherokee Chargers/Pathfinders (1973-1978): these are possibly the best of them all. 5-inch cabin strech makes it ok for four persons. 100 pounds more MTOW. Empty weight up by approx. 50 pounds, another 50 pounds more useful load (ca. 575kg). Rare birds.
3) the -236 Dakota. The heaviest of them all, so slightly less useful load than 2). The other big downside over 1) and 2) is that these can’t take mogas, which makes the fuel bill even more painful. Plus they are obviously expensive to buy .Other than that, these are of course a bit more modern than the other two.
This is the -235, with the short fuselage, that I now fly occasionally.
The 4-adult PA-28 is the Dakota, with luggage it’s the PA-32.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
Also the Arrows and PA28-180 sort of planes have astonishing payload
Well not really. I remember struggling preparing a flight in PA28-180 with four adults 2 hours. Calculated each and any kilogram. It was MTOW and the thing climbed so badly.
The “family Mooney” is the Piper Comanche 
