Opinions on the Piper PA-38 Tomahawk

[DC9stick]

PA-38, the PA-28 is the Cherokee series

 

[Steve]

Anyone happen to know if the PA-38 has a 14 or 24 volt electrical system?

 

[bigD]

Steve - to answer your question about legroom, yes, there's plenty. I'm 6'1", and if I slide the seat all the way back, I can't even reach the rudder pedals. So I don't think 6'3" will be a problem at all.

 

[Immelman]

I learned to fly in the Traumahawk and have maybe 80-100 hrs total in it.

It was the first aircraft I logged any time in, so I'm probably a bit biased when I say I had absolutely no problems with it, and prefer it over a C150/152 for the aforementioned reasons (its much more roomy, has better visibility, and "feels" better to fly than the rather muted and mundane 150/152). I never did spin it, but spent plenty of time doing deep stalls (power on/off), practicing keeping the wings up with the rudders - stalls are conventional and anyone with some tailwheel experience shouldn't have a problem keeping it out of a spin (proper use of rudder...).

This might be just me, but I think the -38 is a tad faster than its cessna counterpart, TAS in cruise about 105kt. I also thought it performed a bit better in terms of climbing @ max gross weight - I nursed it up to 11,500' (I learned to fly in the mountains) at max weight on warm days several times. I recall the C150/152 being a bit more anemic.

To those who say they're built junky.. maybe I was just flying a nice one. After my PPL was done (this while I was in college), I started helping out at the flight school part time in exchange for flight time, and helped out on several 100-hr and an annual insp.... there were never any issues with construction quality or things getting wore out, despite its daily use as a trainer (except for the obvious things such as tires and whatnot). The interior and some of the plastic trim, and wingtips were replaced when the airplane was 20 yrs old, and they did need it... but the parts that count held up quite well.

 

[chuychanga]

The Tomahawk has a 12 volt battery and 14 volt alternator.

 

[atpcliff]

Hi!

52 of my first 54 dual hours were in Traumahawk 2535T. It served it's purpose (I was trying to save $). I didn't know much about spins, but asked my instructor about doing some. The basic was, "R U ****ing crazy?!"

When I was forced to switch to the Warrior (Auburn U. sold their only Tomahawk), I thought I was in heaven. The Warrier flew like dream, and I wondered why I was wasting my time in the THawk.

Good luck!

Cliff
GRB

 

[dmspilot00]

Here are some excerpts of that report:

1. 
   [*]

   The original design engineers were asked why the design (of the Tomahawk wing) had been changed. Both said it was their opinion that the airplane's structure had been simplified for manufacturing purposes after it left their design shop.

   The design engineer said that removing wing ribs and changing the spar design would make the wing less rigid, i.e., "soften" the wing.

   He said the softened wing structure could change the airfoil shape, making the wing a new and unknown commodity in stalls and spins.

   He said he had inspected a PA-38 wing and found it to be very soft, and able to be torsionally twisted without substantial effort.

   [*]

   Before sending the airplane to the production design shop, the remaining design engineer stated the airplane had problems with "A very strong rolloff, I think, to the left."

   The designer was asked if the type ailerons the Piper PA-38 was certified with would be effective in stopping the wing's rolloff at the time the stall occurs. He said, "I doubt it. They're marginal ailerons."

   [*]

   FAA Service Difficulty Reports related to the wing were examined for the period between 1986 and April, 1995. Fifteen reports showed loose rivets in the wing, bent aft spar attach fitting, and undertorqued wing spar attachment plate bolts.

   [*]

   A production engineer at the manufacturing facility stated, "The production Tomahawks I eventually became airborne in, only as part of my job, were, to a plane totally unpredictable...the wings flexed noticeably... ."

   One of the original desginers of the airplane stated, "The aerodynamic performance of a GAW-1 wing is very sensitive to airfoil shape. If the shape became distorted, the performance would rapidly deteriorate...the use of a flexible surface...opens a Pandora's box regarding its performance. The effects...encountered by an aeroelastically soft GAW-1 wing in stalls and spins would be impossible to resolve in a conventional flight test program."

   [/list=1]

 

[jetdriven]

the tomahawk used for certification testing had a conventional tail and a stiffer wing with a box spar. The production machine was missing the wing root fillet, an 11 rib wing instead of a 13 rib wing, and it had a very soft U-shaped wing spar.

interesting enough the tomahawk with the conventional tail ended up in some unrecoverable flat spins in which they had to use the spin chute.

have any of you guys grabbed a tomahawk wingtip and twisted the wing?? You can make diagonal wrinkles in the wing skin.

it is faster and goes farther than a 152, but you have to watch the loading, with full fuel on a dual nav tomahawk it will only caqrry about 275 lbs in the cabin.

There have been 51 FLAT SPIN ACCIDENTS with tomahawks. Out of 2100 built there are only about 1100 on the FAA registry. how many 152 flat spin accidents have you read about?? I have about 250 hours in them as a renter and a CFI and I have been upside down more than I care to admit during regular stall testing.

 

[millhouse21]

I currently instruct in T-hawks and was a little suspicious of them when I started due to their bad rep and my history of flying C-152s. However, now that I've flown them for about 250 hrs, I'd take one over a 152 any day. Especially for instructing. As has been said already, they require proper technique in a stall and/or spin. Why is this bad in a trainer? I have spun them a few times and found them to spin and recover by the book. They also have great vis and are roomier than the 152. One thing nobody mentioned is that they are REALLY easy to land and very forgiving on the students in this area. However, they are not the greatest on Soft Field Takeoffs because of that T-tail; the nose comes up late and very suddenly which sometimes results in a tail strike without proper technique. Overall, I think the bad rep is undeserved and that the T-hawk is a good airplane.

 

[jetdriven]

then explain why there have been 51 flat spin accidents out of a pool of 2000 or so airplanes (only then since 1978) and the C150-152 has had far fewer accidents of that nature with several thousand more airframes produced??

 

[Typhoon1244]

Have any of you guys grabbed a Tomahawk wingtip and twisted the wing?

Uh, I haven't done that in any airplane...especially if I'm renting it!

I may be biased toward the trusty little 150 and 172, but I've sure never seen a Cessna tail shaking back-and-forth like a flag pole in a hurricane during a stall!

 

[Traumahawk]

Guess this might be a good place for me to put .02 in

Really glad to see not EVERYone is screaming Deathrap! Tommytrauma!

Bottom line, this is a very VERY simple airplane that does what it was designed to do based on input from (wouldn't u guess) thousands of flight instructors. It teaches the student what that little vertical trim tab lookin' thing on the back is for.

There are some really great attributes that have been mentioned here so far when it comes to owning one. Fun little cross-country machine. As far as the soft field performance, the 16'' tires are the best for this, all the Tomahawk II's are equipped with them.(1981-82) Another thing to remember, the plane does have some AD's, and on some of the older models 1978-1980 there were instances where they were complied with incorrectly by A&P's out in the field, however, these AD's were complied with as the Tomahawk II's were being built by Piper, so you can rest assured they were probably done as intended.
If you are truly operating out of a SOFT field, meaning soggy etc... make sure you have a good 2800 ft if there are obstacles at the end. On a hot day, make it 3000. Holding the yoke full back does nothing for you until 35 knots besides adding un-needed drag, same goes for the flaps prior to about 50. Holding the elevators full aft prior to 35 just leads to an almost certain over-rotation that really causes a significant performace loss in this plane. 112 horsepower, on a hot day, even when u level off in ground effect there are a few wide eyed seconds when the airspeed sits at about 55 before slowly creeping up to Vx as the branches approach. Don't heave the nose way into the air on the roll either.......Leave the ground ahead of the power curve, You'll surely find the ground one more time otherwise. On a hot day with obstacles you might want to even consider no flaps, seems to perform better this way.

Now, Spins are obviously the soft spot here.....and because of some bad mistakes, and it's 'action-required' spin procedure, the old wives tale has gotten so bad that noone would go up with me to spin the thing a couple years back so I talked to some people who had, read the book and went up and taught myself. I figured, theres 8 AD's on the tail alone, the first 6 should hold the thing on, and the last 2 are just for good luck I will admit, I'm young, unmarried and looking at 20 years of student loan payments

Spins are conventional. The student or, yes, even instructor who's spin recovery procedure is to let go, grab the bottom of his/her seat and scream until the plane stops lawndarting towards the ground is going to have a bit of a problem in this airplane, because it requires you to actually USE the spin recovery procedure that is almost identical to the 150/152 procedure. Ailerons nuetral, FULL(not just some)rudder opposite rotation and then, where in the 152 u can just relax back pressure, you swiftly push the stick forward and yes, in some, not all, but some instances wait until christmas(which still is usually no more than 2 turns) and bam, ure going straight down, unstalled and ready for another. Most first timers might even get into the negative G scenario when the stall is broken and that full down stick takes effect...be ready to release it once the spin has STOPPED, premature relaxing of the yoke can really delay recovery, again, it really makes the pilot use the procedure.

One thing to remember, stick with the procedure.
Myths that lead to NTSB investigations......

#1 Adding/subtracting power will blast air over the T-tail and therefore make it more effective in recovery. Wrong.
#2 The airplane steepening and tightening up when the anti-spin inputs are used means they aren't working so stop and try something different.....the complete opposite is true, this is a characteristic of the recovery.
#3 Two 180 pound guys, flight bags, 3/4 tanks and the seats back far enough to a comfortable position makes for an excellent CG location and any ensuing flat spin after 2 rotations should be met with utter suprise, and the smoking hole 15 seconds later is entirely due to this horrible, AD magnet deathtrap that had no business being built in the first place when we already have forgiving airplanes like 152's to teach pilots feet and book procedures aren't part of today's flying.

How many of those spin accidents began at 5000ft? Not too many. Can a 152 recover from a base to final spin at 500ft? Even Yeager would auger in there. How many of those spins resulted from illegal, many times low level aerobatics? Were the witnesses pilots? If you want the stats for this country, check the NTSB records and do a little reading, I'd be more worried about the gear collapsing if you don't know how to land in crosswinds with this plane.
Yea it has a nosewheel, but it does what it can on the part of a good trainer.
Make sure you check out www.pipertomahawk.com !!
Best Regards'
T-hawk

 

[metrodriver]

Oh yeah, that's what I forgot. You can land this plane straight with a 20 kts pure crosswind without going sideways like a cessna.
ATPcliff, you can't compare a warrior to a tomahawk. That's the same as comparing a 172 to a 152.
If someone wants to do some stalls / spins in a tomahawk, let me know (for people who have a private and have never done them in this plane before)

 

[chuychanga]

I can't refute every point in the report, but as far as the ailerons being ineffective at stopping rolloff during a stall... they're not supposed to stop the rolloff. That's what the rudder is for. If you are trying to turn the yoke during a stall in a conventional light plane, you are doing it wrong.

The Warrior is indeed much easier to fly than the Tomahawk, which is exactly why is it not as good of a trainer. That's like saying GPS is easier than pilotage and dead reckoning, so why did I waste my time with all that map-reading and calculations.

50 flat spins? Who exactly watched all thses flat spins occur? Or did they just find a Tomahawk in a big hole in the ground and decide it had to be a flat spin? It would be interesting to find out some background info on those 50 pilots' training. Had they ever been taught spin recovery? If so,was it in a plane which does not require the proper technique? If you've done a lot of spins in a 152 then you've probably gotten a little rusty on proper technique. Did these pilots simply assume they could let go and it would recover on its own?

It's true that there are less spin accidents in 152s. This is because you don't have to really recover from them, the plane does it for you. That doesn't make the Tomahawk a faulty airplane. The flaw is in the stall/spin training not the airplane design.

 

[Typhoon1244]

I dislike using this kind of argument because it depends on an emotional response, not a rational one. Nevertheless, I'd have to say that if I were teaching my sons how to fly, and I had a choice of doing their solos in an airplane that recovers easily from stalls/spins (150) or an airplane that doesn't recover naturally (Tomahawk), it becomes a no-brainer.

Basic trainers are supposed to be forgiving, not challenging.

 

[jetdriven]

actually there about 53 now. the latest flat spin crash was with an FAA examiner and a private applicant. When you find the left main gear broken forwards, the right main gear broken aft, and the fuel selector sticking a foot out of the quadrant then its pretty esy to tell it was a flat spin.

I actually enjoy flying the tomahawk over a 150 but it has a staggeringly high rate of stall/spin accidents.

in cruise flight you can whip the yoke aft and make the tail shake because the airflow will separate from that GA(W)-1 airfoil. not a very good characteristic.

 

[Traumahawk]

Why exactly would you "whip the yoke back" in cruise flight? We doin snap rolls now?

The spin crash with the FAA examiner happened quite a while ago, and why were they spinning the airplane? Why did it depart into a spin? I know of 2 FAA examiners where I live that are terrified of the plane......just because the person is a DPE doesn't mean they are completely proficient in every flight envelope of every aircraft they do checks in.
What was their power setting? CG? Fuel? Aileron position?
It's funny, to keep a 172 in a spin I've seen it taught with full power, full left rudder, full right aileron throughout the spin.
Enter a Spin in the Tommyhawk crosscontrolled and hold it there, nose bobs right up to about 30-35 degrees below the horizon and control inputs are worth nothing, for what it's worth its pretty much flat. Position the controls with the spin, no aeileron and maybe even deploy the flaps for a second or two and it comes back down, bottom line, and you aerobatic pilots out there can justify this, crosscontrol with full power is a recipe for flat spins with a LEGAL cg.....put it a little farther aft and then it's a no brainer. Again, during more than half of these spins the pilot was probably a test pilot as far as the A/C weight, CG and procedure used.

You know, the piper seminole has very similar stall characteristics.....T Tail will shake.....I can't speak for T Tail arrows and Lance's.......not that we spin them, but.....no prblems with these planes.
The plane requires a specific action to be taken. Period. People are told time and time again what to do in multiengine airplanes, at all atitudes if an egine fails.....yet how many stall/spin accidents do we see with them? And that procedure is pretty straight forward. I would suggest most of these accidents in the T-hawk happened(if a/c was in legal limits)due to an unintentional spin, probably around 3000ft AGL and an adreneline fueled response that was just wrong or not held in long enough when the ground is getting closer and closer to the windscreen. A skiddish DPE/CFI/Student without much patience or focus during a much steeper, more pronounced (unintentional/suprise??)spin than they have ever seen just leads to problems. Know what to do when this happens, do it correctly and commit to it, nomatter how long it takes,you'll buy the farm if you try something different so this is the only card you play and it'll bail you out every time. I've spun this plane nearly empty and heavy, forward CG and AFT(legally) many many times, and even after 5-6 turns it just doesn't go flat, and the aircraft has always acted accordingly when the anti-spin inputs are put in, the right way. None of this having to lean on the dash to get it to recover nonsense.....
Think of the nature of the plane.......and then think of the mindset out there.....ahh, another little simple light Piper, sure we can fly that, doesn't look too different besides that T-Tail.....flight after flight..no problem.....then one day the thing flips over and spins, and that 152/172/cherokkee 140/skipper procedure just doesn't work.
Read the book. It has 2 whole pages devoted to JUST SPINS for people like this.
FLY SAFE
--T-hawk

 

[AA717driver]

I got about 20 hours in one before I beat feet to the Cherokee. What a difference. One of our T-hawks came from the factory with only one stall strip! The thing would still drop the wing without the strip occasionally.

I never looked back.(literally and figuratively!)TC

 

[jetdriven]

one more thing. I remember reading in the POH that you should do stall/spin training above 5000' AGL and that it could take up to 5 turns for recovery.
It doesnt even meet the certification requirements that the aircraft recover within 3 turns using normal techniques. I dont think adding power or flaps is normal or even approved.

 

[Traumahawk]

one more thing. I remember reading in the POH that you should do stall/spin training above 5000' AGL and that it could take up to 5 turns for recovery.
It doesnt even meet the certification requirements that the aircraft recover within 3 turns using normal techniques. I dont think adding power or flaps is normal or even approved.

First, go reread the POH, and then reread my post, both very carefully.
T-Hawk