Cessna Vs. Piper

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Mtns2Skies

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Why is it that nearly all Cessna planes are high wing and nearly all piper planes are low wing? Why don't they diversify?
 
The do diversify

piper has older high wings including the Pacer ( Tripacer) and colt

cessna has low wings 310, 402,410,420 all the twins and jets I believe and now of course the Cessna (columbia) 400.

I guess once you design and tool up for a certain basic design you just continue to do what you do well and its less expensive to keep changing the basic design premis
 
Beechcraft.
 
AdamZ said:
I guess once you design and tool up for a certain basic design you just continue to do what you do well and its less expensive to keep changing the basic design premis
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I don't think there is much commonality in the tooling between models.
 
AdamZ said:
piper has older high wings including the Pacer ( Tripacer) and colt
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Don't forget the venerable J-3. Heck, did Piper ever make a low-wing before the Comanche?

cessna has low wings 310, 402,410,420 all the twins and jets I believe and now of course the Cessna (columbia) 400.
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Don't forget the 350!

SCCutler said:
Beechcraft.
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All low wing, all the time? :dunno: That brings up another interesting question - How many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?

Greg Bockelman said:
I don't think there is much commonality in the tooling between models.
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AdamZ said:
I guess once you design and tool up for a certain basic design you just continue to do what you do well and its less expensive to keep changing the basic design premis
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Greg, I don't think Adam meant the actual tooling, just that they know how to make high-wing singles very well, and they've solved the problems, so that makes it easier to make more high-wing designs.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
All low wing, all the time? :dunno: That brings up another interesting question - How many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?
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What era? None now, but they were quite common in the post WW2 era,

Greg, I don't think Adam meant the actual tooling, just that they know how to make high-wing singles very well, and they've solved the problems, so that makes it easier to make more high-wing designs.
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I suppose.
 
Cessna's trying to diversify more but, at about 65,000 Skyhawks wordwide, they're still to busy building to change very much of a great thing!
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Don't forget the venerable J-3. Heck, did Piper ever make a low-wing before the Comanche?
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Well, there was the Apache ... based on a design acquired by Piper when it bought out Stinson. Piper also flew several prototype low-wing singles in the late '40s (photos below).

All low wing, all the time? :dunno:
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Not quite. Beech built a prototype Model 34 short-haul airliner ... high wing, V-tail, four-engines but only two propellers.

That brings up another interesting question - How many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?
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Ya mean besides Aeronca/Champion, Taylor, Luscombe, Stinson, Maule, Aero Commander, deHavilland, Lockheed, Grumman, ... ?

Greg, I don't think Adam meant the actual tooling, just that they know how to make high-wing singles very well, and they've solved the problems, so that makes it easier to make more high-wing designs.
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There was a real marketing battle going on in the '60s and '70s. Cessna touted "high-wing stability" and used the logo below; while Piper ads rhetorically asked what big-airplane makers Boeing and Douglas had been building lately.
 

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I guess you mean the "Mooney" MU2?
 
SCCutler said:
I guess you mean the "Mooney" MU2?
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I like calling that aircraft the Mitsubishi Mooney or the Mooney MuNi.

In Japanese, "MU" is a syllable in their alphabet, pronounced like "moo" in English. The number 2 is "Ni", pronounced like "knee" in English.

MU2 would be "mu ni", a homophone to Mooney. Considering their collaboration, probably not a coincidence.

--Carlos V.
 
Viking v. Citabria? Or, Super Decathlon?

High Wings Rule! :D
 
HawkEye007 said:
Why is it that nearly all Cessna planes are high wing and nearly all piper planes are low wing? Why don't they diversify?
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To a large extent, it's a design / management preference decision. And, if you have the same designers working there, they tend to make the same choices. Even when you hire new people and other's leave, the tendency is to keep doing things the same way.

I see the same kinds of things at work all the time (auto industry).
 
So, many other good high-wings were named in response to Kent's question, but how about some more modern ones? Like the Allegro, Tecnam T92 & T2004 Bravo, Flight Design CT, not to mention the Piper/Taylor Cub Knock-offs like CubCrafters or Legend Cub, plus the Aviat Husky.
 
All low wing, all the time? :dunno: That brings up another interesting question - How many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?

Don't Forget Boeing (B-47; B-52) and Lockheed (C-130)!
 
Ummmm:

Spruce Goose
Lockheed C-5
Antonov Super Hauler AN-225 and the whole array of Russian High-Wing aircraft
Shorts 330 360
BAe-146
ATR-42 ATR-72
All the DHC Turboprop Models
Rockwell Commander 500+ series
etc.....

Perhaps Cessna is in pretty good company:thumbsup:
 
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DutchessFlier said:
Ummmm:

Spruce Goose
Lockheed C-5
Antonov Super Hauler AN-225 and the whole array of Russian High-Wing aircraft
Shorts 330 360
BAe-146
ATR-42 ATR-72
All the DHC Turboprop Models
Rockwell Commander 500+ series
etc.....

Perhaps Cessna is in pretty good company:thumbsup:
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I believe the question was, how many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?
 
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roncachamp said:
I believe the question was, how many successful high-wing aircraft were NOT made by Cessna or Piper?
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Yes, and to be fair, the only ones I can think of are the DHC dash series, and the Twin Commander series (specially the turbine-powered versions). We have a DHC-8 that flies out of Williamsport for our only commercial service, and it is just fine.

The BAE-146 and related are used in good number by Brussels Airlines, but that's the only commercial outlet I've seen that's used them.

As much as I don't enjoy flying 172s and 182s, I do actually like the high-wing concept, and find that Dash series, Twin Commander, etc. are actually very good aircraft.

As far as aircraft I would buy go? Well, I'd buy a Twin Commander or a Dash-series over their competition, but don't have a reason to at this point.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
As far as aircraft I would buy go? Well, I'd buy a Twin Commander or a Dash-series over their competition, but don't have a reason to at this point.
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Come on -- you know you want the MU-2...

1068421.jpg


:thumbsup:

Saw one on the ramp the other day. It really is an amazing design for its mission.
 
dmccormack said:
The thread, perhaps.

The topic? never.
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Hah, I tried to make a funny and quoted Spike who posted two or three posts from the beginning with "Beechcraft." I thought it was funny, but it fell pretty flat.

As for the topic, I don't really care. As long as the plane is mechanically sound, I don't have much of a preference.
 
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