Piper PA-28 Cherokee / Warrior / Archer Checklist

What the Piper PA-28 Cherokee / Warrior / Archer is

The Piper PA-28 is the low-wing counterpart to the Cessna trainers — a four-seat, single-engine airplane produced across dozens of variants since 1960, and one of the most common airframes on any American flight line. The family spans the early Cherokee 140/160, the Warrior (PA-28-161), and the Archer (PA-28-181), and they all share the same architecture: a single cabin door on the right side only, fixed tricycle gear, a low wing you step up onto, and a fuel selector with LEFT, RIGHT, and OFF positions but no BOTH. Most of the fleet still flying is carbureted — a Lycoming O-320 in the Warrior and Cherokee, an O-360 in the Archer — which means carb-heat discipline is part of the checklist. Only the newest production (the diesel Archer DX/DLX and the fuel-injected Pilot 100i) departs from that pattern. Who flies it: student pilots and instructors, renters and time-builders, flying clubs, and owners who want a stable, economical cross-country machine. Pilots coming from a Cessna notice two things immediately — the visibility differences of a low wing, and that they now have to actively manage fuel tank switching in cruise rather than set a selector to BOTH and forget it. This template centers on the carbureted Archer II/III; if you fly a Warrior or an early Cherokee 140, your V-speeds and some limitations differ and should come from that model’s own POH.

The PA-28 is the airplane I point people to when they want a low-wing after training in Cessnas. I built this card around the carbureted Archer because that is what most rental Pipers still are, and I kept the fuel-selector and carb-heat items front and center because those are the two things that actually bite Cherokee pilots. Print it, add your tail number, and fly the numbers in your own POH, not mine.

Normal procedures

The normal flow runs preflight and walkaround, before-start, engine start, taxi, run-up and before-takeoff, takeoff (normal and short/soft-field), climb, cruise, descent, before-landing, after-landing, and shutdown and securing, with an Archer II/III V-speed table. Two type habits shape the card. Because the selector has no BOTH position, active tank management is a real task — the fuel selector recurs at start, run-up, cruise, before landing, and shutdown. And because the engine is carbureted, carb heat is applied on indication of icing rather than run continuously, and generally not carried through the approach where the power it costs could matter on a go-around. These are the two things that catch Cessna pilots stepping into a Cherokee.

Emergency procedures

The emergency and abnormal section is deliberately conservative, with the reflex memory items in bold. It covers engine failure on the takeoff roll, engine failure after takeoff at low altitude, engine failure in flight with a restart attempt, engine fire, electrical fire / smoke in the cockpit, an alternator/electrical abnormal, and a carburetor-icing flow. Some wording is intentionally left as “per POH” where sources disagreed — for instance whether the engine-fire flow calls for vents open or closed. This is a training aid built from POH-derived steps, not an approved procedure; verify each flow against your aircraft’s approved POH and brief it with your instructor.

Verify it against your POH

The research behind this template flagged several things that genuinely vary by model, serial, and operator. Check these against your aircraft’s approved POH before you rely on the card:

• Takeoff flap setting. The Archer is commonly flown with 0° flaps, but exact settings and whether short/soft-field are taught as distinct named procedures vary by serial — confirm the degrees before flying them as fixed numbers.
• Engine-fire cabin heat/vents wording. Sources disagreed on whether the engine-fire flow calls for vents open (to clear smoke) or closed (to starve the fire of cabin airflow). The card says “per POH” on purpose — settle this against your specific POH page.
• Fuel sump/drain count. Confirmed minimum is one sump per wing tank plus the belly strainer, but some serials add drain points. Verify the full count for your airframe so you don’t miss any.
• Best-glide speed. Cited between 73 and 76 KIAS depending on source and weight; treat the table value as approximate until you confirm the POH figure.
• Rotation speed by flap setting. Sources gave 55 to 60 KIAS depending on configuration — confirm the exact figures for your flap settings.
• Whether “engine failure after takeoff” and “engine failure in flight” are one POH section or two. They are split here by altitude available; your POH’s section boundary and memory-item set may differ.
• Warrior and Cherokee-140 numbers. The V-speeds are Archer II/III-representative. Warrior figures run close but differ (e.g. Vne ~160 vs ~154) — pull yours from that model’s POH.