In April of this year, Piper announced that its PA46 line of cabin-class singles would henceforth be referred to as the M-Class. While the Matrix would retain its name, the Mirage was becoming the M350 (for its 350-HP engine) and the Meridian was now the M500. Shortly afterward, it announced that its new, top-of-the-line M-Class machine, the M600 had completed FAA certification. It did so in almost unprecedented time—44 days—a tribute to engineering and flight test groups that did developmental testing with amazing thoroughness and FAA inspectors who went through the certification flight testing in a no-nonsense fashion.
The M600 uses the fuselage—with beef ups—and a higher-power version of the engine from the M500. The M600 also has a new wing—marketing claims it’s a clean-sheet design—that carries 90 gallons more fuel than the Meridian, allowing the M600 50 percent more range, a 958-pound higher gross weight and 100 more pounds in the cabin with full fuel. The M600 is also Piper’s first airplane to use the sophisticated Garmin G3000 avionics suite.