I concur with Steve. The rendering on the left accentuates the short and tall fuselage of the Skymaster. Extending the colors onto the boom and possibly creating a more narrow and longer band of gold along the lower fuselage and adding an accent color (gold or brown) to the top of the front cowling might help create a more sleek look. I'm taking a particular interest in the paint scheme because I too an planning to have my Skymaster repainted soon. Not to mention an interest in general in all Skymasters looking the best possible. I printed out the two proposed paint schemes and took an unscientific poll of friends and fellow aviators. The paint scheme on the right was preferred 7 to 1. Keep us posted with the latest revisions, and thanks for sharing all the detailed information on the restorations.

Attached is a word file that has all 4 paint scheme versions on it. once you open the file zoom in to about 200% for good detail. Also looking at them at 100% would be about what one would see if the aircraft was on the runway taking off while you stood on the ramp. It is a good contrast to look at the designs that way.

Scheme 4 has been changed to provide an extra color stripe, Maya Gold and also the design on the vertical stab. Scheme 3 has taken the original belly colors and stretched them out to give a longer fuselage look. I think it worked on scheme 3. The template also is a non-pressurized cabin to provide the correct window configuration.

With scheme 3, would the all white cowling cause glare in the pilots eyes? I know that some of the pictures of Skymasters I found had all white (or what appeared to be all white) cowlings. Do they use a different sheen up there?

Paint scheme
 

Hi Herb,
The top of my cowl is all white and I never noticed any glaire. Bottom line is it is your aircraft and go with what you like the best. You have to pay the bill and live with it not the rest of us. Good luck with your 337, it is sure looking great. Dale Campbell

I think No 3 is HOT!!

Thanks for all the input on the paint scheme, I am still trying to tweek the designs a little working with number 3.

Interior progress is still progressing. My interior guys continue to give me finish dates each week but they run into roadblocks that never allow the date to be correct. I still haven't seen the seats but maybe today!!! Some of the roadblocks have been the fault of others, like all of a sudden I decided that we need to replace the map light switch on the left side column by the pilot. My interior guys tried to make it work but it looks like the best avenue is replacement. So now they couldn't finish that trim work around the emergency exit window until I got a new switch. Another order from Cessnaparts.com and the switches are on the way. They were in stock at $6.17 each. When they arrived they are a little different than original but they were direct from Cessna. Actually different in a better way. As of last Saturday the new switch was installed by my qualified IA. Also the new Rosen visors had to be mounted, and after reading their procedure we realized that the visors mount to the Royalite trim over the pilots. At first this was quite a surprise, and we scratched our heads on this one. Rosen's design for the mounting of these units in a Skymaster is a little Mickey Mouse for a better term. I called Rosen and they were no help at all. On top of that their instruction sheet was not clear enough to see the photos of the figures they kept referencing in the procedure. They said that they didn't have the original photos anymore and were sorry they could not help me. Well, I understood how they wanted them to mount so through a process of elimination we got the visors mounted. Has anyone ever installed these? Interesting but once I got the up, WOW these are going to be nice. Oh and they do have an STC for the Skymaster so all the paperwork can be legalized. Now we just need to get the interior guys back.

As some of you may have seen in a post from Larry we made a trip to Nashville to visit Owen Bell. What a great trip and Owen was there with open arms welcoming us. See the Sky-Monster post for details on some real excitement at Owen's Aviation Enterprises. It was a real pleasure to meet and talk with Owen, his son Chris and their employees. He has a lot of things going on down there and it all has something to do with Skymasters. After trying to pry Larry out of the 700 HP P337 we loaded up our goods and flew north. You know you're living when you have tailwinds going and tailwinds coming back. What fun!

Last night we pulled off the old wing tips and started to fit the new Lightning Wingtips from Owen. It's going to be fun and effective. What difference. I'll fog a little Boeshield in there now that this access is open too. More to come on the wingtips later. Here are some progress pictures, one of the interior shots shows the removable panel that provides access to the main gear components inside the cabin. They used velcro to attach the panel and it works really well. The annual is complete except for the gear swing and performed to perfection by my qualified IA. We are winding down and now before I know it we will be at the paint shop. Then a new thread will be posted on the trials of painting a Skymaster. Stay tuned.

Herb,

As you may recall, I am in similar (but less public) process with my plane at this moment. I am very interested to learn more about the wingtips you are installing, because I wanted to install new wingtips too, but was told there are no wingtips with landing lights in them (like the RMD ones I have on my other plane). In my other plane I have HID lights in the wingtips, and I can light up this side of the planet when landing - apparently no such luck for the 337G.

Can you send me more pics and maybe a link on your wingtips, so I can investigate further?

I installed the Rosen visors several years ago and experienced similar difficulties. As I recall the stiffeners were not even close to the proper size, shape or form requiring a couple of hours of grinding, bending, trial fit and repeat until I had a servicable arrangement. I found the visors to be an effective sun block but found their two claims to fame, transparency and adjustability, more hype than substance. You wouldn't want to bet your life on spotting conflicting traffic while trying to see through them and although they are somewhat adjustable the sun is somehow always just out of their range. On the wingtip installation; I assume you or your mechanic have strap duplicators but if not they are a slick little tool for match drilling the new tips to the existing nut plates that you definitely want to employ.

Part of the Horton STOL STC is having the wingtips. How does having the winglet wing tips affect the Horton STC?

Wing tips w/ winglets are from Owen Bell at Aviation Enterprises

www.aviationenterprises.us

I will post some more photos. We got them ready to drill the new holes tonight. I am not sure about the strap duplicator but the instructions that Owen has calls out a 2 inch wide .020 aluminum to duplicate the holes in the original tips and transfer to the new tips. Should work fine, I'll find out tomorrow. I have the Horton Stol and this should only enhance the performance and stability of that kit. Flying the Monster with these wing tips was amazing, especially on landing. They also claim to increase cruise speed at higher altitudes, we'll see. Thanks for all the confidence on the Rosen's Steve. :-) I hope I like them. After spending that much money do I have a choice?

Seats and Carpet
What more can I say.........

I wouldn't let anyone sit in it

I like it! And I agree, I wouldn't let Bowdish sit in it either!:D

That's what I meant!! :D :D :D

Herb has been busy, and gone, so I know he hasn't seen any progress. However, there has been some. I have been working with his A&P/IA, and we actually have gotten a few things finished. The new winglets are on. These really are huge, but very light. They are made out of carbon fiber. There is a lot of matching holes, to make sure they line up, but they are now on.

As part of the upgrade, Herb got new LED position lights, and brighter strobes. Or maybe his old ones were just weak :D In any event, the position lights use clear lenses, and rely on the LED to give the correct coloring.

We also got the boom fairings on. These are also carbon fiber, and huge. There is quit a bit of work involved with getting these in exactly the correct position. Then fastened. We observed that in some places the boom fairing edges would lay up against a rivet. Herb talked to Owen Bell, and he gave advice on how to remedy that. The end result is very clean.

With the comments on the Skymaster that went down in the Artic, Herb got cold weather inlet restrictors, and these are mounted. As well as insulating the crankcase ventilation line.

One of the pieces that connects the stut to the wing (strut fairing) was cracked, and generally in poor shape, so that has been replaced. Getting the old one off was easy. Getting the new one on, was very difficult.

We still have to mount the window in the door, and a couple other things, but we are close.

Here's a picture of the strut fairing piece. It really looks nice.

The insulation for the engine vent came out really well, too.

I can sit in it now, because the new interior has been removed so the paint shop doesn't mess it up. :D