crashed

[WebMaster]

an honest answer from someone who knows, and has one.

Far better than those of us who only speculate.
Do you have de-ice boots?

[aldoradave]

PS The P337 is limited to 20,000 ft. Out of safety I presume since it should be capable of 30,000 as is the T337. My guess is that they didn't want 337 pilots of pressurized aircraft to have to have the skills of a jet jocky in case of depressurization.

Dave Dillehay
N84E

[Skymaster337B]

You're on the right track. My understanding is the 20K limit was based on "newer" certification requirements back in the early 70's. But you're right, the airplane could fly higher, but not maintain cabin pressure, so in the eyes of the FAA its service ceiling is 20K.

[jack374dn]

My airplane, N374DN, best altitude after operation at several altitudes from 14 to 22,000 without a doubt is 16,000 nominal ... I'm sure the wing extensions from Owen Bell would greatly improve performance above FL 18,000 ...

Jack

[N5ZX]

Regrettably, I've flown FL180, FL190, FL200 only a couple of times.

I have the various wing mods from Owen Bell and I loved the performance.

I was putting along at about 175KIA , 22GPH (combined). roughly 70% power on 1500hr engines.

I've since hung zero-hour rebuilds on front and rear and 3-blade composits and cant wait to get past my break-in so I can go up and check my numbers.

I have no other skymaster experience, so I cannot say if this is an improvement or not.

But I like it....a LOT.
Cole

[jack374dn]

I am really interested in the MT props ... Their performance comparison ...
From your picture, it appears you have the wing tip extensions ? Bet that is quite an improvement at altitude ...
One of the drawbacks to the Riley is weight .. Thus, the normal 337 wing gets pretty tired at altitudes above 16,000 ... My airplane ...
If I had a lot of years remaining to fly, and as much as I enjoy my 337, I would install the mod ...
Probably going to sell 74DN this year ..

Jack

[Seagull Tango]

A discussion with another old Skymaster pilot raised an interesting discussion point on the impact of ground effect.

An aircraft flying at or very nearly at Vne, descending into ground effect, would see the airspeed increase as the wing became more efficient, with the concurrent reduction in induced drag, assuming the power setting remained constant.

A second point is whether there is any impact on the loads and stresses if an aircraft enters into ground effect in a bank -- i.e., one wing is in ground effect, while the other is not.

I don't know if the load changes related to ground effect have ever been studied AT HIGH SPEEDS. Does anyone have knowledge of that?

To my knowledge, ground effect research is typically focused on low speed impacts, improvements in the efficiency of the wing while in ground effect at the extremes of the envelope (meaning that the aircraft is able to fly in ground effect at an extreme weight or temperature, but is beyond the envelope and unable to climb out of ground effect until sufficient weight of fuel is burned off, etc.).