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Old 05-23-2015, 04:30 PM
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Sakrison Sakrison is offline
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Location: Ripon, WI, 20 mi from Oshkosh - center of the Aviation Universe
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Originally Posted by rickstef View Post
Cessna 0-2 Skymaster
At first glance, it appears to be an O-2B, one of early examples of the O-2 when the Air Force pulled civilian C-336 Skymasters (fixed gear) off the shelf and put them into the Vietnamese theater as "Bullshit Bombers" -- 336s with speakers mounted in the baggage door to broadcast propoganda and psy-ops to the enemy. If it were a USAF plane, the absence of extra windows, fixed gear, and the spinner on the prop would identify this as an O-2B. But the hard points and camo scheme suggest that it's not an American plane; some other country has apparently modified an C-336 for combat.

The fireball suggests that this plane is on a strafing run, which means it's a fixed-gear C-336. A C-337 would have its gear up during combat.

Cessna began building C-337Ms for the Air Force with beefed up spars and airframes, hardpoints, and extra windows. When those aircraft went operational, it was designated O-2A. Cessna built about 525 of these between 1967 and 1970, when the OV-1 Bronco came on line.

Why The -B first and then the -A? Probably because everyone knew the off-the-shelf O-2B was a stopgap measure while Cessna spooled up production of the militarized C-337.

A great way to see these in action is the move "Bat 21."
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A puzzle for the aircraft buffs - what is it?-c337p.jpg   A puzzle for the aircraft buffs - what is it?-cessna-02-bg.jpg  
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Last edited by Sakrison; 05-23-2015 at 05:29 PM.
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