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This started out as a simple update of Henry William's C-118A repaint for Greg Pepper's FS2002 CalClassics DC-6. Like a lot of projects, it snowballed into something much larger.


Departing Wake Island for Hickam.

I started out planning to just relocate the door openings to match the latest model. Problem was, the newer doors interfered with the location of the windows.


Somewhere over the Pacific

The CalClassics paint kit is generally pretty good, but there are a few small problems. One of them is that the window spacing is off. Not usually noticeable until you get into very specific marking schemes. I spent a lot of time comparing and measuring between photographs, as well as picking information from the Air Force Dash-1.


It's interesting watching mountains reflected in the polished skin while cruising over the middle of the ocean. First time I've ever really paid attention the envmap effect.

Once you adjust the doors and windows to their proper locations, you've got to adjust the paint and markings as well.


Yes, I did cage #4 enroute. This is a great airplane. With Ken Mitchell's panel installed, the FE becomes a very important part of the crew. In this case, #4 had unusually high oil consumption (How do they do that?!), so we did a precautionary shutdown.

Since I was redoing the paint & markings, just to give myself something else to do, I decided to mess around with the bare metal areas, playing around a LOT with the alpha channel.


Over the numbers, I can almost taste that mai-tai waiting for me at the Shorebird.

In the end, I probably would have been better off starting from scratch, but I'm pretty happy with the resulting paint. Thanks, Henry, Greg, Tom, Ken and the others at CalClassics!


Turn it over to Maintenance and Aerial Port. Time to hit the beach.

FS9
Honolulu/Oahu scenery by Gottfried Razek/Blue Sky Scenery
Sky by HDEv2
DC-6B by CalClassics
Custom paint by me (from the original by Henry William)

Awesome work! 

Very nice...well done...an aircraft we do not see much of on the forums here...

Thanks, mfaulisi. Thanks, Doug. It was fun, if frustrating at times (like getting the sides mixed-up and pasting everything in bass-akwards), but I learned a lot about repainting, especially making the metal parts look good. Yeah, I could have just used somebody else's settings for the alpha, but now I've got a whole catalog of ranges mapped out for use on other a/c.

You're right, Doug. You don't see a lot of these birds on the forum. Most seem to be interested in the kerosene-burners. I am, too, buuuuut... those big round engines are a whole 'nuther world, as well you know!

I love the colouring on the cylinders on those big radial motors!

It really makes them stand out!

An excellent job!

Paul... 8-)...!

Very nice shots! Love the reflections

Cheers,
Clem

Looking great, a most enjoyable set!

Awesaome repaint...well done 8-)

Thanks everybody. I suppose I should think about uploading this so someone else might have a go with it. Never done that before.

@Paul: I agree about the engines. They look great. Ironically, they're the one part of the paint kit I didn't monkey with. Airframe, windows, panel lines, props and spinners, even the oleo struts... but the engines looked great straight out of the box. So I can't claim credit for them.