Great choice of plane, the Cessna Skymaster, for aviation techno buffs.

Hey, I was impressed by the choice of airplane used by Dwight Renfield, aviator vampire. It is a Cessna Skymaster, twin-engined propeller light plane. The Skymaster was unique for its rare, tandem engine layout. The idea is not new. The Germans experimented with the tandem engine configuration layout with their late 1944 Dornier Pfeil (Arrow). The risk of a tandem engine layout is that if both engines are not exactly matched and synchronized in horsepower, rpms, etc., the plane experiences a phenomenon called, 'porpoising'. The plane will buck like a bronco.

Cessna solved the problem of porpoising and the U.S. Air Force purchased the Skymaster for extensive use in the Vietnam War. The Skymaster served in duties such as, scout observation and artillery spotting. For the latter a pod of smoke rockets would be attached under each wing. I think other more substantial armament was available but I don't know if it was ever used. The advantage to a twin-engined airplane is that if one engine is shot out or quits, the other engine can still bring you home safely. But that still didn't prevent the Skymasters from sustaining their own share of losses from North Vietnamese surface to air antiaircraft machineguns, cannon, rockets, and missiles and anything else nasty that could be supplied by the Soviet Union and Red China. (Later on, President Reagan got back at the Soviets by supplying stinger antiaircraft missiles to the muhajheen in Afghanistan which downed a number of Soviet helicopters and reportedly airplanes, too, he, he, he.)