Video: Coolifying A Straight Tail Cessna 150 - Nice!
Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 10:33PM 
Thelma, a recently restored & converted straight tail Cessna 150 by Taildragger Aviation
You might remember that quite a while back I posted an old Cessna 150 ad from 1966, the first year for the swept tail. This brought the 150 fully into the 'modern' era with the Land-O-Matic tricycle gear, the Omni-Vision rear window and now the new Flight/Sweep swept tail. The only problem for me was that all the things that made Cessna airplanes great thru the 40's and 50's was pretty much gone. In my opinion, the 1966 Cessna 150 had no heart. No soul.
Then I posted a story about how the nice people at Taildragger Aviation took an old straight tail 150 and restored it while also converting it to a taildragger. Check out that post: This Is What The 1966 Cessna 150 Should Have Looked Like! And now they've done it again. The pic above is another old straight tail that's been restored and converted... and wow, does it ever look great. I still think this is how the 150 shoulda looked thru the 1960's.
This restoration also comes with the video below to show the work and the finished product in 4-1/2 minutes. The best part? Watching that perfect landing on a beautiful grass runaway at the very end of the video. Wow. That my friends, is flying!
Reader Comments (6)
The 150 does look better as a taildragger...seems like a minor thing, but it really does look a lot cooler all of a sudden.
Used to own a straight tail 150 - both more stable and more responsive than a swept tail, slightly faster, too. When they swept the tail they messed up a good airplane. Friends who have owned both swept and straight tail 17s2 have made similar observations.
Thelma's a looker!
Beautiful airplane. I own a 1964D straight tail tri-gear and would like to make it a taildragger. Any help directing me to the proper STC and related information would be appreciated. Thank you
And yes, I agree, Cessna should have made the C-150 straight tails into conventional gear from the onset.
I got training hours in both C 140 and C 150 back when tail dragger training was still around. I never got the feeling I was working the rudders on the 140, especially on landing. The post war flying boom, source of so many fine airplanes, wouldn't have happened without the tri-gear. It's just that much harder enough to discourage many, not to mention insurance costs. But tail draggers do look so cool.
Informative suggestions , I loved the details - Does someone know where my business might be able to grab a fillable a form version to use ?