Hey guys. Yes it's another episode of 182 questions from RCU's most annoying member! I was looking at HP's pilots, and thought they would work great. But, after talking to the guy yesterday, and measuring my cockpit, I have come to this conclusion. Although the plane may be 1/5 scale, the pilot needed to fit would have to be 1/7 or 1/8 scale. HP lists their 1/5 pilot as 7 inches from the butt to the top of the head. With the cockpit kit in place, I have only 5 (more like 4 1/2) inches of clearance from the seat to the top of the cabin. Even HP's 1/6 pilot doesn't come close. Now with it being a 1/5 scale plane, and only 5 inches of clearance, this means the pilot would only be 25 inches tall from butt to head, if translated to full scale. Huh? What's going on here? Does anybody make a 1/5 scale midget pilot? LOL.

[link=http://www.hppilots.com/gpage13.html]HP Pilots[/link]

The problem is with the thickness of the wing inside the cabin. My pilot is a DGA pilot (sewn and stuffed body with latex head) and when he's inside the cabin, his chin is buried in his chest.
This makes him look like he's looking down. That's partly why I have him looking at a clip board with a pencil and stuff. If i had to go with a stiffer, molded pilot, I would do two things.
First remove as much from his butt and legs as possible yet still appear to be sitting in the seat, as opposed to on it.
Second, I would then simply cut off the top of his head. Would look scary when the wing is off, but when on, you'd have to get under and look up in to see that. The important view is from the side at a scale angle.

My .o2

I see. So you are saying in the full scale 182, the pilots head sits above the bottom of the wing. Maybe I will go with the 1/6 scale pilot, and hack and cut him up a bit. Thanks SDCrashmaster, you have helped me in a lot of aspects on this plane.

Deadeye,

You're right. On full-scale Cessna 182's, there is no carry-through structure for the wing that intrudes into the cabin. The struts carry the lift and landing loads of the wings. This means that the ceiling of the cabin is no more than about 1" thick, which gives plenty of headroom for the pilot and passengers. In the model, there is a lot of wing where there is none in the real airplane.

The pilot's eyeline will be below the top of the window, but the rest of the head is above it. High-wing pilots have to get used to ducking their heads down to help look to the side, and to raising the wing before turning to make sure it's safe to do so.

Thanks for clearing that up, Bax. It looks like my pilot will be getting a labotomy.