East bound over Papua New Guinea with the sun at my six. Beautiful weather - "Active Sky Next" on - with some storm clouds in front of me. Around thirty miles to my destination at Aiome. Autopilot on. Looking at charts, and info on the Aimoe airstrip for best approach. VOR needle started it's slow swing to line me up with runway 19. At ten miles started slow decent, flaps, gear down. Time to disengage the autopilot. Having trouble finding the autopilot panel in the dark. The Autopilot on off switch was not only hard to find but getting that index finger to land on it was another challenge. Solved the lighting problem by holding a mini flashlight with my teeth. .
All this to say it would sure be great if that panel had more lights on it.

Yes, night flying the AC500S is a bit of a challenge because of the lighting, the gauges look nice but the AP and the very top overheard panel are impossible to see at night?

 

Cheers

Martin