Activity Stream

The sleeping giant of US Governenmental overreaching oversite and beurocracy has noticed you!

http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/NTSB-Urges-Oversight-of-Specific-Alaskan-Operators221943-1.html

Yesterdays chicken scratch at the breakfast table if anyone's interested in the box dimensions

Thanks for the input thats what I was hoping for but wanted to know before i cut into my panel. here is how its looking so far. it will have the master switches on the far left side and will be painted yellow to match the rest of the plane. hate to cover up the carbon fiber but we want the gauge color to contrast the panel rather than just disappear into it. I made a tray behind the panel so the handheld sits flush but can still be easily removed for use outside the aircraft.

What type of terrain are you looking to land on? Grass, sand, gravel, stone?

You can easily put 21, 26, 29, 31, or even 35" diameter tires on a 6" wheel. This can range from a couple hundred dollars to several thousand.

I want to land on fields I was wondering how big a tire can I put on a 6 inch wheel.

Sorry to jump in so late I'm just finally getting caught up on some of the threads. to throw in an alternative option (which I chose to use on my project) the main gear legs off of a Ridge Runner http://realflying.com/ will fit perfectly on our airframes and they use the bungees like the cubs have under the plane rather than on the seat truss. all I had to do was fab up my own cabane and shorten the bungee struts 1/2" and it all bolted in real nicely just finished the mod this last weekend. This gear is just a tad longer than Brett's wide bush gear so it sets almost the same but replaces the springs with bungees. I'm planning to finish painting it this week and get it installed soon if you want pics just ask and I will shoot some for you.

-Robert-

I don't have the proper engineering words to explain this, but my comparison of the Matco internal disks and the Cleveland and Grove external disks indicates to me that the brake torque of the Cleveland and Grove has to be much greater than the Matco, considering the difference in leverage between a 2 inch radius for the Matco, and a greater, maybe 3 or 4 inch, radius for the external two.

I believe the MC and pad pressure are also greater on the Grove and Cleveland, but have no specs to prove this.

EDMO

IFMT, that would be great. I've been wanting to see what your upgraded truss looks like since you mentioned it. If you could measure some tube diameters it would really help too. Thanks a lot for your help.

Luke D.

I did the plywood glue in when I first put the wide gear on. I cant say that I pancaked it but the plywood will give way a little at a time. The seat truss mod is WAY stronger than the original. At the stage you're at with no fabric to cut off I wouldn't fool around. I think the whole thing cost me about $1200 without fabric. The truss is cheap. The tig welding up here where I'm at was $100 an hour. Make no mistake...it takes skill to put the new piece in right. The cost of peace of mind. Maybe you are skilled yourself or specialized welding is more affordable where you are at. I'll get some pics of that as well when I get to the plane. B

Ha!, Thanks Larry.

I'll measure it up and get some close pictures for you.

I have seen drawings of what was supposed to be a "Swiss" muffler - Looked to be about 5 feet long - and yours didn't look like that.

Thanks Bernard,

EDMO

I think the MCMC4GH master would work better on the Avids with the updated pedals as it is shorter than the 4D master.  But you still have to deal with the rudder bar issue and slot the bottom of the master or move one mount tab on each of the rudder bars.

 

http://www.matcomfg.com/MasterCylinders-tp2-5.html

 

Link the Matco master cylinder page

 

The MC4G is the master cylinder I used when I remade my pedals to make the brakes work.  When I'm back in town (the end of May at this point), I'll take pictures of the new pedals/cylinders.  They work much better than the 'stock' Avid pedals with the MC5 cylinder.

Mark

I haven't bid on any aircraft stuff...not that I remember anyway. I bought the spinner from UHS in ontario. Around $200 for the kit if I remember. The plane came with the warp prop but I had to replace the blades after a bungee got cut by the safety cable. The rad is directly out of a VW rabbit. Cools it fine, even on long full power climbcout on hot day. I scavenge heat up through an inspection type hole in the floor. Not that great when it's real cold though. The thermostat doesn't let enough heat back. Thinking about redirecting the muff for the carb heat through a switchable door. The muffler is a custom built "swiss" made of stainless steel. Just google "swiss muffler" and you will get some views. I'm Bernard. But I'm not french so it's pronounced Bernerd. Cheers. B

Ok! That's more like it...

Leni - Why not take your boy up there with you, tap him with a cattle prod and step back to let nature take it's course?

Dang that sucks man.

Happy wing-ing!  

Man, that's a bummer. Sorry to see that it turned out this way. In situations like this, it's hard to know whether to just chalk it up to a bad experience and move on, or see if you can get some kind of resolution. Sometimes it's not worth the extra headache. I guess everyone is different. Of course, I know it would probably bug me every time I saw it. Like you said in one of your earlier posts though, this plane is a pickup truck of the sky not a hangar queen. If it's airworthy, maybe just go with it.

The thing I can't understand is that this guy isn't willing to work with you a little more. Like they say, a happy customer might tell one other person, but an unhappy customer will tell ten other people...

Flyable and airworthy are not the same as "Quality of workmanship" - The repair station should be held to higher standards.

Maybe FSDO will have 2nd thoughts about his "expertise"?   I would go there and bitch.

EDMO

Small update for today. I got some stuff from Kitfox...

John and Debra McBean were great to deal with, and got my order of parts to me pretty quickly. Parts quality and packaging was excellent. From what I can tell so far, I would recommend using Kitfox parts.

This is my first wave of wing parts. I will be ordering most of the remaining items from Aircraft Spruce. Probably some more from Kitfox too though. We'll see how things go. Here's what came today:

3 big boxes

Gas tanks

Various gas tank parts

Various wing parts

I also got PVC leading edge pieces, some ribs, and trailing edges that are not in the pictures.

Larry, I think we are going to take them up to the FSDO and see what they think about that work coming out of a certified repair station... The bad news is, when the FAA inspectors have an issue with something and are wondering how bad is bad enough to not be safe or fly able, this is the guy they call.... So we may just be screwed on this one..

Thanks Doug. That's really helpful information. I was considering going to 3/4" tubing on the top where it is in compression to increase resistance to buckling, but I haven't gotten down to the detailed calculations yet. Doing the calculations takes me a long time because I have to double check everything so many times to make sure I'm doing it right.

My current design looks a lot like your rear bungee truss (except flipped upside down). My idea is to put closer spaced diagonals with shorter lengths near the center where the bending moment is the highest. It turns out the Bearhawk uses a landing gear truss that is almost exactly this design. You can sort of see it in the picture below.

Thanks,

Luke D.

Stop payment on check?

Call local FSDO?

Open up a 2-liter of whoopazz?

Suberavid, I do live in Valdez, the offer stands.  Hope to atleastto  meet you if you make it down.  Very interested in checking out some of these light experimentals.  Grew up in the back of a cub but will likely not be spending 40 to 80 k on a plane anytime soon.  Also convinced I don't want a certified airplane.