Avid Stretch (Mini Plus)

[TJay 1041]

Very nice guys keep it up

[1avidflyer 1983]

It's kind of funny, but I remember a set of Catalina wings that were for sale a couple of years ago.  I think they had two sets of jury strut fittings.  I looked at some Catalina pictures last night, and never saw any with two sets of jury struts.  May have been someone's better idea on just one set of wings.  JImChuk

Hey Jim, indeed the Catalina wings have two sets of jury struts each side......I am the one who bought the catalina wings as I thought it be a good idea to have a spare If I where to ding my wings into a dock...

Are you saying that particular set of Cat wings has two sets of jury struts, or do they all have two sets per side?  JImChuk

[flywise 169]

It's kind of funny, but I remember a set of Catalina wings that were for sale a couple of years ago.  I think they had two sets of jury strut fittings.  I looked at some Catalina pictures last night, and never saw any with two sets of jury struts.  May have been someone's better idea on just one set of wings.  JImChuk

Hey Jim, indeed the Catalina wings have two sets of jury struts each side......I am the one who bought the catalina wings as I thought it be a good idea to have a spare If I where to ding my wings into a dock...

Are you saying that particular set of Cat wings has two sets of jury struts, or do they all have two sets per side?  JImChuk

Hey Jim,

from what I know, the Avid Amphibian (straight rudder trailing edge) had a single jury strut per wing /side. The Catalina wing (round trailing edge rudder+other mods) has two jury struts per wing/side (the outboard one is quite short & close to the strut attach fitting- wing side). All this came about because tests showed that for the long wingspan of the Catalina to have only one jury strut made the wing too flexible and sucessible to flutter. The Avid amphibian with only one jury strut per side had a shorter wingspan because of their drooping into the water wingtips. The Catalina has one more rib and a normal wingtip, separate floats are attached further inboard where the strut mounts to the wing.

[1avidflyer 1983]

Wow!  this reminds me of the guy who said he had to admit that he was wrong once.  What happened was he found out he was wrong about something, but later learned that he was right after all.  The mistake was in him thinking for a while that he was wrong about something.     Well I won't claim to be that guy by any means.  I know I've been wrong more then once...  maybe once times one million... JImChuk

[SuberAvid 617]

Hi Flywise,

Thanks for the information on the Catalina.  Can you take some measurements for me on the positions of the two fury struts from the root end of the spars? (say from the spar pin on the front and bolt on the rear)  Also, some pictures of yours showing the jury struts would be great.

Thanks!

Randy

[aschlem 15]

Do you have pictures of the boat seats installed?

[SuberAvid 617]

Here are the ones I used in my Avid+

[SuberAvid 617]

Time to get back to working on the Mini + again.  I put the original set of gear legs I built for the Avid + on the Mini + so we can make sure all fits up well before gluing and wrapping the tanks into the wings (these will be it's permanent gear as well).  It actually makes the plane taller than I expected; and starts to look more like an airplane!

[wypaul 448]

Looking good, what are you planning for power?

[aschlem 15]

Are your tires 31''?

[SuberAvid 617]

This one is getting a stock Yamaha Apex motor.  The tires on it in the pictures are 26" Bushwheels.  I haven't decided if I will go to 30" or 31" yet.  I have a spare set of them but not sure how airtight they are.  I'll plan to  fly it on these for a while and then decide.

[Buckchop 479]

Man Randy that baby is startin to really look good!! The 26” tires fit i very well also i think, but i was never a big tire short gear guy, i like long gear smaller tire. Im watchin and gettin ideas for my Fox Monster 0048. 

[ChrisBolkan 130]

Those are the biggest 26's I've ever seen! Swear they look like 29's or bigger in the photos!

[SuberAvid 617]

Well Jack and I tried to test fit the wings on the Mini+ last weekend and I am sure glad we didn't put the tanks in until we checked this.  The bottom line is the pins are about 1/8" off.  Not a big catastropphy as it would have been if the tanks were all glued in and wrapped with fiberglass but it will require removing the end rib, drilling out the doubler plates replacing them with new plates fitted in the correct locations.  The dihedral ends up around just under 1 degree which is pretty flat compared to the stock Avid so I don't know what that will mean to the flight characteristics. 

[SuberAvid 617]

After taking out the inserts and removing the end rib to get back to square one to fit the wings to the Mini-Plus we kept the original hole position on the top rear of each spar and refit the bolts and pins for the front and rear spars from there to get the wings to fit on the Mini-Plus airframe.  This means all the doublers, except the one in each wing, will be repositioned and the holes through the aluminum will be oblonged somewhat.  Even though not preferred, it is the steel doublers that take the load, so with some oversized top doubler plates and oversized SS rivets, I am not too concerned about it.  The wings fit and aligned very well after this was done; now we can get to work putting them back together!  This is what a stretched Avid looks like with Catalina wings on it.

[Cass256 4]

Words can't describe how impressive this is!! It's shaping up to be one beautiful machine, can't wait to see it fly :D

[Landcruisinmy93 5]

I love your mini+ do you have any plans, dimensions etc... for those great legs? Where are the getting your Apex mount from? Great job so far.

[flywise 169]

Hi Flywise,

Thanks for the information on the Catalina.  Can you take some measurements for me on the positions of the two fury struts from the root end of the spars? (say from the spar pin on the front and bolt on the rear)  Also, some pictures of yours showing the jury struts would be great.

Thanks!

Randy

Hey Randy,

here the measurements (roughly) going from the spar pin towards the wingtip:

Spar pin to first Jury strut is 69,5in

Spar pin to second jury strut is 89in

Spar pin to strut attachment bolt on spar is 120 1/4in

Front and rear attachment is the same distance.

[akflyer 1427]

Looking good.  Should have known that the wing swap wouldn't have been as easy as we hoped.  I think its going to be well worth it in the end though mr.!  looks like you could really use a tailwheel lift.  I built one for my brother a couple months ago and I don't know how we got along with out one all these years working on the birds.

I am making a platform for the lift so I can put a scale on it or the tailwheel with a tail ski on it.  Makes leveling stupid easy and I love being able to crank the tail up to work on things and not have to strain.  Granted, our tails on the avids are not too bad to pick up but the pacer and 170 are not as much fun.

[TJay 1041]

Oh I like that think Ill make a few and sell them after my airplane is flying. Very cool.