Today's Message Index:
----------------------
1. 03:28 AM - gear retract - continued (Mike & Lee Anne Wiebe)
2. 03:35 AM - Attracting Warm Bodies to this list (Mike & Lee Anne Wiebe)
3. 03:50 AM - gluing on the cove ribs - order of operations (Mike & Lee Anne Wiebe)
4. 10:54 AM - Introduction (Al Aitken)
5. 12:50 PM - Re: gear retract - continued (George Richards)
Message 1
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| Subject: | gear retract - continued |
Well, I guess the list won't survive if we don't answer the questions
that people ask of us on the list! George, regarding the spring on the
clamshell nose gear doors...The idea is somewhere at seqair.com - I just
can't find it right now. I"ll describe it in the gear up position. In
essence, its about a 1/8" diameter spring steel rod attached to each
gear door, that goes up and over the nose gear strut. On either side of
the strut, the rod has two complete "loops" in it, which create the
spring effect.
Upon closing, the nose strut hits this spring steel rod and pulls the
gear doors up with it. The door attached to the gear overlaps the
clamshells a little, and holds them up. Upon opening, the spring does
its thing by trying to straighten and pushes those doors open
marvellously. In theory, it could cock off to one side. However, if
each of your doors operates smoothly, and the spring is "tough" and
built symmetrically, that just won't happen. I was concerned of the
gear failure mechanism if one door closed with the gear down, so we did
visuals from other aircraft while cross controlling with full rudder.
The doors are rock solid in every circumstance I can create with my lead
feet!
Regarding the gear down warning system. We don't have the system of
mechanical indicators sticking up through the wings (I don't think many
falcos actually do this). However, all of Alfred's gear mechanisms have
two little tabs welded on to them, which are intended to be the
mechanical strike points for those indicators. We just placed
microswitches in the gear wells that struck those tabs instead, and
wired them to a couple of lights in the cockpit. On the nose gear, we
tapped into the down limit microswitch circuit to accomplish the same
goal. Now, I actually do get "three green" when I put the gear down.
Mike
Message 2
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| Subject: | Attracting Warm Bodies to this list |
Any and all..I was having an offline conversation with someone the other
day about this forum, and it struck me that at least two things will be
necessary for its success. Forgive me if you think me as slow - many
of you may have already had this "ah hah"...
First, it needs to have a bunch of falco builders hanging around, and
not just a bunch of falco pilots. Each of us can help with that, via
our network, and hopefully the great Ing. Scotty might have some pull in
this area too!
Second, if us flyers get questions from builders in some other form, we
should make the effort to post them here for all to see. Only my two
cents worth, but the following post is intended in that spirit.
Mike
Message 3
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| Subject: | gluing on the cove ribs - order of operations |
Gents (I don't know any women dumb enough to build a falco, but I stand
to be corrected...), I had a call the other day looking for some advice
on the following topic, and I thought I would appeal to the great masses
on this list for info...
A meticulous builder (he knows who he is..), building from kits, is
about to undertake gluing the centre section rear wing spar (the one
thru the fuselage) to the bevelled surfaces of the rear "wing" wing
spars. He's building in the recommended jig, wing nose up. His dilemma
is, does he glue the cove ribs and cove skin to the centre section spar
before attaching it to the wings as per plans, or later in construction?
My recommendation was do it before, as he'd spend less time on his back
on the ground trying to attach them above his head later. His concern
stems from the fact that in fastening leading edge and "mid chord" ribs
to the spars already, he's found a few places where he didn't get
alignment as nice as he'd like between ribs and spars, and he's going to
have to float sand more than he would like. IF the same thing happens
with the centre section cove ribs, the trailing edge is so thin that any
extra float sanding could eliminate key structure. So, he'd like the
option to put these on later - more or less after float sanding the rest
of the wing - in order to improve his odds of getting them aligned well,
and therefore minimizing his float sanding.
I can't fault his logic, and as I said he's going about this very
meticulously. However, maybe a revised question is how many people did
the cove ribs first, and then found themselves with excessive sanding
later that compromised the structure of the centre section cove ribs?
Comments appreciated. I don't know if he's hanging around the list yet,
but I'll be sure to pass on your thoughts.
M
Message 4
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Hello everyone,
Having been tipped off by my good Canadian buddy, Mike Wiebe, about the
Falco List, I thought I would sign up and introduce myself to all of
you. Many of you have heard of me in the Falco community, as I have had
the opportunity to test fly a number of Falcos, and I am of course
building one.
I am the "meticulous" builder Mike referred to in his last post. I
think he wanted to use the word "anal", but he was kind. George
Barrett, another builder suggested strongly to me that I install all of
the cove ribs and the cove skin on the aft face of the aft wing spars
before I glue the spars in place. At first that sounded like a good
idea to me, but as I prepared to do that, I wondered how accurately I
could place those cove ribs to ensure proper clearance with the
aileron/flap assembly and also whether I would get the cove ribs at the
right elevation on the aft spar to avoid sanding too much of the cove
rib trailing edge strip away when I float sanded.
So there you have it. I just joined the list and I'm already whining
for help. Anybody have any ideas on this?
Al Aitken
Message 5
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| Subject: | gear retract - continued |
Thanks for that Mike... My light system is the same in that I get three
greens but didn't use all three for sense purposes to keep it "standard".
Re the nosegear doors... OK.. I've got the plans on that one. I was trying
out the different system that was in an FBL somewhere that Ian has on his
machine... Mine needed stronger springs than I tried and the doors started
to close on the ground with increased power so I took them straight of.. I
haven't put them back on yet.. I my get the regular spring and see how I get
on.
Cheers
GR
www.falco.co.nz
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-falco-list-server@matronics.com
[mailto:owner-falco-list-server@matronics.com]On Behalf Of Mike & Lee Anne
Wiebe
Sent: Monday, 16 January 2006 12:29 a.m.
To: falco-list@matronics.com
Subject: Falco-List: gear retract - continued
Well, I guess the list won't survive if we don't answer the questions that
people ask of us on the list! George, regarding the spring on the clamshell
nose gear doors...The idea is somewhere at seqair.com - I just can't find it
right now. I"ll describe it in the gear up position. In essence, its about
a 1/8" diameter spring steel rod attached to each gear door, that goes up
and over the nose gear strut. On either side of the strut, the rod has two
complete "loops" in it, which create the spring effect.
Upon closing, the nose strut hits this spring steel rod and pulls the gear
doors up with it. The door attached to the gear overlaps the clamshells a
little, and holds them up. Upon opening, the spring does its thing by
trying to straighten and pushes those doors open marvellously. In theory,
it could cock off to one side. However, if each of your doors operates
smoothly, and the spring is "tough" and built symmetrically, that just won't
happen. I was concerned of the gear failure mechanism if one door closed
with the gear down, so we did visuals from other aircraft while cross
controlling with full rudder. The doors are rock solid in every
circumstance I can create with my lead feet!
Regarding the gear down warning system. We don't have the system of
mechanical indicators sticking up through the wings (I don't think many
falcos actually do this). However, all of Alfred's gear mechanisms have two
little tabs welded on to them, which are intended to be the mechanical
strike points for those indicators. We just placed microswitches in the
gear wells that struck those tabs instead, and wired them to a couple of
lights in the cockpit. On the nose gear, we tapped into the down limit
microswitch circuit to accomplish the same goal. Now, I actually do get
"three green" when I put the gear down.
Mike
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