Michel and friends,
I have several hundred pictures of the process that I will have to
high-grade for posting on my web site.
I have selected a few of the final pictures here:
I don't have any pictures of the nose gear installation. I did go with
the big metal springs rather than the bungee cord for the nose wheel.
Nor do I have installation pictures of the flap drive mechanism or new
brake master cylinder. I'll have to take some pictures of these when I
go back out to the hanger to complete all the work and get the aircraft
flying again.
For what it's worth, the reason for the conversion was a ground loop on
takeoff. Broke the outrigger mounts on both sides and had a prop
strike. The monowheel is just too sensitive on hard surface runways.
It's wonderful on turf. A dream to land and take off. But on concrete
it's a witch. I had been flying early in the morning two days in a row
before the incident. Light winds, (runway 17, winds 0-7 kts variable
170 - 210 degrees) great for practice. No problems at all. On this
day, the winds were still 0-7 kts from 170 - 210 and forecast to remain
that way till after 1500 hrs local. The pattern was full of training
planes. I made one takeoff and landing, no problem. All landings in
the monowheel have been full stop, no touch and goes, so I had taxied
back to the north end of the runway and waited for a break in the
training traffic so I could take off. When the break came, I taxied out
onto the runway and checked the wind sock, still light and about 210
degrees. I advanced the throttle slowly and the aircraft accelerated
well, at 40 indicated I raised the tail and the aircraft started sliding
across the runway sideways while turning to the right. I corrected the
heading with some left rudder but before the aircraft was ready to
actually fly, the left outrigger got into the grass and mud and turned
me into a ground loop. Pretty bad at 40 kts. Damage to both outrigger
mounts and a prop strike. Seems that after I taxied out and applied
throttle the winds shifted to 16 G 20 from 270 degrees. The monowheel
couldn't handle those winds. Literally blew the aircraft off the runway
into the long grass and mud. What a mess. Having had a number of these
excursion into the grass over the last year, mostly on landing, mostly
due to excessive cross winds. I decided that I had an aircraft that was
of EXTREMELY limited utility. Only safe to fly on nearly dead calm
mornings and nothing else. Sure couldn't plan cross country flying
since you never know what winds you'll find at the destination. And in
the U.S.A. public turf runways are very rare. You are always landing on
hard surface. So, I decided to convert to tri-gear to try and get a
more utilitarian aircraft.
This is not a trivial conversion. Go to the Europa site and download
the builders manual sections on the Tri-Gear installation to get an idea
what is involved. It's a LOT of work and setup and jigging and some of
the most miserable glass layups ever. Installing the flap drive is
UGLY. Took 17 days working 9 - 12 hrs a day with the help of Bud Yearly
and his two sons (they have done about a dozen of these conversions) at
Custom Flight Creations to complete the basic conversion and repair the
wings. And I still have another couple months of work to do in the
hanger to get N914XL flying again. But, I'll have a much more usable
aircraft in the end.
If you have any questions about the conversion please don't hesitate to
ask them. I'll answer as best I can.
Best regards,
Bob Borger
Europa Kit #A221 N914XL, XS Tri-gear, Intercooled 914, Airmaster C/S
http://www.europaowners.org/forums/gallery2.php?g2_itemId=60232
http://www.biplaneforumgallery.com/index.php?cat=10046
Europa Flying!
3705 Lynchburg Dr.
Corinth, TX 76208
Home: 940-497-2123
Cel: 817-992-1117
On Sep 15, 2010, at 1:02, mau11 wrote:
> Hi all,
> Does anyone have pictures of this conversion?
>
> Mainly, main gear adaptation and fixation.
>
> Thanks
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