Bertie the Bunyip wrote:
Dudley Henriques wrote in
:

Bertie the Bunyip wrote:
Dudley Henriques wrote in
:

john smith wrote:
Dudley Henriques wrote:
The spring type one piece main gear legs are as you say much
better suited to taking any side loads that might be imposed then
an oleo
leg.
In this scenario, the principal negative is excessive tire wear
due
to
scrubbing.
Ah! But what about the wheelpants? :-))
My guess would be that if a pilot is catching a pant while
attempting
a
one wheel landing, that pilot is in wind WAY over their head :-))))

Zachery. I had a nasty experience somewhat realted to this about ten
years ago in my Luscombe. I had bought a pair of wheel pants form
Wagaero. Fiberglass ones. The field I fly from is a bit muddy so I
fiberglassed a pair of "dams" in the back just behind the wheel to
prevent mud building up inside of the pants.
Anyhow. i dropped a friend at a paved strip to collect is airplane
and while taxiing in I noticed it was pulling to one side a bit. It
had mechanical brakes so I got out the tools and let the cable on
that side slack a bit and went to go home. It was very windy. About
25 knots with a fair bit of crosswind from the right ( the left wheel
was pulling a bit still, but not what I considered significant) I
rolled and just as I rotated the airplane lurched left with a god
awful screech. Airborne and catching my wind, I climbed away and
wondered WTF that was all about. A bit later I looked out at my left
wheel and saw my wheel pant pointing straight down! ****.
I flew back to my home base. The wind there couldn't have been more
favorable. It was about 25 knots, about 25 degrees off the runway
heading from the right. I was able to touch down and keep my left
wing up almost to walking pace, when the left wheel came down and I
did a gentle groundloop to the left. Very little damage to the pant,
BTW. The bracket broke and a bit of fiberglass was ground away is
all. Couple of interesting points about it were; the field I went to
was unpaved and also uninhabited, so no emergency services if I had
hurt myself. (No radio on this ship) However, my friend had seen the
incident from the ground and called his wife to be at the field when
I arrived. I did have the presence of mind to try and ensure that the
impact , if I did flip it, wouldn't ruin my looks. I took off my
glasses and took the pen out of my pocket. I thought about using the
vacant seat cushion on the panel just in case, but couldn't figure a
way to fasten it there. ( no shoulder harness) Anyhow, I got away
with it and no real harm done. The cause, of course, was one of those
dams I had put inside the pant coming adrift and lodging itself
between the wheel and the pant.

Bertie
Good job on not dinging it. We used to take the pants off our training
planes for the winter each year to keep ice from causing similar
issues.



Yeanh, I should have done the same year round in this place, but it was
so much prettier with them on!


Bertie
Adds a few knots on a 150. Anything on the Luscombe?

--
Dudley Henriques