Darick's Sonex #1646

[gammaxy]

Congratulations, drilling the holes and doing the alignment is a lot of work.

I recently welded and re-drilled the holes in my axles since the holes wallowed out a little and were causing shimmy. Sonex mentioned using shim stock to reduce any play in the axles since even with perfectly drilled holes, the titanium rod potentially has about .008" of play inside the steel tube.

[Bryan Cotton]

Awesome! You have one upped most of us having the wheelpants on for that milestone though.

[Darick]

Bryan, I borrowed some of your photographic magic tricks. The wheels pants may look right, but they are just sitting on the wheels. Which brings up another question.

I've looked at many Sonex pictures to determine the best angle for the pants and it seems they look best if aligned with the longerons. However, the wheel pant mounting plate is pointed way down, about 10-15 degrees. I may just try to attach the pants level with the longerons and trim the mounting plate to minimize that 10-15 degrees. I'll let you know how that goes.

On another note, I didn't use the suggested way to get the toe in. Instead I aligned the axles using a laser and plumb bobs. After they were aligned, I used trigonometry to set the toe in at a distance of 36" out from the axle. Tangent of .7 degrees times 36" gives the correct answer. I know this description is a bit simplistic and it may be difficult to understand exactly how I did it. Maybe some day I'll try to explain it in detail if anyone is interested.

[Bryan Cotton]

Darick,
I have heard from a couple builders that the wheel pant mounting plate is at the wrong angle. I have not dug into that issue yet.

[Darick]

I didn't try to adjust the angle of the wheel pant mounting plate, just cut off the amount that stuck out beneath the fiberglass and added two more nut plates.

I may try to add a fabric boot to the junction of the wheel pants and axle just for aesthetics.

I was curious about the appearance of the leg fairing and how the hydraulic line would fit under it,so I just cut a three inch piece of aluminum and fastened it on the left gear, which you can see in the picture. Tomorrow I'll start fitting the left wheel pant.

[Darick]

I finished the wheel pants and have about 2-3/4 to 3" of clearance. A friend has a WACO with about the same clearance and has no problems being too close to the ground, which is what I was concerned about.




Owner and pilot Joe Kaminskas, WACO RNF, NC859V

[Darick]

The instrument panel design has been going on for over a year, probably two. That's what I'll be looking at all the time and if it wasn't pleasing, I'd be forever wishing for another layout. It just a pet peeve of mine. Anyways, I have cut out mostly all the round holes, but still waiting for some switches to arrive.

The cardboard mock up is sitting below the real panel.



I'll probably get the Sandia transponder but hate to spend the money right now.

[Darick]

Seems like Ive been working on the panel forever. Almost completed…just waiting for a few supplies to finish up.

[Darick]

Almost finished the instrument panel, some things I'm please with, others not. The labeling turned out nicely, done on a Brothers 1750 label maker. After trimming the label very close to the white frame, I applied it to the panel then sprayed with a matte clear finish. Depending on how the light hits the panel, you can't see the label edges.

[Darick]

Almost done (for the third time I've said this)with the panel, installation of the real Sandia transponder (not a paper cutout) and a smaller "amateur built" placard still needed.