Fitting Wheel Pants/Gear Leg Fairings

smithhb · Post by **smithhb** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 12:33 pm

OK, I now have a flying airplane. I LOVE flying, but I still need to finish the wheel pants and fairings. I believe this to be the hardest part of the entire build. Gotta motivate myself!

Here's my quandry: The Plans say that the plane MUST be lifted until the main gear wheels are off the ground in order to fit the wheel pants correctly. What is the most efficient, safe and inexpensive way to lift the plane?

Oh, it's a -9A weighing in empty at 1120 lbs.

rob · Post by **rob** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 6:40 pm

I built a set of wing jacks for my -7 out of 2x4's, 2x6's, and two bottle jacks from Lowe's. They worked VERY well and I had no issues at all jacking the plane up to align the fairings and wheel pants. I think I found a picture of a set that a guy built on the "other" site. I can take a picture of mine and send it to you, if you want.

Some may say that you don't need to jack it up, or that the intersection fairings are good enough. Don't believe the hype -- the intersection fairings weren't even close, and I bought the nice ones.

smithhb · Post by **smithhb** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 8:57 pm

Thanks Rob, absolutely, we all like pictures.

I have seen where guys like Mike Schipper bought the Harbor Freight motorcycle lift for $69.00 and added a wood frame to take up the gap. It works pretty nice from what I can see.

rob · Post by **rob** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 4:47 am

I probably won't make it out to the hangar until Friday, and I'll grab some pictures then. I do think a motorcycle lift would work well as a single lift under the main spar carrythrough, but it was nice with the individual lifts that I could make small adjustments in the height to make sure the plane was level, despite the hangar floor.

rob · Post by **rob** » Mon Jul 27, 2009 6:27 pm

Let me know if you have questions on construction --

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Post by **bullojm1** » Mon Jul 27, 2009 6:50 pm

Bret-

I think I have seen other people use an engine lift attached to the engine hook to raise the weight off of the wheels.

smithhb · Post by **smithhb** » Mon Jul 27, 2009 7:36 pm

Damn Rob,

You could lift a house with that thing! I paid $79 at Harbor Freight and bought an ATV lift. It is rated to 1500lbs and works great.

Thanks for the picture! Very well made.

cjensen · Post by **cjensen** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 8:37 pm

smithhb wrote:Damn Rob,

You could lift a house with that thing! I paid $79 at Harbor Freight and bought an ATV lift. It is rated to 1500lbs and works great.

Thanks for the picture! Very well made.

I'm proud of those lifts Rob made too...I get to use 'em!!

RivetBangers.com

Fitting Wheel Pants/Gear Leg Fairings

Fitting Wheel Pants/Gear Leg Fairings

wing jacks

Here's a pic of my wing jacks