Brief Description: Fixtures for installing wheel pants
Installing the wheel pants is straight forward enough but it must be done very accurately to ensure minimum drag in flight. First, the fuselage must be leveled fore, aft, and laterally. To do this the tail must be lifted a few feet off the floor. In preparation for this I fabricated a tail stand. The plan is to place two carpenter levels on the canopy rails to check level both fore-aft and side-to-side. Then the stand will be placed under the tail wheel at the appropriate height. The main gear tires will be in contact with the floor.
I also fabricated a couple short stands that will be used up front between the gear legs. One stand, the stool, will be used to establish a true fore-aft line centered under the fuselage. I plan to clamp a metal yardstick to the stool running right down the center of the fuselage. I will establish center with plumb bobs hung from the bottom skin on the center line. The metal ruler then will allow me to measure an exact distance from the fuselage center to the center if each tire and pant.
The other odd looking stand will be used at the back of the pant to keep it lined up fore and aft. I plan to use some wood blocks to get and hold the vertical height of the pants. I will take some pictures of the process so it will be clearer.
