REFLECTOR: Door strut review

[Laurence Coen]

I am still using the old 17" 60# gas springs.  I think we can all agree that the original placement with the attach point at the upper rear corner on the door worked really badly.  It took me several tries to find the "sweet spot" for the gas spring.  I did not add any reinforcement to the door or the hinge area and my doors work well.  The spring is attached to the door about the center of the window and the other end is located on the carbon fiber beam at the upper rear corner of the door opening. The door opens fully and is also held closed (mind your fingers Al) with this position.  The position of the gas spring on the fuselage is the tough one to locate.  The lower you go the better the angle for holding the door open but if you go too low then the gas spring will run out of travel and the door won't close.  When it's at the right spot you will use the full travel of the gas spring.

Larry Coen
N136LC


From: nmflyer1 at aol.com 
Sent: Friday, October 09, 2009 9:51 AM
To: reflector at tvbf.org 
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: Door strut review


Al, 

Well I have both doors off right now, so I'll have to wait a bit to get you a complete picture. here's what I did though:

Added a piece of Triax across the top of the door (wide protrusion/stiffener) then feathered it into the hinge pads & door lip with 3 piles of fine bid.

I also ran the fine bid down the stiffiners for & aft of the window about 2/3 of the way (to the bottom of the window). 

Then I ran a 5" piece of Triax in the fuselage, next to the upper door opening. It starts at the windshield, runs next to the door opening and aft to behind the carbon beams. This is done on each side. 
I also ran Bid (few plies if I remember right) from the firewall, up onto the roof (centered on the underside of the NACA scoops) all the way up to overlap the triax mentioned above. 

The gas spring attach point on the aft beam is about 3.5" above the related (factory) door pin spot. 

The picture below shows where the gas spring mounts on the door & the finished product. 

I can take better pictures once it is together... but don't seem to have any of the stiffenening. At least not on this computer.. I may have some laying around somewhere. 

Kurt 











-----Original Message-----
From: Al Gietzen <ALVentures at cox.net>
To: 'Velocity Aircraft Owners and Builders list' <reflector at tvbf.org>
Sent: Wed, Oct 7, 2009 8:51 am
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: Door strut review



I purchased some gas springs that had half the force of the factory originals (mine are 30 pounds). Then I ended up working on the attach points to stiffen things up on the door, and find a place that would work for mounting the new springs. 
The good news, My doors do not bend up at the back and they don't twist the door. The not so good news is that the door opens about 4" shorter height than the factory ones. Works for me since I'm short 
Hi; Kurt,

I, for one, would like to see what you did – or at least get further explanation.

Thanks,

Al

_______________________________________________
To change your email address, visit http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/listinfo/reflector

Visit the gallery!  www.tvbf.org/gallery
user:pw = tvbf:jamaicangoose
Check new archives: www.tvbf.org/pipermail
Check old archives: http://www.tvbf.org/archives/velocity/maillist.html


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


_______________________________________________
To change your email address, visit http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/listinfo/reflector

Visit the gallery!  www.tvbf.org/gallery
user:pw = tvbf:jamaicangoose
Check new archives: www.tvbf.org/pipermail
Check old archives: http://www.tvbf.org/archives/velocity/maillist.html
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/private/reflector/attachments/20091009/60410fa7/attachment.htm>