REFLECTOR: fixed gear nose wheel

[velocityxl]

I had the same experiance except the fairing did not brake off .I did add an extra tail to the front fairing for the same reason you want to. I have had good success with the extra fairing on the back of the front wheel fairing in keeping the front wheel straight




Ron

Sent from Samsung tablet not an Ipad  Ron

-------- Original message --------
From: David Ullman <ullman at robustdecisions.com> 
Date: 03/17/2013  8:05 AM  (GMT-06:00) 
To: reflector at tvbf.org 
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: fixed gear nose wheel 
 
I have an SEFG and don't have much of a shimmy problem.  Seems to come and
go, and is never very bad.  But, a bigger issue occurred last summer.  I had
the front faring on and I took off.  The plane had a bad yaw that I had not
experienced before.  I checked and all the controls were working as they
should.  I figured that somehow the front wheel was cocked and acting as a
front rudder.  I landed and sure enough, when the front wheel touched down,
I felt a jerk, like the wheel aligning.  I taxied back to the hangar and
found the back half of the front faring was missing.  The jerk of the wheel
aligning had whipped the fairing so hard that it literally tore off.   This
confirmed what happened in flight, I must have skipped to the side just as I
lifted off and the friction was enough to hold the misalignment in place.  I
started a search of the airport area for the faring half when I guy pulled
up in truck with a "is this yours?".  It was on the runway, luckily he
landed right after me, saw it depart my plane and was able to land around it
and go back and pick it up.  

I want to put the front faring back on, but don't want to experience this
again. I think my friction is about right as I can easily steer when taxiing
and don't have much shimmy.  First question: anybody else ever experience
this?  Second question: I am thinking of putting a rudder on the back half
of the faring.  This should give enough aero force aft of the pivot to make
it weather vane should I knock it off center again.  It may also add a
little shimmy damping.  I would have to beef the connection of the rear half
to the wheel.  It should look cool too.  Has anyone tried this?  

David Ullman
N444DX
President EAA 292
541-754-3609
david at davidullman.com


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