Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Matt Heintz on December 1, 2009 at 8:32am

Jim,
Solid rivets are preferred as they fill the inside of the hole. This removes some of the stresses made by the hole area. Also, if installed properly, solid rivets will never move in the hole and there are no nuts that could get loose if not properly installed. No torque values to worry about etc.

With bolts and if installed correctly are extremely effective. When torqued correctly, they squeeze the material together which helps spread the loads past the hole. When using the bolts, it is important that the bolt fit tightly in the hole. Use the torque value as specified in AC 43-13.

Permalink Reply by Peter Johnson on November 30, 2009 at 11:06pm

Mathieu,

Do I need any supports under the fuse when I remove the center section? It looks like just the main gear and nose wheel are OK from your photos.

Cheers

Peter. Wonthaggi Australia

Permalink Reply by Matt Heintz on December 1, 2009 at 2:25pm

Peter,
Yes, the fuselage is stiff enough without the center spar.

Permalink Reply by Andy Elliott on December 1, 2009 at 2:12pm

I have started a separate discussion directed specifically toward concerned builder/owners of 601XL aircraft already certified in the Experimental-Amateur Built category. This discussion is not about how to implement the published modifications, but about other alternatives. This discussion does not apply to S-LSA or E-LSA aircraft, and is probably irrelevant to not-yet-certified E-AB aircraft, unless the FAA changes its directions to the DAR community. This discussion is called What about already-flying E-AB 601XL's?

I would like to invite builders/flyers of already-certified 601XL's to visit that discussion group, read and comment about the open letter I have uploaded there (and also made available on-line at http://members.cox.net/n601ge/mods/ .

Thanks,
Andy Elliott, N601GE, 601XL/TD, Corvair
1 year and 145 flying hours so far.

Permalink Reply by Joe Scheibinger on December 1, 2009 at 3:00pm

Hi Andy,

I read your post and and it was well done. I understand the frustration that you and the other finished builders must be going through opening up a perfectly good airplane and making modificatons. My fuselage and wings were finished and I was planning on painting this winter,.I already have the bottom of the plane painted.

On the other hand, Zenith is offering me a way to strengthen my plane by 20% for a cost of around $350 in parts, and what I figure will be around 100 hours of labor! After watching the videos, I agree with the changes made and even though I am not an engineer, I can see where the changes will make a much stronger airplane for just a few extra pounds.

To me, it's a no brainer! I'm making, and I am welcoming the changes, my plane will be worth more in resale, and I can take up passengers with an added confidence. The icing on the cake, so far the Company has bent over backwards to help us. This never happened with the last 2 homebuilts I was involved with.

I don't want to change anyones minds, I just want to give you my opinion and post what I am doing. Would I fly in an unchanged 601 XL, YES.

One quick word to my friends who have a 601 XL LSA. From what I have seen in these posts, I have seen FBO's advertise that they can do the change for $2500 - $4500 + parts. As time goes by, other FBO's and A&P's will step up and offer their services. These changes are not that hard. This is less money than what some builders have in their glass instruments! If these accidents never happened, and Zenith stepped up and said we can make the plane stronger by 20% for $2500 to $4500, would you make the changes? I would.

If anyone in Wisconsin is making the change, call me at 920-237-1450. We can share the shipping costs and the experience. I am opening up my wings this afternoon.

Thanks
Joe in Oshkosh

Permalink Reply by Phill Barnes on December 2, 2009 at 2:50am

Hi Mathieu
I have a few questions,

1 Which rivet hammer should be use for the solid rivets a 3X or a 4X ?

2 What nuts and bolts are not included that we will need to purchase separately?

3 Is using a drive pin to mark the holes for the wing mounting bolts through the .125" wing root spar doubler the most accurate way to locate the holes or should we use a 5/16" bolt drilled out to say 5/32" on a lathe and insert it into the holes and drill through it get dead center, or is there a better way?

Thankyou in advance for your ongoing support.

Regards
Phill Barnes

Permalink Reply by Matt Heintz on December 2, 2009 at 2:16pm

Phill,
A 2X or 3X rivet hammer is fine. There is a good chart at:
http://www.hansonrivet.com/w80a.htm

Zenith is trying to include all the hardware in the $352.00 upgrade kit. This will include the new NAS bolts with shear of 160,000 to 180,000 PSI. Tougher bolts are required since we are adding extra material at the spar caps.

For those of you who are not purchasing the upgrade kit, a good source for hardware is:
http://www.gen-aircraft-hardware.com

Yes, using a drive pin works great if you have on. I believe that Zenith used this. The other option is to use an old AN 5/16" as you mentioned.

Permalink Reply by Donald Lynam on December 2, 2009 at 9:22pm

Hi Mathieu,

I am concerned about the discontinuity at the 1680mm location between the existing spar angle and the new extrusion angle. Do you see any reason not to continue the new 6-ZU-1-1 extrusion outboard to just short of RR #8? (Other than having to R&R more solid rivets.)

Thanks to you and the other folks at Zenair for all of your efforts. I'm sure all of this work will result in a superior aircraft that will be safer for first time builders like me, and hopefully that will translate into improved sales for Zenair!

Don

Permalink Reply by Matt Heintz on December 3, 2009 at 3:28am

Don,
We exceeded the ultimate load test by quite a bit with the existing 6-ZU-1-1. The main purpose of 6-ZU-1-1 is for potential bending of the spar caps (bending forward or rear) and not for shear. Bending loads further out on the wing are very small and existing caps are more than enough.

So if you want to continue with 6-ZU-1-1 out to RR#8, that is fine but you are just adding weight.

Permalink Reply by Mike Armstead on December 3, 2009 at 8:27am

I was originally concerned about this also, so I thought I would share a bending stress model of the spar I made a few weeks ago. This is for an UNMODIFIED spar. It only considers the spar and not the skins, but does account for the rivet holes. I used the loading figures and load placement provided by the document that zenith posted that documents the load test performed. I believe this model is fairly accurate, because the deflection caculations were close to the ones Zenith measured durring their load test. I guess I should have paid more attention statics and dynamic classes in college. Assumming this graph is correct the only part of the spar that would be overloaded is the first few inches of the root.

One other thing of interest. I found out by increasing the load out on the tip of the spar by only small amounts would very quickly overload the root area, so be careful with sudden full aerilon movements.

Attachments:

• 601XL Spar Stress.JPG, 47 KB

Permalink Reply by Matt Heintz on December 3, 2009 at 9:51am

Mike,
So my understanding is that you completed the attached stress report on the original UNMODIFIED wing. Based on that, I hope that you are satisfied with the upgrade as we are adding 0.125 to the caps.

Regarding the ailerons, Chris has said many times now that abrupt manoeuvres above the manoeuvring speed is not permitted. However, with the upgrade, we are significantly stiffening and reinforcing the rear spar, skins etc.

Also, note that the Static load test that Zenith posted is for the ASTM SLSA category which is tougher than FAR 23 for light aircraft. Most engineers agree that the original spar section at the root just passes when calculated to FAR 23. When performing the static load tests to Ultimate according to the SLSA rule (not FAR 23), what is required is that the airframe does not break for 3 seconds (at ultimate). We accomplished this and than added a lot more weight. After the test, we added another 0.093 to the root area. 0.032 to 0.125 (part number 6-ZU-1-2), and also added a lot of extra things to the airframe. Again, these things were added after passing the load test past ultimate.

Permalink Reply by Donald Lynam on December 3, 2009 at 12:23pm

Mathieu,

The fore/aft bending loads at 1680mm are what I am concerned about; from the static testing it appears the new design has the wing sheer loads well under control. My thought is to get the end of the new 6-ZU-1-1 angle outboard of the aileron pushrod hole that is in the rear spar, in order to strengthen that section of the wing assembly. It's probably a belt and suspenders approach, but it is about 1 lb per wing and a few more solid rivets so why not as long as there are no objections. Thanks much.

Don

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• …
• 6
• 7
• 8
• 9
• 10
• …
• 26
• Next ›
• Page