Flat tire on touchdown / Wheelpants

My RV4 is about ready for first flight and I try to figure out any bad things that might happen. I'm wondering about what will happen if one tire will burst on touchdown. The ground-clearance of the wheelpants is so little that there might bad things start to happen.
In my imagination the tire will tear off the whole wheelpant if things go really bad. The clearance between the tire and the pant is very marginal, so a flat tire would no be able to spin free and will pick up the pant immediately and the pant itself will get ground contact. If the tire will pick up the pant it's very likely that the whole wheelpant will start to turn an tear off.
Has anyone had some experience with this?
Cheers from Germany!

Yours is a valid concern, and your best option is to make sure you have good tire to wheelpant clearance.

A buddy wrecked one of his wheelpants on his first flight. He flies out of a grass strip, and on landing he must have hit a bump which flexed a tire, which proceeded to tear off one of his wheelpants. I'm sure the same thing can happen with a blown tire.

I've been flying my airplane for 5 years and just enlarged the tire opening in my wheelpants (again) because I continue to see evidence of tires rubbing on the wheelpants.

Been There, Done That....

Hello Dirk,

I blew a tire on the right side on Valkyrie because I didn't have enough tire to wheel pant clearance. On landing, the tire compressed and the sidewall was cut by the edge of the wheel pant. The tire went down sorta slow and I ended up sliding on the pant - ground off about an inch of fiberglass. We got the plane off the runway, lifted the wing enough to get to the valve on the tire, and pumped in some air - the slit in the tube sealed itself enough to taxi back to the hangar. It was a pretty simple two-night job to repair the fiberglass on the pant (my typical love/hate relationship with glass...), and fortunately, it hadn't been painted yet, and was still in primer anyway.

I opened up the clearances to a good thumb's width, and have no further problems. I know I'm not the only one this has happened to....many have reported similar experiences. The airplane was well behaved during the event, and didn't tear up the pant, other than where it ground away on the pavement. I can certainly see how it might if the tire really came apart, however.

My advice is to start with adequate clearance!

Paul

Good clearance between tire and wheel pant is likely your best insurance. Years ago I saw a pristine Cessna 140 go over on its back when a tire that was just low on air grabbed the close fitting wheel fairing. The plane flipped over before the pilot could even react. Thankfully, nobody aboard was hurt, but the airplane was a total loss.

PROPER TIRE INFLATION

WHAT IS EVERYBODY RUNNING FOR TIRE PRESSURE? ACCORDING TO THE AIRCRAFT SPRUCE CATALOG WE SHOULD BE RUNNING 50 TO 54 LBS.

rv8r said:

My RV4 is about ready for first flight and I try to figure out any bad things that might happen. I'm wondering about what will happen if one tire will burst on touchdown. The ground-clearance of the wheelpants is so little that there might bad things start to happen.
In my imagination the tire will tear off the whole wheelpant if things go really bad. The clearance between the tire and the pant is very marginal, so a flat tire would no be able to spin free and will pick up the pant immediately and the pant itself will get ground contact. If the tire will pick up the pant it's very likely that the whole wheelpant will start to turn an tear off.
Has anyone had some experience with this?
Cheers from Germany!

Click to expand...

Perhaps you could make a few flights without the wheel pants to get comfortable with airplane. It would be one less thing to think about.

I've had one nose tire go flat in flight and on landing on a grass strip the pant acted like a ski, really did a job on messing it up.

I had a index figer gap between tire and wheelpant. After the annual I see that it picked up in a few places as well as bent/creased the glass in one area. [bad landing?]

I have opened the gaps more now. About 3/4 inch. Problem should be solved.

EJ

I had a flat tire on landing in my Rocket about 5 months ago. I did not know the tire was flat while I was in the air, but it was.

I had about a finger or two clearance around the entire tire. It didn't make much of a difference. When the tire compressed, it started rubbing on the wheel pant mounting bracket, essentially shredding the tire. The shredding tire pretty much chewed up the wheel pant. The wheel pant stayed attached mostly, but a couple of screws pulled through the fiberglass.

As I started to roll out, I felt the airplane dive to the right. I was already on the rudder pedals so I just applied enough rudder to hold the airplane on the runway. The FBO sent a truck out to lift me off the runway and tow me back to my hangar.

Lessons learned? Two things.....One, if you land with a flat, you are going to destroy your wheelpant. Might as well forget about it. If you had enough clearance to not destroy the wheel pant, your wheel pant would look like a bowler hat on top of a bald man. Two...I installed tinnerman washers on all my screws on my wheelpants to keep them from pulling through the fiberglass. It's the only place on the airplane that I use them. I don't really like their looks, but I feel they are an absolute necessity here.