wiring issues

I am trying to determine the wiring runs for my 8A. I will have the battery on the front baggage compartment floor.

Headset jacks: Where is the best location for the headset jacks for the pilot?

ELT: I will put the ELT on the rear baggage shelf, as many others have done, with the antenna to the right of the rear seat. I am wondering if I should run the antenna cable to the ELT on the side under the longeron (kind of a skinny area) or lower down where it will penetrate under the baggage floor.

Any ideas?

If anyone knows where to find pics of the wiring runs, please let me know. I have looked over serveral websites, including Mickeys and Mark Richardsons, and found them very helpful but they don't contain all the information that I need.

Thanks for the help.

Hi Tony

Yeah, I guess I didn't show where all of my wires ran on my web site. Sorry.

My ELT wire goes up under the right longeron, forward, then across to the left side of the panel where the remote ELT head is located.

My pilot headset jacks are on the bottom (most aft part) of the switch panel by the pilots right leg.

If there is anything else I can help out with, let me know. I'll be at my Mom's for Xmas for the next week, so my Internet access may be somewhat spotty ;-)

Merry Christmas

Wiring

tonyjohnson said:

...Headset jacks: Where is the best location for the headset jacks for the pilot?

Click to expand...

I have not yet wired my headset jacks, so I'm also interested in ideas.

tonyjohnson said:

ELT: I will put the ELT on the rear baggage shelf, as many others have done, with the antenna to the right of the rear seat. I am wondering if I should run the antenna cable to the ELT on the side under the longeron (kind of a skinny area) or lower down where it will penetrate under the baggage floor.

Click to expand...

I'm putting my ELT unit on the rear baggage shelf as well, but I've run my antenna to the tail. I also replaced the normal antenna that was shipped with the ELT with a "rubber ducky".

On the first -8 that I built, I put the headset jacks in sort of an odd place. There is an aluminum plate that goes between the front and rear attachment points of the front seat back support bar on each side of the cockpit. I drilled holes in the aluminum plate, and mounted the headset jacks there. I also put the rear seat PTT button on that plate, since it saved having to unplug it when removing the stick. I was pretty happy with that arrangement, and plan to do it again on the current plane.

The plan for the ELT is similar to rv8ch. I'lll put the unit in the rear of the baggage compartment (under the cover if possible), and put the antenna under the empennage fairing. On the RV-3, I bent the standard antenna just a bit to make if fit, then covered it in a plastic tube to keep it from grounding out. I'll probably do that again on the current -8.

On the earlier -8, I was leaning toward being tail heavy, so I put the ELT under the right side panel that goes between the main spar, and gear box. The antenna was mounted just in front of the right side of the canopy bow. I bent the antenna in a curve similar to the bow, and put it in a plastic tube. It was practically invisible in front of the bow. It worked out pretty neatly, but I wouldn't normally consider it to be the best choice.

Thanks

Mark, Mickey and Rusty,

Thanks for your input. It is very helpful.

Tony

Headset Jack Location

Tony,
I copied the placement from Dan C. They are always out of the way, if needed you can get to them in flight.



Gary
N715AB

Seats

Wow, those are some nice looking seats!

Mark,

I ran the ELT antnna wire in the path you suggested. WHat path did you use to run the remote wire to the remote unit?

Rusty,

You have the experience of having your headset jacks on the aluminum plate that secures the seat weldment. I am thinking of putting mine behind that plate on the forward edge of the forward upright that the plate is riveted to. Do you think that would be as easy to get to as the plate? It seems that would keep them out of the way.

Gary,

Thanks for the pic. I have an 8A.

tonyjohnson said:

Rusty,

You have the experience of having your headset jacks on the aluminum plate that secures the seat weldment. I am thinking of putting mine behind that plate on the forward edge of the forward upright that the plate is riveted to. Do you think that would be as easy to get to as the plate? It seems that would keep them out of the way.

Click to expand...

Hi Gary. I don't have a plane in front of me to look at, but I found some old pics, and don't see anything at all wrong with putting the jacks where you propose. In fact, I may look at doing that myself when I get to that point.

I assume you're thinking of putting the pilot's jacks on the front side of the forward upright. What about the passenger's headsets?

pax jacks

Rusty,

You are correct. I am putting the pax jacks on the other side, that is the rear side.

Thanks for your input, I am going into the garage now to drill the pilot jack holes in the area I was thinking of.

Tony

tonyjohnson said:

Mark,

I ran the ELT antnna wire in the path you suggested. WHat path did you use to run the remote wire to the remote unit?

Click to expand...

Hi Tony

Sorry I haven't replied sooner. Just got home last night from Christmas with the folks.

I ran the ELT remote wire along the bottom of the right longeron, forward through the center section bulkhead, like in this picture:



then along the bottom of the cross brace behind the panel. Once the wire was over on the left hand side, I just brought it forward to the remote head on the panel. It is that bundle of wires in this picture.



You can see the end of the ELT wire lying on top of the gear tower brace. You'll probably have to snip off the telephone connector on the end of the wire to feed it through all of the holes and so on, but that is no big deal. I bought the tool for putting those on at Radio Shack and it was cheap.

Hope this helps,

GaryK
I'll second that. Your seats look great , but it's your interior color that I would like to ask about - color ? manufacturer ? pint or spray can ??
BTW Happy New Year to EVERYONE.

Thanks

Mark,

Thanks for the pics and the explanation of how you ran the ELT remote. I am thinking of putting it on the right console above the switches, to shorten the wiring run and simplify it. I was wondering what to do with the excess wire between the ELT unit and the remote. Thanks for the info on snipping it.

I hope you had a great holiday.

Tony