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Design for lifting/placing the lower cowl?

D

Dick3310

Member
Does anyone have a design or idea about a combination dolly and lifting device that would allow easy lifting and positioning of the lower cowl?

Would tilt the cowl, lift, straighten out, position for securing, etc. and reverse for removal. Dolly feature would allow moving it around and out of the way.

I am building a tailwheel 7 and am currently fitting the cowl. I don't look forward to potentially scratching it or dropping on the hangar floor.

At this stage in the build my few remaining brain cell are fusing into one uncreative lump.... Hope someone has a design or pictures.

Appreciate any help.

Thanks
Dick Sunderland
 
Regardless of what you come up with, keep a roll of blue painters tape around. Put a strip of tape on the top front of your gear leg fairings and some behind your spinner. These are the areas that you will rub your cowling when you are taking it off.
You can also use the tape to hold the rubber cowl inlet ramp strips back so you can easily slide the canopy up without having them catch on the ramp.
 
Dick3310 said:
I don't look forward to potentially scratching it or dropping on the hangar floor.
Click to expand...

Don't worry about scratches. Those are going to be the least of your worries with the cowl.

When you start filling the pinholes, that will take care of most scratches too.
 
I stuck a couple of strips of 2" wide blue masking tape on the bottom to avoid the worst scuffs. Even then, I found that the tape was barely scuffed by the time I was done. Once you clearance the aft bottom corners for the gear legs, I think you'll find that it'll stay put by itself, especially if you have the spinner back plate (or facsimile) in place. Also, the cowl is pretty light. I found it was pretty easy for me to slide it back and up by myself, sitting on the floor in front of the airplane. I used a loose ratchet strap around the lower cowl & engine to hold it during initial fitting. Once I got the aft cowl trimmed to the gear legs and firewall, I used clecos to fix it to the camloc plates (I'm using 1/4 turn fasteners instead of hinge).
 
My mom came up with something many years ago. Took her about 9 months to construct. Seriously, a device like you describe would probably be more difficult and expensive than it would be worth.
 
Cowl Lift

A cheap plastic chair with arms works pretty good. Slide it back under the engine then go to one side and lift it up into place.
 
I'm building my RV6 pretty much by myself and am well into the gazillion times the cowl will have to be fitted and removed during the build. Came up with this contraption. Yes it's crude but surprisingly effective and easy to use when set up properly....and it's cheap!

A length of PVC pipe, some twine and and hooks formed out of short lengths of wire. Duct tape over the gear legs and an old Vans tee shirt threaded over the prop/spinner to minimize scratches complete the ensemble.

Photos tell the story:

http://i456.photobucket.com/albums/qq282/whittfic/DSCF0104.jpg
http://i456.photobucket.com/albums/qq282/whittfic/DSCF0108.jpg
http://i456.photobucket.com/albums/qq282/whittfic/DSCF0106.jpg
http://i456.photobucket.com/albums/qq282/whittfic/DSCF0109.jpg
http://i456.photobucket.com/albums/qq282/whittfic/DSCF0112.jpg

Twisting the PVC pipe with one hand while guiding it with the other, I can hold the cowl in any position with the 'locking device'. Once the cowl has been lifted into position and the device 'locked' it is now securely suspended and can easily be maneuvered to line up the hinges. Removing the cowl is simply a reversal of the fitting process.

Clive Whittfield
Auckland
New Zealand
 
Great Idea and so simple and cheap too.

Clive,

The best ideas are the simplest. I am going to store that away somewhere on my website. I hope you don't mind if I copy your photos.

Thanks very much for an excellent idea.

Tony
 
Last edited:
Feel free

Tony and anyone else who wants to use this idea, feel free to use as you wish. I've found plenty of great ideas on this forum myself during the build so I am more than happy to return the favour whenever I can.

FYI It takes a little experimenting to get the lengths of twine just right. Once I had it figured out I secured them to the PVC and used sharpie pens to colour code the hook ends to the appropriate holes in the cowl flange.

Plenum info can be found here:

http://www.vansairforce.com/community/showthread.php?t=67276&highlight=plenum+update

Happy to answer any questions.

Clive
 
Clive,

I used your device last night to remove the lower cowl on my 6A. Works great and took 10 minutes to make. Wish I'd thought of it myself a year ago. Would have saved hours! Thanks for the post.

John
 
Thanks John

Was wondering how well it would work on the 'A' model. Glad it did the job for you.

Clive
 
bummer... its too hard to place pics here..You could all join my Yahoogroup for installing the sam james Cowl..:)

Frank
 
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