Door latch design factors.

[Phil]

For the record, I think my 12v door pin idea isn't nearly as nice as Vern's solution. My idea was heavier, required removing some strength from the mid-fuse decks, and didn't oppose vertical door movement.

Like Mike suggested though, I'd like to see it moved a little further aft.

But I humbly request that my idea be thrown out of the running... There are some far superior ideas here.

[Gary 40274]

I have been wondering how much the doors flex when latched and pushed outward in the middle. I tried on mine with the Metal pin recepticles and it only will flex 1/8 to 3/16 " no matter how hard I push.

Do some doors have more flex than that? Could the flex be the problem asside from not latching the rear pin?

Inquiring minds want to know

Gary Specketer

[Pat Stewart]

Verns idea is functional and simple. I have the Hendricks locks and putting the lock handle on is a sinch. The receiver Matt made will work perfectly.

Here is a lesson I learned last week in over engineering. The hendricks door latches are flush on the exterior and have a lock. Internally the lock mechanism is on the horizontal center line which interfers with the internal tube mechanism. I spent 3 days building a lot of crazy linkage combinations to get this to work. Although I made it work I did not like the reliability prospects of the linkage. after stepping back a couple of days I returned to shop and started engineering this again. The solution ended up being simple. After spending many hours trying to build a linkage system that went around the lock the answer was just to move the lock.

[douglassmt]

I was in the FBO shop today and there happened to be two quasi-gull-wing doors in there: a Cirrus and a Socata Trinidad. Of course, the Cirrus has forward rather than top hinges. Still, it has a two pin system facing aft.

More interesting was the Trinidad door system, of which I could only see the exposed features. No pins, but two forward and aft latch points in the bottom of the door. The door has two "hooks" on it that face outboard, and as the door drops into the sill, the hooks latch into two "eyes" that pop up out of the sill. As the single door handle inside is rotated forward, the two eyes pull the door via the hooks down and lock in place. I couldn't see the inner workings, but it looks awfully simple. Not easy to retrofit, but for those of us still building, very attractive and should be pretty simple to emulate. I can get pictures if someone wants.

[bruce1369]

With the current interest in the RV 10 door safety latch, I wanted to start a separate thread to get a group consensus of the design elements that we, the users, find desirable.........

.......... But, as far as I know, all door losses have come from a lack of rear pin engagement.

**** Purchase a proximity switch and connect it to warning light. Most modern Avionics will handle a discrete input you can configure. If your avionics does not have that capability, then add a warning light to the instrument panel. *****

P.S. Might cost you $30.00.

[Mike S]

Originally Posted by bruce1369

**** Purchase a proximity switch and connect it to warning light. Most modern Avionics will handle a discrete input you can configure. If your avionics does not have that capability, then add a warning light to the instrument panel. *****

P.S. Might cost you $30.00.

Bruce, thanks for the comment. I see you are an 8 guy, so you probably aren't aware that there is already a prox switch and warning light from Vans.

Problem is not everyone installs them, or maybe not everyone pays attention to them??

The idea of the safety latch is, IMHO, to keep the door on the airplane if other systems---including the organic system at the stick----fail in the door latching arena.

Thanks for the input, and thanks to all who have contributed to this thread.

[andrejv]

Hi Mike,

A mate of mine in Temora, Australia has built four RV10's - and on the last two he has used my latch idea. He has refined the design and his latches are more slim-line, but the idea remains the same. Recently, one of these planes took off and the pilot forgot to close his door handle - he was focused on closing his daughters side but forgot his. Took off and guess what happened..... nothing! He noted increased noise and then realised he had not latched his side - returned and landed safely.

I reckon that the wheel has been invented... this system works, the latch is automatic, the rear pin always engages, its in the middle of the door... rest my case!!

Cheers

Andre

[Geico266]

Originally Posted by andrejv

Hi Mike,

A mate of mine in Temora, Australia has built four RV10's - and on the last two he has used my latch idea. He has refined the design and his latches are more slim-line, but the idea remains the same. Recently, one of these planes took off and the pilot forgot to close his door handle - he was focused on closing his daughters side but forgot his. Took off and guess what happened..... nothing! He noted increased noise and then realised he had not latched his side - returned and landed safely.

I reckon that the wheel has been invented... this system works, the latch is automatic, the rear pin always engages, its in the middle of the door... rest my case!!

Cheers

Andre

Andre, Congrats on the save man!

Can you post some pictures of the new design?

I want to thank you for working on this years before the crowd. You are on the cutting edge mate!

[Mike S]

Larry, this is the original safety latch from acouple years ago, here is the link once again. It has been posted before, but as the thread grows, things tends to get lost...

As can be seen, it is obviously the mother of the Vans SB latch.

[Mike S]

Originally Posted by andrejv

Hi Mike,

I reckon that the wheel has been invented... this system works, the latch is automatic, the rear pin always engages, its in the middle of the door... rest my case!!

Cheers

Andre

Is it still a two step release, or is the safety now released by the factory handle??? Like in this post