Mikey is sporting a stylish new look these days ? a new aluminum spinner, courtesy of Allan at Cummins spinners in Australia. (I?ve always wondered how the Valkyrie would look with a gold anodized spinner?but this one came silver, and since Mikey has silver in his scheme, he gets to try it on?.)
I figured I?d share a preview of an upcoming KP article (which covers both the Fixed Pitch and C/S models) with the group here ? Allan sent us the spinner to try and let him know how it fit and installed. The answer is ? right out of the box!
Here?s what came in the box:
It?s not yet polished (I need to find a good polishing guru around here), but it installed in just a couple of hour?s work. The blade slots were pre-cut and the edges rolled (whew ? does THAT save a lot of time!), and we re-used the existing backplate from the original fiberglass cone. It was pretty simple to match-drill the holes to the existing nut plates.
A new forward bulkhead was included in the kit, and it fit perfectly snug when the rear of the dome was even with the rear of the backplate ? the tolerances of the kit are amazing. Careful measurement gave us the position of the holes in the forward bulkhead, it took about ten minutes to install nutplates, and everything was assembled and ready to run. I stood outside while Louise ran it up, and there was no movement of the nose at all ? the alignment is perfect.
I can?t speak to the price of the unit, as we are testing it for the magazine, but if you want to go with an aluminum spinner instead of glass, this one fits and installs perfectly. And?.no pinholes to fill!
I figured I?d share a preview of an upcoming KP article (which covers both the Fixed Pitch and C/S models) with the group here ? Allan sent us the spinner to try and let him know how it fit and installed. The answer is ? right out of the box!
Here?s what came in the box:
It?s not yet polished (I need to find a good polishing guru around here), but it installed in just a couple of hour?s work. The blade slots were pre-cut and the edges rolled (whew ? does THAT save a lot of time!), and we re-used the existing backplate from the original fiberglass cone. It was pretty simple to match-drill the holes to the existing nut plates.
A new forward bulkhead was included in the kit, and it fit perfectly snug when the rear of the dome was even with the rear of the backplate ? the tolerances of the kit are amazing. Careful measurement gave us the position of the holes in the forward bulkhead, it took about ten minutes to install nutplates, and everything was assembled and ready to run. I stood outside while Louise ran it up, and there was no movement of the nose at all ? the alignment is perfect.
I can?t speak to the price of the unit, as we are testing it for the magazine, but if you want to go with an aluminum spinner instead of glass, this one fits and installs perfectly. And?.no pinholes to fill!