loading plane on truck?

[Greenley]

Looking for how to safely load my RV-10 minus wings onto the truck to take to airport. I plan to use the flat bed truck from a local towing service. The bed tilts down and they winch the car onto the bed. My neighbor put his 14 on the truck by using a harness strapped around the roots of the prop blades to pull the plane of the slope. However I read on the prop manual never to push or pull on the blades. What is safe, a strap on the nose gear leg? Ideas?


Hoping to hang wings by the end of the week

[BobTurner]

I winched mine up a tilt-bed backwards, using the tail tie-down ring.
Make sure the truck bed is wide enough for the -10. My local rent-a-truck place had two tilt beds, but only one was wide enough.

[Greenley]

Was that with the engine mounted? I am surprised the tail tie-down was strong enough for that much lateral stress.

[1001001]

First, get the truck up to about Vso +5kt, then...


...oh, wait, you said without the wings.

[BobTurner]

Originally Posted by Greenley

Was that with the engine mounted? I am surprised the tail tie-down was strong enough for that much lateral stress.

Engine was not installed.

[9GT]

Make sure the bed of the deck is a roll back in addition to tilt. Make sure also that it is wide enough to fir the wheels and axle nuts. The driver failed to heed my request when I made arrangements and had to return to the yard for their BIG roll back! Deck was about 6" wider than the original and had no side rails. Totally flat. DO NOT winch it up by the prop! Wrap a big strap around the nose wheel strut by the pivot. I hooked up my tow bar to help steer it up. Once up and tilted flat, the winch cable attached to the nose wheel strut remained in tension. I put a dummy bolt in the carry through spars and ratchet strapped them down to the strap bars along the sides of the deck bed, two each side with one facing forward and one facing the rear. Really tight with parking brake set. Finally two ratchet straps hooked to the tail tie down, one going to the right and the other to the left. Tight but don't over do it. The plane did no budge during the transport to the airport. I crated the wings for a second trip.
[IMG]IMG_0027 by David C, on Flickr[/IMG]

[Greenley]

Thanks, that makes sense.

[rleffler]

I did the same as David. I winched it by straps around the nose wheel.

Also, you need a person on the tail. I know of one person that scraped the tail on the ground after it was painted. All it takes is somebody with a little hand pressure to keep it from hitting. YMMV, depending on the bank angle of the truck.