Wheelpants tight fit!

[prkaye]

I have been doing some preliminary cutting of my wheel pants, figuring I'll do the final alignment and drilling after the plane is assembled. In doing the preliminary fitting, I have discovered that my main wheels are not straight, relative to the center line. They are angled in towards the front, one more so than the other. Is this normal? DWG C2 suggests that the tires should be parallel to the centerline. Will this work itself out when I do some taxiing, allowing things to work into place??

[osxuser]

It won't really work itself out.... It'll wear tires pretty bad, and create a bigger load on the nosegear. I work on a 6a that has this problem. What you are describing is called toe-in.

[prkaye]

Yikes! So what can I do about it?? The toe-in seems to be permanently built-in to the fuselage-gear leg assembly.

[Bill Dicus]

My RV-8 instuctions describe a method to measure for toe-in or out and Van's sells wedges to correct this; they go between gear and wheel mounting when you bolt them on. I believe they come in 1/2 and 1 degree sizes. I bought some to correct mild toe in but haven't used them yet. Bill

[prkaye]

Darn... should have payed more attention to this when I was installing the gear legs!!! ARG!
My VERY rough measurement with the plane sitting on my uneven floor with no wings on - I measured by holding a long straight-edge along the side of hte tire - gives me a little less than 2 degrees toe-in on one wheel (about 1.8) and a little more than 2 degrees on the other wheel (about 2.2).
Can this be corrected later with shims for the -9A?

[C-GRVT]

Phil,
it is possible that the angles may change with load - camber will change, which I think will affect toe in/toe out - I would be inclined to wait until you have the wings on to see what the final situation is before panicking (not to suggest that you are panicking), and adjust toe-in with the aircraft close to or at a flying weight and rolling attitude.
Bill Brooks,
Ottawa, Canada
RV-6A finishing kit (and not having measured toe in yet, but crossing my fingers)

[Steve]

Given the robust manufacturing process, I wouldn't worry about the wheel geometry until the finished plane has been rolled around and the gear legs have moved into their final position.
For your own peace of mind, verify the gear leg mounts are properly attached to the center section and not hung up on a rivet head.

Steve

[f1rocket]

I would not mess with fixing this until you have finished the airplane and filled it with fuel. Leave the wheelpants and gear leg fairing stuff until after you have fixed the toe-in. With the airplane weighted down to your typical landing weight, set to the toe to be as close to zero as you can using grease plates on the floor and axle shims from Van's. Once that's set, then mount your wheelpants or otherwise, they won't fit back the same way.

[prkaye]

Not sure if axle shims are available for the -9A. They only list them for the -8 on their webstore.

[prkaye]

I finding the nose wheelpant is an insanely tight fit around the brackets. I haven't yet been able to stretch it over the brackets for fear of breaking it. Is this common?