Wheel pants for 6.00x6 tires?

[speyers]

Has anyone ever heard of or seen an RV with 6.00X6 main wheels? Can this even be done? Would you even be able to do this with the standard wheel pants, or would you have to come up with your own pants somewhere. Just kicking around some ideas. I'm thinking about trying it out on my -8 for opperating out of some grass strips and was wondering if there was a precident. Thanks for any suggestions or comments.

[robertahegy]

You don't need to change tires to operate off grass. I fly out of our 1700 ft strip in my 7A with the standard 5.00 X 5 mains and that teeny tiny nose wheel. Note the grass covers the main wheel completely up to the pants. No problem.

Roberta

Note the position of the nose wheel. A proper alighting for any airplane. Land on the mains. Sorry about the clarity, this was blown way up.



Nose wheel still up during roll out. Best technique for grass or pavement.

[Kyle Boatright]

Van's adapted 6"x6" wheels and tires to one of their RV-6's once upon a time. Their conclusion was that it wasn't a worthwhile modification, so they chose not to pursue it any farther.

You might call the factory and talk to Ken Scott or someone else who's been around for a while and get a little more information beyond what was in the RVator...

If I operated off of a bumpy or soft grass strip, I'd be looking into this.

[ptrotter]

I'm putting 6" wheels on my 8. I'm using Groves's wheels as I believe they make the only 6" wheels that will fit a 1.25" axle (1.5" is standard for 6" wheels). Sam James is making a wheel pant for the RV-10 that might fit. The RV-10 uses 6" wheels but uses low profile tires, but that wheel pant might fit or be modifies to fit.

[Spindrift]

At the NWEAA Fly-in I spoke to a guy that had flown his RV8 in from the Yukon in Canada where there's only one paved strip in the entire territory (from what he said). He had larger tires, probably 6x6, but no wheel pants. Sorry, no pictures and don't remember his name, but you could probably track him down through Vans.

-- bill
aspiring 7A builder

[Steve Sampson]

What is the spec on the VANS tire for the standard 5 inch wheel on most of the range of aircraft?

I have been told there is a slightly larger tire that fits the same wheel but I only have its metric spec. 380*150-5. I would have thought this was the same as the VANS tire but I am assured it is not.

[osxuser]

I was planning on going this route. I was also planning on simply modifying Van's wheelpants to fit, after all, fiberglass work is easy...

[Steve Sampson]

To answer my own question you can put a slightly larger tire onto the 5" wheel. See here for details.

[Pilottonny]

Hello Steve,

Will the larger/wider tire not cause a lot more drag when taking off from the grass strip, thus making your take-off roll longer?

I was thinking of putting a larger wheel/tire on the front of my 9A, because there have been quite a lot of discussions on flipping A-models landing on grass (bumpy grass or not) and even accidents while taxiing over a slight bump. Although the larger tire should be able to cope with the bumps a bit better and also give a bit more ground clearance to the landing gear and prop, would the extra drag when landing, not cause even more risk of flipping over?

Also there will be a small penalty in airspeed I supose?

A lot of things to think about, but I will order the fuselage in a few weeks, so that is still a while before I have to decide.

Regards,

[Steve Sampson]

Hi Tonny, greetings from the UK.

First of all the -9A. I think you will have some difficulty fitting a larger tyre to the -9A because it has to fit inside the "U" shaped nosefork. It certainly needs it though for safety. I had a -9A (Picture 3rd down here.) and put about 45 hrs on it before I sold it, partly because it was so unsuited to soft ground. The flip over issue appears to be associated with bumps and holes. I never got involved with that but there is another related problem. The wheel is very small and has about 275 lbs on it before the take off role starts. Because of the long gear legs, on soft ground this weight increases significantly because of the forward moment. I worked out on the back of an envelope that it was probably over 350lbs as you put the power in. Once you have enough air flow over the elevator of course the nosewheel lifts and flight is pretty well instantaneous....or at least, levitation into ground effect. It did have the effect of doubling the (short) ground role though.

Landing can be a bit frightening too! Once you loose elevator authority the wheel comes down and you stop in a hurry. Its very hard on the gear.

The -4 will have a much easier time on my strip. The typical flying weight is less (and the gross) and by having a 20% wider tire the loading on the ground per square inch much reduced. Also when you start your takeoff role you have a positive angle of attack so you will have some lift from the wing and the prop is pointing upwards! On the -9A with the tip forward of those long legs it appeared sometimes to be thinking about Australia.

Bottom line the drag is caused by the tires sinking in. Thats why the tires on the S'cub are so large. It even handles snow half way up the wheels quite well. The issue with tail draggers is to keep the stick on the rear stop as you touch down until you are down to a very slow walking speed if it is soft. With snow I try and touch down with power on so there is plenty of airflow over the backend. I have never heard of a -9 flipping over.

So good luck with your -9A. My suggestion is keep it on hard runways or firm grass. I am not sure what you have mostly in Belgium. I have been to Namur and Achen...one of each.

The downside of putting bigger tires on is I will undoubtedly loose a little off the top speed.

Cheers!

PS When I started there was no RV-9 option, only the -9A. They said at the time there never would be a -9A. If I was building it again it would only be a -9.