I

ifly94d

I'm New Here
Need to know a good way to fasten the upper intersection fairings for my
RV-9(yep,tailwheel)
Thanks,
Rich Reinhart
Flying off the 40
 
Rich,
On my -9 I am using four screws with tinnerman (dimple) washers on each upper fairing. Two forward and two aft. I eyeballed the locations to provide the best security. The two fwd holes are in the cowl and the aft behind the firewall and in the radius of the lower fwd skin. I pop riveted the nutplates there and solid riveted the nutplates to the cowl.
I would include a picture but my plane is at the painter's waiting for me to pick it up tomorrow. :)

Great to hear there is yet another RV9 flying!
 
A little different

I did mine a little differently. I got them to fit pretty good then split them along the cowl line. I molded the forward portion to the cowl and the rear portion to the fuselage. The front has a cuff molded to overlap the rear section. No screws, great fit and undoutedly faster :D
 
I bought mine from Fairings, Etc. They fit ok but I still did a lot of work with them until I was happy. For all the work I did it would have cheaper to go with Van's and make them fit. Bob at Fairings, Etc. is a good guy, however, and got mine to me quickly. I love how some of these small vendors will send you what you need and trust that you will send a check when you receive the merchandise.
 
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Another option

is to use -6 or -8 rivnuts set into the fuselage and countersink the screws into the fairings. I haven't used rivnuts anywhere else but interior panels. The nice thing about rivnuts is they can be installed "blind"...just make sure you know there's no wiring or antenna coax you're going to drill into.
 
Spring and screw

I glassed a little hook into the inner surface, just one. I ran a spring from the hook to a hose clamp on the gear leg inside the cowl. Latter I added a little floating nut-plate inside the cowl, with a little clearance hole to add a screw near the leading edge. This was to make sure the front of the fairing was not lifting in flight and adding drag. I never cranked down on the screw it was loose and just a "chicken" fastener to make sure. The fairing should have some float or give. I added some anti-rub tape on the inside of the cuff where it sat on the cowl/fuselage. It looked good and did not wear or crack. Some cuffs I have seen crack and wear if they can't float a little.

If you want a picture email me, I'll sketch it up. I did not invent it, I just copied it and it worked great.

To remove the fairing just take the leading edge screw out and pull the fairing down a little, stretch the spring and pop the spring off. To install grab the spring with a long nose needle nose pliers and re-hook and "snap", its sucked up to the cowl and side of body. Install chicken screw.

The way Darwin N. Barrie did it is cool sounds cool and have seen that. I think it may be a little less drag molding the leading edge cuff into the cowl (good for 0.0059123 mph). :D
 
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