After market door hinges

[Phil]

Does anyone know of a place that makes after market door hinges? Perhaps some stainless ones, or anything that's more pleasing to the eye and less prone to rust than those supplied by Vans?

Phil

 

[rleffler]

The only ones I know about are made by Dave Ward. He's also a RV-10 builder. I had the pleasure to meet Dave when we both attend Dave Saylor's fiberglass class at AirCrafters in Watsonville a few years ago.

You can go to airward.com or go directly to this link.

I've purchased several other items from Dave in the past, but I've not seen or know anyone that has used these.

bob

 

[Phil]

Yeah, I'm familiar with those. I think they're just $350 decorative caps that go over the top of Vans hinge.

Have you seen anyone glass the hinges in? That's a thought I was kicking around too.

 

[David Shelton]

Bonded Hinges

My LAK-12 sailplane had aluminum hinges bonded into the composite wing structure. Unfortunately, the aluminum oxidized over time and jeopardized the bond. There was a very expensive AD to fix it. Be very careful if you experiment with a bonded hinge... it may be more reliable to mechanically fasten it.

 

[flion]

I'm planning on following the procedure a friend used on his Lancair IVP Propjet. After fitting the door, he was unhappy with the way the hinges looked, though he was not unhappy with the hinges themselves. So he coated them in release agent and re-installed them after bedding the receptacles with flox, carefully setting them to be flush with the outer surface of the fuselage (he said that if he were to do it again, he'd do this first before fitting the door but it didn't really change the fit of the doors noticably). Then he filled around the hinges to remove the gap. His last step was to remove the hinges and clean up the edges around the receptacles. The finished result looks very nice and is still easy to remove if necessary (he's had it off for maintenance purposes). He painted his hinges but I was thinking they could also be anodized or powder coated. Anyway, just another approach.

 

[johngoodman]

Unless I'm missing something, I don't believe you can even see them unless you are on the wing with the doors closed. That would mean you are the only one that sees them.

John