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What happens when your pants explode?

B

briantucker

Member
On the takeoff roll from VNY last week I felt a substantial “thud” from the right main just before Vr. It felt like I had hit a pothole, but the remaining few feet of my departure continued without issue so I pulled back and lifted off. Landing at SMO, I touched down the mains on what felt like one of my better landings in a while. About 200ft later as the tail came down I saw a large puff of smoke erupt from under the right wing as I simultaneously felt an even larger “thud” and the sound of fiberglass scraping the runway. I lost control of my right brake and eventually, after fighting friction with the tailwheel and left brake, ground looped around the right main to a skidding halt facing the end of the runway I’d just landed on. A quick chat with ATC asking for a tow truck (I thought I’d popped a tire) and I powered down, hopped out, and found not a flat tire, but the gnarled remains of my right wheel pants wrapped around the tire it was supposed to protect. Curiously missing, however, was the fore intersection fairing that had seemingly been ejected from the pants.

After removing the pants and limping back to the hangar, I did a few laps with airport ops to look for any additional debris and we found nothing. Whatever happened must have been damaged before I landed.

Sure enough, I received a call from VNY ops the next morning - I’d left a message asking for any camera footage they had of my ill-fated takeoff - saying they didn’t have any footage, but they did have the missing piece of my wheel pants. Thanksfully, I’ll be able to use that to create new molds.

I have no idea what I hit. I don’t recall seeing anything run in front of me but best I can assume is a small animal (hare maybe, I’ve hit several of those over the years in my car late at night) that had just enough mass to shatter the wheel pants and place them in a position where they could be swallowed by my tire on landing but not enough to cause any further impact to my takeoff.

I’m a relatively low time pilot with 150hrs and this was my first real aviation incident. My takeaway here is that I simply need a larger plane that can take larger hits. If anyone is selling an RV-10 with cattle guards, please reach out.

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The screws can back out over time and come loose, at least they do on my 9A. It's part of every preflight for me to look at the wheelpants for missing screws. Lose enough of them and the front part can come loose and depart the airplane - and then the back section can flop around enough to contact the tire and become ensnared, and there you go.

I used to consider it "good form" to run a tap through the nutplates for #6 screws to reduce the torque requirements, and make the screw heads last longer. Now I consider that previous "good form" to be a direct contribution to my occasionally missing screw problem. I'm coming up on needing a re-paint on my airplane in not too many more hours, and I'll probably redo the nutplates on the wheel fairings at that point and I won't run a tap through them.
 
airguy said:
The screws can back out over time and come loose, at least they do on my 9A. It's part of every preflight for me to look at the wheelpants for missing screws. Lose enough of them and the front part can come loose and depart the airplane - and then the back section can flop around enough to contact the tire and become ensnared, and there you go.
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Yep, same here. Everything was good to go before takeoff so this was definitely the result of an impact on the roll.
 
I’ve seen a couple instances where either the inboard or outboard mounting bracket gives way & the pant shifts enough to be grabbed by the rotating tire, the wheel pant than blows apart. On one of those RVs, the pant stayed intact long enough to actually roll under the tire, broke the inner bracket, and swing the tail end of the pant up hard enough to slice a hole in the lower wing skin before it (the pant) blew apart. Not a good day for that plane.
 
For what it’s worth I don’t think there is a cow catcher for the RV 10
The closest thing to that are the wire cutters on the props of spray planes
 
I think other potential takeaways are to stay on the ground if able and if airborne to fly by a tower or someone on the ground for a visual inspection. Then one could better prep for landing.
 
I have a tough time believing that hitting a rabbit could screw up a wheel pant enough to cause that. I agree with Greg & Ralph. It seems more likely that it came loose.

Last year I hit a coyote with the left main wheel pant on a 172. It was hard enough that it killed him dead in his tracks but all it did to the wheel pant was put a small crack in it a couple of inches long. 172 wheel pants can't be that much tougher than RV pants.
 
I have done a thousand touch and go's at KBPG in Big Springs, Texas and it is amazing that I haven't hit a Prairie Dog! Occasionally, I will see one scamper off the runway in the corner of my eye! I did see a dead one on the runway once!
 
Brian

It’s difficult to tell from the photos but is it possible these haven’t been mounted according to vans plans?
Is it possible to have some photos of the wheel and mounting bracket’s.
Were the screws left on the brackets?
My suspicion comes from the photo of the rear part of the pant that should have reinforcement and two screws on the inboard side just behind the fairing. Maybe it’s just the light in the photo but I can’t see it.
Maybe some photos of the remaining pant and how it’s filled might give a clue.
It looks more like that something has let go and then the pant has rotated upside down and destroyed itself.

Edit looking closer at the photos I think I can see the holes and that the screws have possibly just pulled though because the is no extra reinforcement on the inside of the pant were the mounting brackets are.

If you can still take some photos of your other side it would be helpful in determining if this was the case

Regards Peter
 
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If you hit an animal there would likely be evidence of that in the form of blood, guts, etc..
I’ve seen more than my share of damaged wheel pants caused by poor installation and/or neglect.
 
An RV-8 builder we flew formation with had not installed the wheel pants on his airplane. We gave him the name "No Pants". So the title of this post was a funny reminder!

Happy your airplane stayed sunny side up. Pull your pants back on and keep flying!
 
1) Glad you're okay and the damage is relatively minor.
2) Based on the title of the original post, this thread took an very unanticipated turn...thankfully:rolleyes:
 
Hey Brian,

By any chance did the nice folks at VNY leave one of these on the runway? Those scrapes on the intersection fairing aren't DuPont JetGlo "Fighter Blue"...

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Brian- I commented on your other thread about the serviceability of your flat spotted tire and while looking at the pictures over there I noticed a couple of things.

from your previous posts I think this is an RV7? If so, then per print, the outer bracket is supposed to be riveted to the wheel pant. Yours was installed with screws and tinnerman washers. Also, the center bolt that attaches it to the axle nut is supposed to be a drilled head with safety wire to the loop on the axle cotter pin.

I'm not saying either of these were the cause of your issue, but a guy could make a case that there's an opportunity here for something to get loose and let the pant flop enough that the tire could grab it.

Maybe something, maybe nothing- In light of what happened to you it just stood out me.
 
Brian

I saw the photos on your other flat spot tire thread.
It shows the two rear screws still in place but looks like the front ones are missing. As someone else mentioned your outer attachment isn’t per the plans - with one screw missing and the bolt that goes into the wheel nut should be lock wired.

looking at the various broken bits in the photos it looks like there was little or no reinforcement layers under the attachment points. There should be extra layers of fibreglass at these points where the screws are.

My guess is that the screws have come loose and once there was some movement the others have pulled through the fibreglass - causing the pant to rotate and then destroy itself.

You’ll need to replace the inner bracket as the one you have is bent well out of shape.

I’d take a close look at the other pant. It most likely needs internal reinforcement layers applying or could do the same trick. Plus lock wire the bolt that holds the outer bracket to the wheel nut.

Regards Peter
 
Thanks to OP posting a pic of the inboard wheel pant bracket on his flat spot thread, it looks to me like he was missing both of the forward screws which hold the pant to the inboard bracket. The red-circled hole on the intersection fairing does not look like a screw was in there, or the hole would be mangled. The bracket shows two screws in the aft portion (circled blue), while both forward screws are missing (red).

Not disputing that you might have hit an animal etc, but the basic problem was lack of proper preflight. Those forward screws must have been partially threaded for a while, and probably both didn't depart the airplane at the same time, so that should have been obvious on even a cursory preflight.

And that tire... it's trash.

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Thanks for the post. Animal or missing screws - I will check my wheel pants more carefully on every pre flight. Glad it worked out for you aw well as it did.
 
I saw it happen on a Giles, where eventually the mounting bracket broke overtime and vibration and caused the pan to blow up just like yours did a normal landing, and then a crazy sound and ended up with one wheel pant laying on the runway. I would say this is the more likely scenario than hitting a small animal.
 
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