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James. I am with you. The spacers should be your last resort to bring the tail up to a normal height. Especially on hard landings you will need every inch of travel on the mains to absorb the shock. But if you find the tail still low after installing the new main gear, I would rather use the spacers. I am doing it myself reluctantly. You can take off pretty easy with a low tail when you trim for cruise. The more air goes over the tail when taking off, the more the nose will be pushed to the ground. This is my preferred takeoff method in cross wind situations. It does not matter if the tail is low, the plane will correct itself according to your trim setting. You can also have problems taking off in a tail high Ercoupe when the plane is trimmed nose up. Best is to make it habit to trim for cruise on takeoff - makes for an easy to handle plane. The difficult situation comes when you are in for a landing. The plane then is trimmed nose up and will still be after touching down when in a tail low configuration. You need to push forward on the yoke. The force needed I find harder to estimate. I found myself constantly pushing with too much force, using the expensive front tire as a marker on the runway. With the plane tail up, you will find yourself steering the plane with ease after it looses its momentum on rollout. Of course you could also trim for cruise briefly before touching down and get the same effect. But who has the nerves to do that? Hartmut ----- Original Message ----- From: "James B. Brennan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Ercoupe Tech Forum" <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, January 05, 2007 8:20 PM Subject: Re: [COUPERS-TECH] Nose Gear > ----[Please read http://ercoupers.com/disclaimer.htm before following any advice in this forum.]---- > > > I recently acquired a set of tires, wheels & Cleveland brakes from Clem > Beauchamin's sad loss. I also acquired his struts, with the lip seals > and bellevue springs plus 7/8" spacers, as I have the newer nose gear. > John Wright, Sr. told me to NOT use the spacers: he described the low > tail height as a "myth" (yup, his word) and that he's seen too many > examples of center section damage owing to not enough oleo travel that > he does NOT recommend the spacers be used. > > It seems that about a year ago (while I was pretty new to this list) I > read a long string of discussion on these spacers. My plane has old > struts, no doubt with shot oleos and tired rubber, so getting Clem's > pair, that had been serviced 3 years ago by J.W., Sr. and have the > springs instead of the rubber seemed wonderful. Needless to say I was > floored by Mr. Wright's remark. I am due for annual so I reckoned that > in the course of it, the Clevelands would be fitted, as well as the > replacement struts. > > What about those spacers? I have around 100 hours in my 415-C and have > not attempted a "wicked" cross wind - my instructor simply told me that > after my mains were planted to shove the yoke forward and steer. > > ?????????????????? > > J.B. Brennan > > PS - yeah, my tail is quite low now, but I think the replacement struts > with the springs will bring it up a lot (I think my doughnuts are sad - > they're sticky to the touch), but I really don't want to make this a > two visit job if I can help it. > > PPS - on takeoff, my plane, even with its low tail, obviously has a > negative angle of attack - yesterday I guess I let it get up near 80 > before I picked it off (very long & smooth RW) > > ============================================================================ == > To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm > > > > ============================================================================== To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm
