Club Homepage Forums Classified Ads Buy & Sell - Everything But Airplanes Wheel pants: Answer creates problem

Oh, one more thing, go look at the pictures Wayne posted for the Thomasville Fly-In. The 3rd one down is John Vargo's 150, a '73 or '75 model, tubular gear with the older style wheelpants on it.

Some people LIKE the little door!!??? There are two ways to fill the tires without the little door.

One way is to have a 90-degree attachment on your compressor. You lie on your side beside the wheel and roll the airplane back and forth using the main gear until you can feel the valve stem. You wiggle the adapter up and get it on the stem, and then try to apply sufficient pressure to get air into the tire.

OR

You pull the wheel pant off...

I find that yanking the wheel pant is easier.

Reg

Some people LIKE the little door!!??? There are two ways to fill the tires without the little door....
OR
You pull the wheel pant off...
I find that yanking the wheel pant is easier.
Reg [/quote]

Mine does not have the little door, I merely stated some of the preferences of owners in regard to tire servicing. Obviously, Cessna saw it as enough of an issue to add the feature. To my way of looking at it, it's a solution to a non-existent problem, and one more latch and hinge to wear out.I have no problem servicing tires, as you merely move the plane to position the valve stem for access{you should do that anyway to preflight the plane}- AND you need the correct air chuck to fit the valve, as well as a gauge with the appropriate fitting.
Anyone can service their tires as you see fit, but I sure as heck wouldn't want to yank the pants off just to air-up a tire! Time to visit a "Snap-off" truck to buy the chuck and gauge you need.
As far as wheel pants and model year, I'm sure someone has managed to swap any style on any year, we've all see them flying around.Whatever works, I guess....
-Brian

Mine does not have the little door, I merely stated some of the preferences of owners in regard to tire servicing. Obviously, Cessna saw it as enough of an issue to add the feature. To my way of looking at it, it's a solution to a non-existent problem, and one more latch and hinge to wear out.I have no problem servicing tires, as you merely move the plane to position the valve stem for access{you should do that anyway to preflight the plane}- AND you need the correct air chuck to fit the valve, as well as a gauge with the appropriate fitting.
Anyone can service their tires as you see fit, but I sure as heck wouldn't want to yank the pants off just to air-up a tire! Time to visit a "Snap-off" truck to buy the chuck and gauge you need.
As far as wheel pants and model year, I'm sure someone has managed to swap any style on any year, we've all see them flying around.Whatever works, I guess....
-Brian [/quote]

Brian:

Do you have a photo of the chuck and gauge you use? It CAN be done with a 90-degree chuck, but it is still a major pain in the sit-downer.

I can R&R a wheel pant in about ten minutes. I can mess around trying to get the gauage and the chuck to properly seat on the valve stem for double that length of time.

Reg

You can do the job with these tools (attached photo below)
These are from Snap-on, but other brands may be equal in quality. Beware of cheap pencil type gauges, they are notoriously inaccurate.
-Brian

There are a LOT of "cheap" guages available. They are a safety hazard and should be illegal, but apparently they aren't. Buy a brand name that you can trust!

A couple of years back I paid enough for a store brand bourdon tube (round) guage that I should have received an accurate one. It wasn't! It read about 10 lbs low, but I didn't discover that until one of my tires came apart at highway speeds due to overinflation.

When it comes to air pressure in tires, I usually use 2 quages---to check one against the other for more accuracy.

In looking at the repair manual it appears that the different backing plates all mount the same. It's not really clear, but that is how it appears. So, that does offer me another option, doesn't it??

Though it appears now that backing plates may be even more rare then nose pants??

Yes, I do like the little door on my wheel pants. With the style of my wheel pants (see attachment), no part of the wheel/stem is visible without a door or a round cut-out.



Apparently you can work a hell of a lot faster than I can. No way I can R&R that nose wheel pant in 10 minutes.

[quote=Though it appears now that backing plates may be even more rare then nose pants?? [/quote]

I've seen several sets of the different plates on eBay just this past year- you just have to know what you're looking at, as most sellers have no clue to the year/model they are selling.
What is almost impossible to find is the nose pant top cover, I made mine as I was unsuccessful in tracking one down.
-Brian