Long-Ez repair

[mrlupin]

Good day,

 

I am looking at buying a long EZ, I did an inspection on an aircraft I am interested in, and found a crack on the right hand side of the area where the nose gear retracts. The crack is at the junction of the belly skin and gear recess.

 

I am an aircraft maintenance engineer and I do have some experience with composites. I do know how to repair them but in this case, since I am unfamiliar with ez-poxy, (which from my understanding is no longer being produced) I would like to know if there is a compatibility problem when using another epoxy for the repair. Which epoxy is recommended?

 

Also, any ideas as to why this damage would have occured? the current owners doesn't seem to have any idea.

 

Thanks for the help..

[Lynn Erickson]

Good day,

 

I am looking at buying a long EZ, I did an inspection on an aircraft I am interested in, and found a crack on the right hand side of the area where the nose gear retracts. The crack is at the junction of the belly skin and gear recess.

 

I am an aircraft maintenance engineer and I do have some experience with composites. I do know how to repair them but in this case, since I am unfamiliar with ez-poxy, (which from my understanding is no longer being produced) I would like to know if there is a compatibility problem when using another epoxy for the repair. Which epoxy is recommended?

 

Also, any ideas as to why this damage would have occured? the current owners doesn't seem to have any idea.

 

Thanks for the help..

first, ez poxy is still being produced http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/cmpages/ezpoxy.php

for that repair you could use almost any epoxy, as they only hold on the nose gear box, not structural. these cracks a common because the layups in that area are thin. has the aircraft ever had a nose gear up landing that the owner has forgotten about?

[Kent Ashton]

It looks like the nose gear box is starting to delaminate from the bottom, perhaps from taxiing into a hole or something. I wouldn't call it airworthy but it's all repairable.

 

The basic approach is to cut and sand away old structure until you get down to sound structure, flox in new foam or build new structure, reglass, overlapping onto the old layers, fill, sand, paint. For the worst case, saw away the nose and rebuild a new nose. These kinds of repairs have been done many times and the airplane is good as new if the repair is done right. You can rebuild a nose pretty easily. "Owner didn't know"? I don't buy that. Somebody installed that ugly pop rivet.

 

Post your location. You might find a canard builder/owner help nearby.

 

Any current structural epoxy will work.

[Big Steve]

Kent said:

 

"Owner didn't know"? I don't buy that. Somebody installed that ugly pop rivet.

 

 

Kent are you sure those are pop rivets?? They look like a probe of some sort and a vent or a drain to me??? Of course I could be wrong and I aggree they are ugly. STeve build on

[Kent Ashton]

Kent are you sure those are pop rivets?? They look like a probe of some sort and a vent or a drain to me???

Duh! You've got a better eye than me.

[Wayne Hicks]

I'd be willing to bet that what you're seeing are cracks in the nose gear cover itself. The cover is 2-3 layers of fiberglass. It gets glassed in between the nose gear bulkheads after the floor pans are glassed structurally to the nose gear bulkheads. Its purpose is to seal off the air flow from going inside the plane. That's a laugher since most of these covers get hacked up with holes to accommodate the nose gear deploy/retract mechanisms.

 

It is not uncommon to see cracks eminating from the holes. However, the cracks along the bulkhead are puzzling.

 

What you really want to check are the structural junctions between the floor pans and the landing bulkheads. Stick your head into the nose gear access cover and peer down between the nose gear bukheads. The top and bottoms of the floor pans are attached to the inside and outside of each nose gear bulkhead. (The nose gear cover is attached after the fact.) You want to ensure that the layups attaching the floor pans to the nose gear bulkheads are still intact. If these layups are delaminated, it's a sure sign that the nose has been dropped (geared up) or the nose gear ran into sonething substantial.

[mrlupin]

I had a look at the nose gear attach structure, the delamination isn't apparent in that area.

 

Thanks for the advice, I haven't decided whether or not I will buy this bird.. It's construction is amazing but the original owner sold it two years ago and the new owner has not maintained it to my standards. It needs to be refinished and a a few minor repairs here and there and I should be good but in order for that to be worth my while, the price needs to be right.

 

I will post more pictures when I get home.