Ok, clearly you "DON'T GET IT". First off, I'm not 450lbs, I'm 266, so I am not WAAAAAAAAAAAAY over the Cozy fwd CG limits. The number I gave you was 2 grown people in the front, myself and another person. Another point I'll make is that the Cozy fits me, I just want more room, and that's a complaint I see in many posts here. Thirdly, this is a MODIFICATIONS forum, so this kind of stuff should be discussed, not shot at by people who want to stick to plan gospel. If you meant to discuss the issue, the tone of your post needs to turn from pretentious and honestly RUDE to more positive and thoughtful (Take some pointers from the post below yours), especially if you want anyone to listen to you. Despite your tone and rudeness, I will give my thoughts to some of your concerns with the idea of adding width:
A.The approved canard design isnt conducive to your weight.
- The design IS conducive to my weight. See above
B. Sorry to be blunt, but you dont just make it wider and everything 'works'.
- Correct, however, this is an experimental aircraft (plans built no less). A plan is just that, a plan. This is not a production aircraft, it's in the experimental category for a reason.... Many people have made various modifications without increased safety risk to these aircraft. I have been looking through these forums and have seen some very thoughtful discussion on this forum about widening the Cozy. Each design change must be carefully thought through, and that's what I'm attempting to do here. My question was merely why 3 inches wider seems to be a more magic number than the rest (Sweet spot, pusher prop issues, etc...).
B. Widening adds weight. A electric noselift adds weight. A full panel with all the bells and whistles wasnt in the calculation originally for a light Cozy. And whatever you add to the opposite end of the teeter totter behind the FW, exacerbates the front seat 'problem', electric starter, added oil cooler, etc.
- I design jet engines for a living, so I definitely understand that adding anything to an aircraft must be carefully considered from a weight perspective. You pay for bells and whistles with decreased useful load and ultimately performance. The question in this case would be probably about 20-30 Lbs of excess weight in structure, possibly more but not much. This is something I am prepared to live with and compensate for in my design.
- Some other issues I want to consider more thoughtfully:
- What is the load change into the fuse from the wings (A la the main spar) and is the structure capable of handling that with safety. This requires some more thought to the added moment and weight the wing must support, but not in-surmountable (My aircraft structures class would finally be useful, and we talked about Composites!)
-Would the penalty in performance from the added weight of the aircraft be worth the modification. This could be compensated for by adding more horsepower, or slightly modifying the wing area (With added drag and weight penalties, but may be worth it) to give more lift.
Essentially what it all comes down to is that the Cozy Mk IV is a capable airframe with quite a lot of performance. IMHO sacrificing some of that performance for a little comfort and fit (Especially if I am going to go on a long trip like they say you can) is alright with me. I bet if I built a 6 inch wider Cozy, it would be no less safe than a strictly plans built one. The key is to make judicious changes, and be fully aware of the consequences of those changes, good or bad. In this case, widening the aircraft sacrifices some weight, harder working prop (More horses possibly), and performance for added comfort, something I think the Cozy could use : ) (Ever hear of Robin hood? ). These are just my own ramblings at this point, until I get my plans it's all up in the air. I've gotta go run 3 miles, just like I do almost every day... Check back with y'all later, thank you for the feedback!
-Chris Z.
