Pants, Yes or No?

Ok guys and gals, don't get to excited. I was wondering if wheel pants had anything over straight ole plain wheels with doors? I have noticed that some planes over the years have had it both ways. I have wheel pants on my Air Show plane (450 Stearman), but they give no real increase in speed over when they are off. They weigh a whole bunch, but do look cool so I keep them on. Same reasons in the models? Just a thought....

LAST EDITED ON Feb-01-04 AT 04:15 PM (CDT)
 
Chris Cox of BC, Canada, wrote an article for "Flying Lines" about a trim problem with his "Defiant". A thorough checkup brought to light an alignment issue with one of the wheel pants, that caused the problem. Moral of the story is that if you use them, make sure they're on straight. Suspenders might help. Steve

LAST EDITED ON Feb-02-04 AT 05:07 AM (CDT)
 
I've used wheel pants on most of my airplanes, and I've never noticed any problems. However one of my last models flew very bad ( very sensitive on "UP" but extremely reluctant on "DOWN" ), and a friend suggested to remove the pants ( he had had problems with them ). I didn't want to remove the pants since I wanted to sell the airplane to a sport flyer. I assumed the pants to somehow disturb the airflow over the wing, so I just cut off some part of the strut fairing close to the wing ( see sketch: the dark portion ). After one flight it was my impression that this has helped a little, but I didn't do any more work with the airplane as it had still some other bad habits. So I'm not 100 % sure whether this cure can be seen as a generally proved method.
Regards, claus

>Ok guys and gals, don't get to excited. I was wondering if
>wheel pants had anything over straight ole plain wheels with
>doors?

Well. I don't know about that, but your title suggests an emergency rules change proposal.

>"Pants,Yes or No?

Ok guys and gals, don't get to excited. >
>
Kirk Wicker
>www.wingwalk.com

I personally have found that flying with pants allows you to get in more patterns because of lack of arrests. Although, flying without pants is handy when you forget to carry your stooge because you can always count on law enforcement to launch for you. In addition, flying without pants affords more freedom of movement through the pattern, but that has to be offset by the inability to do overhead maneuvers with any sort of discretion. Lastly, I would strongly recommend reducing your nitro content because the money you save there will allow you buy a decent set of pants.
>

Kirk,

Don't use anything but the Fiberglass or better yet, Carbon Fiber wheel pants that are made by some aftermarket parts makers. These will be much better than trying to shape your own. Also make sure when mounting them that they are exactly in line or they will cause trimming problems. The only reason for using them on our models is to get that maybe 1 extra appearance point that can become a large thing when trying to qualify in the top 20 at the Nats. If you don't plan to do any flying at the Nats then there just not worth the trouble they can sometimes cause.

Just my opinion on the issues!

Kirk - I found the same thing with my Cherokee. After painting it, I logged around 75 hours without wheel pants. I then put them on and found absolutly no difference - fuel consumption, climb, cruise - all the same! The biggest performance difference was when I had the prop (fixed pitch) re-pitched from 72 to 76. A slight sacrifice in climb but a most noticeable decrease in fuel consumption. Now for those inverted passes!!!
Oh, yes - one thing the wheel pants do accomplish - they make it near impossible to get to the valve stems on the mains. Time for some Dremel work.
Regarding wheel pants for our models - they really do look great, especially on classics, like the Argus.
Bob Z

They surely improve the looks of most models, but you can have trouble when flying off of rough, grassy surfaces.

Whey I go into a high school study hall mode, lazily doodling stunt ships, they always end up with pants. And a spinner.

Pants 'n Spinners...the T & A of modeldom, for sure.

Take the front fender of a 37 Cord, elongate it just a bit and convex the bottom in side view...Now you have an ideal shape, at least to my eyes, for your typical Classic stunt ship.

Friend if your pants are too heavy, you need to build lighter pants...

But I have no pants! I'm easy to pick out in a crowd though.

Okay, I'll be different. I prefer gear doors. I tried pants on the Bonanza, but when I cycled the gear I heard this incredible noise. Scared the everlovin' poop out of me I had to finish the trip with the wheels down. Much slower in my opinion.

I think if Zambelli put some gear doors on that Cherokee, it would take care of his valve stem problem. He might figure out a way to retract the gear, too

Ron King