Today was a huge milestone on the project: moving the fuselage to the airport!
I like to think it was my careful preparation that made this something of a non-event, and I’m sure that’s partly true. I had built this event up in my mind, and when everything happened simply and easily, I realized I may have spent more time thinking about it that was necessary.
The airport is a 40 mile drive from my house, and the route includes surface streets, freeways, and winding canyon roads. I would have liked to rent a box truck, and transported the fuselage inside, but I couldn’t find one that was wide enough. The distance from the outside of each wheel is 91 inches, but there’s an addition 2 inches of axil protruding from each wheel giving it a total width of 96 inches. The max allowed width of vehicles (in most states) is 102 inches, and with box trucks, there’s at least 3 inches on each side that is unusable. The widest box truck I could find was about 92 inches, so I gave up on that idea.
That left two options, ranting or borrowing a trailer, or renting a tow truck. I decided to trust a tow truck driver, and found someone local who seemed like he would take good care of the project. I scheduled Leo to arrive at 8am on Sunday, and asked a few friends to stop by and give me a hand.
The evenings before the move I made a list of everything I needed to do to secure the fuselage. Using some moving supplies I protected the wing spars, prop, and wrapped the aft fuselage in cling wrap in case of any road debris that might get kicked up. The weight and balance was a consideration too. Without the wings and tail installed, the fuselage is nose heavy, and I’ve had some weight attached to the tail wheel to keep it in balance. I bought some cheap sandbags from Amazon, filled them with sand, and slung them over the tail, after carefully protecting the tail with dense foam blocks, heavy moving blankets, all wrapped in cling wrap. By slinging the weights I was able to take them off for the 40 mile drive.
I was up early preparing, and rolled the fuselage out onto the level portion of the driveway. The driveway has a fairly steep incline, perhaps 30%, dropping about 6 feet over a 20 foot section. At the bottom is a nice flat cul-de-sac where we could maneuver the fuselage and load it with lots of space. To get down the driveway, I realized I could use the brakes to steer and slow the decent, and if I went backwards, I would mitigate any nose-over risk. Not wanting to trust the brakes (they had never been tested before) I rigged up a safety line.
When the truck and the help arrived, I climbed in and had a friend push the plane backwards until gravity took hold and I was able to “drive”. The brakes worked well and were able to completely stop and hold the weight halfway down (I made a point to test them). We were down the driveway in no time, and then Leo used the tow truck winch to pull her up onto the truck bed while I steered from the tail. Friends helped keep an eye on things and we were up and onto the truck in no time. The fuselage fit perfectly, with just a couple of inches to spare fore-and-aft, and about 6 inches on either side of the wheels.
To secure the load, we used straps on the steps, the tail wheel mount, and the main gear. With everything looking good, my friend and I drove behind the truck to the airport.
Unloading was a breeze, and we had the plane tucked into the hangar in just a few minutes.
