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Planning to build an experimental PA-18

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P Fedorka

New Member
Joined
Apr 30, 2010
Messages
1
Location
Alaska
Hi Fellers,

I'm planning to build an experimental PA-18. I have a number of the original Piper drawings so I could actually build an 18 clone if I wanted to.

However, I'd like to modify the fuselage to make it a full truss instead of a smaller truss with the sheet metal turtle deck arches. I would think this would make a stronger fuselage structure without adding too much weight.

I've come up with a design to do this but I really don't want to have to spend the money to have an engineer do a detailed stress analysis on the design to satisify safety and the FAA. I'm assuming that in a case like this that the DAR that performs the certification inspection would want to see that there had been at least some engineering done on the design.

I know a few years ago someone had gone through the process of certifying a cub fuselage that incorporated this change, but it never went into full scale production.

Has anyone ever seen plans for building an 18 fuselage like this?
 
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