My lower tail nav light doesn't work because the braided metal ground
strap that connected the tailcone to the light housing fell off the
tail cone side. I can't tell (at least from the outside) how it was
originally attached to the aluminum skin. I don't see a rivet -- would
it have been soldered? Crimped somehow?

--
Ben Jackson
>
http://www.ben.com/

>My lower tail nav light doesn't work because the braided metal ground
>strap that connected the tailcone to the light housing fell off the
>tail cone side.

Usually they are connected with a crimp ring tongue on the braided strap and by
a screw to the frame that the tail cone attaches to.

John Dupre'

You didn't specify make/model, but on my C182, the Grimes lamp
holder assembly is mounted on the fiberglass tailcone. There
are two wires, power and ground. Each has the aircraft-style
"quick connect" interlocking-blade connectors (the kind
that have a piece of insulating sleeve pushed over them).

The power wire comes through the rear fuselage bulkhead via
a grommet. The ground wire is grounded to that same bulkhead
with a crimp-on ring-tongue terminal under a 6-32 screw.

At each annual, it only takes a moment to remove the fiberglass
tailcone and to disconnect the blade-tongue connectors.

MikeM


Ben Jackson wrote:
> My lower tail nav light doesn't work because the braided metal ground
> strap that connected the tailcone to the light housing fell off the
> tail cone side. I can't tell (at least from the outside) how it was
> originally attached to the aluminum skin. I don't see a rivet -- would
> it have been soldered? Crimped somehow?
>