Grob 102CS tow-out gear

Hi, all, long time listener, first time poster.

I'm planning on flying in the Region 10 contest in August in my club's
mighty Grob 102CS. I know this will strike fear into the hearts of
all the other competitors.

Unfortunately, we lack any tow-out gear.

I'm in the process of building a wing wheel, and I have an idea on how
to build a tow bar, but before I go with my idea I thought I'd see if
anyone has any pics/drawings/ideas on how to build one.

Anyone care to post a known-good solution?

--Stefan

Many years ago, I built a wing wheel for my LS-6a. To build the cuff, I
laid a wing on saw horses, covered it with aluminum foil in the target area,
then covered that with padding and then cellophane wrap, and laid up many
layers of fiber glass over top of the whole mess. I also imbedded a piece
of ply wood in the glass on the bottom as a mounting base for the wheel
hardware. I used sufficient glass that no perimeter flanges were required
(and it was really heavy!). After cure, everything was removed from the
wing, separated, and the padding glued into the glass with contact cement.
IIRC, I left the trailing edge open and extended to facilitate installing
the padding and closed it with a couple of carriage bolts, nuts, and
washers.

The down side with this method was that the cuff was unique to the left wing
due to fitting the taper so closely.


"Stefan Murry" wrote in message
...
Hi, all, long time listener, first time poster.

I'm planning on flying in the Region 10 contest in August in my club's
mighty Grob 102CS. I know this will strike fear into the hearts of
all the other competitors.

Unfortunately, we lack any tow-out gear.

I'm in the process of building a wing wheel, and I have an idea on how
to build a tow bar, but before I go with my idea I thought I'd see if
anyone has any pics/drawings/ideas on how to build one.

Anyone care to post a known-good solution?

--Stefan

On Jul 7, 3:38*pm, Stefan Murry wrote:
Hi, all, long time listener, first time poster.

I'm planning on flying in the Region 10 contest in August in my club's
mighty Grob 102CS. *I know this will strike fear into the hearts of
all the other competitors.

Unfortunately, we lack any tow-out gear.

I'm in the process of building a wing wheel, and I have an idea on how
to build a tow bar, but before I go with my idea I thought I'd see if
anyone has any pics/drawings/ideas on how to build one.

Anyone care to post a known-good solution?

--Stefan

I'm assuming you're focused on the towout bar, which is what is unique
to the Astir CS with its unconventional tail dolly.

For my ship, I did the following:

- Extended the wheel axle using a longer shoulder bolt and
appropriate bushings.
- Had my welder fabricate a tow bar that ran under the tail skid and
then attached to a "c"-shaped section of flat stock.
- Two notches in the ends of the "c" legs picked up the bushings
- Secured with a small bungy on either side that cliped onto the tail
dolly wheel forks.

It would be a lot easier to see in pictures, but I sold that ship
nearly 20 years ago and don't have any pictures of the tow bar.

P3