I attached the cutout aluminum letters of the name Spiritus Tomas to the left side of the fuselage with the smallest brass screws I could find. I may have to glue them down eventually, as I stabbed the shit out of my finger just lovingly running my hand over them...

      I cut out and ground smooth the letters for the other side, as well as 3 trim pieces for the rudder and elevator control rod slots.

   I raised the fuselage up on stilts and attached the old geat to design and make the new WW1 type straight axle gear I have been thinking about for months. At 36 lbs each, the Harley wheels and tires are just too heavy, I will use them on the trailer I am planning to build for the plane.

  I went looking on e-bay again, and found some 12" pit bike rims that looked like they might be a good option, so I ordered them.

       The front legs on the existing gear are at a 50 degree angle to the bottom of the fuselage.  The question is do I keep the legs on the new gear the same . Most WW1 planes had fairly vertical legs and a narrow stance. I am well aware that there would be less stress on the holding cables if the legs were more vertical, but on the other hand the wide stance should make the plane more stable on the ground. I like that...

      The front leg pieces were cut (out of 1" aluminum tubing with a 1/8" thick wall) at that angle and bolted so the beveled end fits tight against the channel.

    I went to a couple of motorcycle shops to look at pit bike wheels, and saw some really nice and sturdy Kawasaki rear wheels with really wide 6" or 7" hubs. The problem is that they cost a fortune, something like $750 each!

    So I went back on e-bay and looked some more, and ran across these 10 " wheels with built in drum brakes and wide low tread street tires included. I e-mailed the seller, and the hubs are about 5", the axles 12 mm. I ended up ordering them, and am awaiting their arrival with my fingers crossed.

     I did not find much on the last search, most people don't move their planes by car I suppose! Most of what I found was for gliders. One image shows how huge the trailer is and the idea of towing this thing scares me. I have towed some big U-HALL trailers and almost gone off the road. Of course,the plane is light, and a payload of 500 lbs or so is not much.

    Also, something that big is going to be pretty expensive.

    I found kits at    http://www.utilitytrailerkit.com/      and    http://www.championtrailers.com/UTILITY_TRAILER_KITS.HTM

   The cables touch where they cross in the middle, and I will make little leather protective sleeves to protect them.

   The gear is now bolted onto a 24" x 24" board , so it can be tested before it is mounted on the plane. Assuming the plane with the pilot is 700lbs, and a 3Gs bad landing, that would be a 2100lbs force. I plan to test the gear by loading 2000lbs or so on that board with the gear upright and the wheels on the ground.

    I moved the attachment point of the 2 front cables from the middle channel to the front channel , as close to the opposite leg as possible, which didn't even require making new cables. That way, on landing, the pull on that cable from one leg will be balanced by the push on the other leg.

   To stabilize the legs laterally before putting tension on the cables, I cut two 1/8" plates to fit tight between the two leg attachment plates on the bottom, and attached them to the compression tubes with small screws, after slipping inside the steel tube re-enforcements, drilling them and tapping them 6-32.

   The mini-chopper wheels arrived today, and they look real good and sturdy. The hubs are about 6" wide actually. The axle bolts are 11". They weight 16lbs each.

     I moved the attachment point of the 2 front cables from the middle channel to the front channel , as close to the opposite leg as possible, which didn't even require making new cables. That way, the pull on that cable will be balanced by the push on the leg.

   The only possible problem I see is the rather small 12mm axle size. I am considering changing the bearings to a larger size. Those on the wheel now are metric deep groove 6201-RS(32mm OD, 12mm ID, 10mm W).

    I searched the Internet, and the only 2 options with the same OD are a 6201-ZZ13( 13mm ID) and a 6002-RS(15mm ID). The problem is that 13 and 15mm are very very odd sizes, and axles in those sizes are almost impossible to find , as are 15 mm drill bits I would need to enlarge the bushing ID on the brake unit. Also , these bearings are pretty expensive.

    So I considered enlarging the bore of the hub to fit much more common and much cheaper 99502H-2RS bearings, which have an OD of 1 3/8' and an axle size of 5/8" . I took the wheels down to the machine shop, and was shocked that they wanted $150 per wheel to do it.

   Back to square one, the only solution is to use the 6002-RS bearings with a 15mm axle. I noticed that 15mm= 0.59055", and 19/32'= 0.5938", pretty close. But the only thing I could find in a 19/32' diameter is a drill rod, which is going to be too hard to thread or drill.

  Well, 5/8'=0.625". Could I not sand down a 5/8"OD tube (with a 12mmID) to a 15mm diameter. It is only hardly more than 1/32' to whittle down total, just 1/64" all the way round...  I will use the 12mmm axle that came with the wheels inside that 5/8" OD tube. Now, I need to fit this 5/8" OD tube into my 7/8"OD axle tube. That will require another tube with a 5/8"ID and a 3/4"OD that will fit into the 7/8" axle tube I already have. OK I ordered the tubes from AS.

   This is a sketch of the testing rig I plan to build to subject the gear to about 2000lbs. It is mostly 2x4's, and the pieces are assembled with sheetrock screws . It works like a scale, with two 50lbs sand bags as weights that can be moved down the lever arm to increase the force.

   I built the rig as drawn, but had to add a 200lbs counterweight (4 sand bags) to keep the gear from tilting.

   I moved the 50lbs weights slowly down the 8 foot 2x4's , until the total force was about 1700 lbs.

    The axle tubing was noticeably bent up, as well as the two aluminum compression tubes, about 1 inch in the middle. I suppose that just adds to the spring.

   I would like to increase the force using 2 sand bags on each lever arm, and possibly test each side with 2000lbs, to simulate a 3 Gs landing on one wheel.