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S-51 Tailwheel Parts – Prep For Welding

November 23, 2023 by Mike Leave a Comment

Today, as I continue with my parts inventory, I’m also working on batching items that need to be sent out to be welded. It’s a good time for me to be doing this because I don’t have much happening on the S-51 build at this time. Partly because I’m deeply involved in building the F1 Rocket fuel tanks and want to get the F1 wings skinned so I can get the wing panels off the jig stands. Secondly, I need some aluminum sheet to make the spar caps for the S-51 wing spars, but I’m not ordering that until I’m ready to order the sheet metal for the F1 wing skins, so that’s a bit further down the road.

In the meantime, here are a bunch of S-51 parts that I want to have made into their final assemblies. I’m starting off with the tailwheel strut assembly (p/n 7201-1). As you can see HPAI did a beautiful job of cutting out these parts. They are all a perfect fit.

Here’s a diagram from the S-51 plans that shows an expanded view of the complexity that is the tailwheel strut assembly.

Here’s a close up of the lower guide ring. There’s a step machined into the ring so it can seat against the main strut tube. The ring now needs to be welded to the strut tube.

In this next picture I have the cross tube set on the main tube. Also note the trunnion fittings in the end of the cross tube and the collar ring on the upper end of the main strut tube. These are all parts that need to be welded to form the 7201-1 strut assembly.

Below is the 7201-2 Inner Strut tube. The ring needs to be welded somewhere in the middle of the tube.

These parts shown below, form the tailwheel steering lock collar assembly (7201-3) which is clamped on the top of the main strut assembly.

Next is the 7201-27 Lock Assembly, also note the drawing for this item in the background of the picture. As you can see from these parts already shown, and the details of this drawing, the complexity that goes into building up the systems of the S-51. As I always say, this definitely isn’t your average homebuilt aircraft project.

This next item is the tailwheel spring spacer. This is one of the components that goes inside the main tailwheel strut tube. This spacer is one of the parts of the assembly that is used for the tailwheel spring to compress against.

It took a little bit of filing to get these rings to snugly fit the diameter of the tube. Another part ready to weld.

Moving away from the tailwheel strut assembly parts, I have a few various parts, levers and plates that are part of the tailwheel steering box that need to be welded up as well. This item below is the 7204-3 Hook Assembly.

And this item is the 7202-8 Lock Lever Assembly. The bolt is just used temporarily to keep those tabs in alignment.

That’s all for today folks! I’ll keep you updated when I get around to getting these parts all welded up. Please comment. I love to hear from my readers.  Thanks again for coming along for this ride, you make my work worthwhile.

Filed Under: Landing Gear Tagged With: Steering Box, Tailwheel, Welding

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Profile Photo 1 Hello - My name is Mike and I'm a true believer that if you can imagine something, it's just a matter of bringing it into reality.

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