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Disassembling and assembling Wings and elevator for container

Ralf Schneider

I'm New Here
Hi All,

next month i travel from Germany to Oregon and hopefully i will buy a -4.
The 40' container is ordered and i need to disassemble the wings and the elevator (or maybe even the whole horizontal stabilizer) to put it into the conatiner.

Unfortunatele the seller has no drawings or manuals for this kind of work.

It would be very helpful, if someone can provide a manual, drawings or a videolink in which i can see the steps for disassembling and assembling these parts.

Furthermore, please cross fingers, that it will be a good one and i have it on my homebase in 3 months ;)

Ralf
 
A couple things..

Ralf,
I would start by ordering the build DWGs/Build Manual on disk from VAN's and study up a bit. While its not that hard to disassemble, The spar carrythrough bolts can be a challenge and its easy to damage things while removing them.The spar joining plates are specific to location and should be marked. Be prepared to document what came out of what. The seats will need removed to get the floor pan opened (hopefully all installed with screws) but some have closed theirs with pop rivets. The aileron push tubes will have to come out with the wings if the wingtips are not removable.There is a lower wing skin to fuselage skin that will have a row of screws and need removed. The tail surfaces should fit in a container assembled, but removal isn't hard if elevators need pulled. That only reduces the width by about 4 " total. If stabilizer needs removed, the vertical fin and rudder are coming off first. Fuel lines should have disconnect fittings at the root. If wiring and pitot lines in wings don't have a disconnect, they may need cut under the floor pan. You will need a couple "careful individuals" to pull the wings out.
 
Picture of Spar carrythrough

Here is what it will look like under the floor at the Spar carry-through. I have my wings attached with a few hardware bolts in this picture. You can also see the aileron push tubes.
 

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One more thing..W&B

With wings off, and tail feathers off there is a good chance it will fall on its nose if not handled just right. Be prepared to put some weights on the tail. I recall mine being extremely light on the tail when I moved it from home to the airfield.
 
If the airplane will be transported on its gear, make sure that when you remove the vertical stabilizer you reinstall the bottom 3 AN4 bolts that go through tailwheel weldment. If this is not done the tailwheel spring will beat the **** out of the the rearmost fuselage bulkhead (F-412) and it will have to be replaced.
 
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