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Canopy hold open options

dbenoit

Member
My canopy got hit by a gust of wind and it shut without guidance. The pilot side latch was damaged, but repairable. Has anyone come up with a good solution to keep the canopy in the open position? Thanks in advance!
 
I have a 6, not a 12, but I put a piece of PEX slit long ways (~8" long) snapped over the piston part of one of the struts anytime my canopy is open and I'm more than 1' away.

Harder to reach on the 12, but might still be doable.
 
I used some schedule 40 PVC pipe to make a stop that fits around the strut shaft. I do not have a photo of it installed on the strut, but I did find the prototype to give you an idea of what it looks like. The slot in the end fits around the flat part of the strut shaft to keep the PVC from rotating. The long slot along the length fits over the shaft and butts against the gas cylinder end. I used a heat gun to soften the PVC and wrap it around a wood dowel to get the correct diameter. An oscillating saw is handy for cutting the slots.

Installing is simply putting the thru-slot end on the flat shaft mounting end and rotating the long slot over the shaft. I trimmed mine for a snug fit. You can install and remove it while seated in the pilot's seat. If you use one on each side, the canopy will not move.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 

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I use a similar slotted tube, but aluminum. I also made 1/8” cable lanyard with a caribiner at one end and a key ring at the other to parent blowing forward. I installed an AN eyebolt in the crash arch manufacturing hole. The key ring fastens to the eyebolt hole, and the caribiner clips on to the canopy handle. The cable is about 1/2” shorter than full open so the air spring attachments never gets stressed if the canopy is caught in the wind.
 
I split a length of rubber hose. Slips over the rod part and is easy to pop on or off. One for each side.
Yeah, it's cheap but so am I.
danny
 
I decided to upgrade my PVC pipe version of a canopy strut lock to 3D printed item. 3D printed version has a much better fit and I added a key ring tab to attach a Remove Before Flight flag.

The printable STL file will be available on Thingverse.com and Printabales.com shortly, along with some other RV-12 3D parts I created.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 

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I decided to upgrade my PVC pipe version of a canopy strut lock to 3D printed item. 3D printed version has a much better fit and I added a key ring tab to attach a Remove Before Flight flag.

The printable STL file will be available on Thingverse.com and Printabales.com shortly, along with some other RV-12 3D parts I created.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS


That's looks great! Nice job!
 
Print files

I decided to upgrade my PVC pipe version of a canopy strut lock to 3D printed item. 3D printed version has a much better fit and I added a key ring tab to attach a Remove Before Flight flag.

The printable STL file will be available on Thingverse.com and Printabales.com shortly, along with some other RV-12 3D parts I created.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS

Will this work on my rv6a?
Is there any chance you have a dwg file for this part and if so can I buy that from you?
Thanks
Dave Shenk
 
Will this work on my rv6a?
Is there any chance you have a dwg file for this part and if so can I buy that from you?
Thanks
Dave Shenk

Dave,

The part was designed with Fusion 360, so no .dwg files is available. The lock is 81mm long and the slot is 6.5mm wide. The gas cylinder on the RV-12 has a shaft length of 71mm from the gas cylinder end to the weld at the 6mm round shaft to 5.5mmx11mm rectangular mounting flange. The photo shows the bottom side of the lock, the small expanded area is to clear weld bulge at the round shaft to flange weld.

If you have some dimensions from the RV6 gas strut I would be happy to make a quick modification and publish an RV6 specific .stl file you can use.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 

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I decided to upgrade my PVC pipe version of a canopy strut lock to 3D printed item. 3D printed version has a much better fit and I added a key ring tab to attach a Remove Before Flight flag.

Would you be willing to print and ship a pair of these to someone with a -12iS who doesn't have access to a 3D printer? Of course paying you for them and the shipping.
 
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John,
I searched on the two sights you posted and could not find the files for the canopy stop or any other items you mentioned were created for your 12.
I know a couple schools that have 3D printers where I plan to contact them to see about them making these parts for me. However, if paying you for creating the parts is an option I would be interested too.

Thanks
 
John,
I searched on the two sights you posted and could not find the files for the canopy stop or any other items you mentioned were created for your 12.
I know a couple schools that have 3D printers where I plan to contact them to see about them making these parts for me. However, if paying you for creating the parts is an option I would be interested too.

Thanks

Try one of these links, same files on both.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5357124
https://www.printables.com/model/173360-vans-aircraft-open-canopy-lock

My collection of other parts can be found by searching for JS_SunnyFlorida on printables.com. or JSACbuilder on Thingverse.com.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 
Would you be willing to print and ship a pair of these to someone with a -12iS who doesn't have access to a 3D printer? Of course paying you for them and the shipping.

I already printed a half-dozen. Send me a PM with your information.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 
Thanks for posting the file!

IMG-3753-2.jpg
 
Early RV-12's can be subject to an even greater danger than the canopy closing unexpectedly; it can blow forward in a wind gust and into the moving propeller. This was addressed by Vans in Notification 16-10-03 Install Canopy Safety Catch and by Notification 16-11-04 Install new canopy lift struts. The early lift struts had plastic ends that could easily break.

Before these fixes we used to taxi with the canopy handle resting on the roll bar. The picture below shows a canopy that was caught by a gust from aft and went into the prop. Not my airplane, I copied a picture that was posted on the internet. There was actually a video, pretty scary.

My point is; there are many early 12's, built prior to about 2016, that have changed owners and, if you are one of those, these two notifications are important fixes and should be in the logbooks. But they are not Service Bulletins, so may NOT have been completed.
 

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Early RV-12's can be subject to an even greater danger than the canopy closing unexpectedly; it can blow forward in a wind gust and into the moving propeller.

Does anyone have their canopy open after engine start?
 
Does anyone have their canopy open after engine start?

I guess my post wasn't clear. The canopy in the picture was partially open with the handle resting on the roll bar. The airplane was taxiing. This was commonly done in hot weather before the canopy catch was installed. A gust of wind came from aft of that airplane and the canopy swung fully open, breaking the lift struts, breaking the canopy and breaking the moving propeller.
 
Awesome but !

Great ideas for a tip ups but has anyone come up with way to hold a slider at say 6” open for startup & taxi. Mine will either slide shut or slide all the way open once the engine starts. :eek:
 
3d Printer

John,
What model 3D Printer are you using? I've been looking at them for creating items for our airplane. The choices are a bit overwhelming.
Thanks
Rick
 
Rick,
I use a modified Prusa i3-Mk2.5 with an MM2S multi-material (5 filaments) feed unit. Most of my printing is high temp material (260C-275C) with 110C bed temps. I use an Olson Ruby nozzle as I print a lot of Nylon-CF and PC Blend-CF which is very abrasive. You need an enclosure for anything high temp to stop warping/heat bed lifting. The one in the photo is two IKEA LACK tables end on end. Tune-ups and quality filament are needed for consistent prints, I use cheap PLA for prototypes and fit checks, usually takes 2 or 3 rounds to get a finished item that gets printed with PETG/ASA/Nylon/PCBlend.

I have the new Prusa XL with two print heads on order to replace my current printer, however it will not ship until next summer.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 

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John,

Sent you a PM - struggling with your RV-12 step plug file which is on printables.

Appreciate if you get a moment to take a look.

Robert
 
John,

Sent you a PM - struggling with your RV-12 step plug file which is on printables.

Appreciate if you get a moment to take a look.

Robert

Looks like the inch dims in the .stl file are being read as mm dims by the slicer software, which makes for tiny parts. I will generate a new .stl to see if that fixes the problem.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS
 
Any suggestions/tips for the other way around – an accessory for strain relief when you've got a tailwind where you're parked and it's catching the canopy like a sail? The way the winds blow at my airport, I almost always have a tailwind where my plane is parked.
 
Looks like the inch dims in the .stl file are being read as mm dims by the slicer software, which makes for tiny parts. I will generate a new .stl to see if that fixes the problem.

John Salak
RV-12 N896HS

This is pretty common as pretty much every slicer out there for 3D printers thinks everything is in mm's. Also to add to the conundrum, STL files are dimensionless so they are at the mercy of the importer which circles back to the issue of virtually no slicers (I didn't say there isn't a slicer that won't allow assignment of units before import, but I haven't run into one yet) providing support for imperial units- they tag everything as metric during parsing. One of these days when the weather stinks, I have it on my list to modify Cura to do such a thing.

The problem is easily corrected by scaling the X,Y,Z dimensions in your slicer by 2540% or make sure the file units are in mm before exporting the STL.

PS- I printed a couple of these from PETG, they work great- thanks for sharing!!
 
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