Trike and a stooge

[Bob Reeves]

I do quite a bit of flying off a stooge, hard to get any awake help at 6AM. As you can see in the Latency thread my new ship is a trike and I'm trying to figure a reliable way to use a stooge. In the past I've always just used the tail wheel but even though the Latency has provisions for a tail wheel the mount is 6 or 7 inches off the deck when it's configured for a trike.

Elwyn's stab stooge might work but the uprights are not quite tall enough and I really don't want to build something that elaborate for one airplane.. Wondering if anyone has came up with something simple that would work well with a trike.

[Randy Ryan]

Bob,

I haven't don it yet, but for my Sabre Stunt I intend to make a cable harness that connects to the main gear struts up near the wing  (to keep it from dragging in the grass) and goes back to a single loop that can be attached to my standard stooge. We used to use something like this on our F-106's when we tied them down to the "deadman" for engine trimming.

[Randy Powell]

Either Randy's idea or using a cable that attaches to your tailwheel mount and goes down to the stooge. You'll still get a bit of nose in the air when the engine is running, but as soon as you release, it would be fine. I did this before with a trike and it seemed to work OK.

[Bob Reeves]

Either Randy's idea or using a cable that attaches to your tailwheel mount and goes down to the stooge. You'll still get a bit of nose in the air when the engine is running, but as soon as you release, it would be fine. I didn't this before with a trike and it seemed to work OK.

Thought about that but heard if you don't keep the nose wheel of a trike on the ground the thing might be chasing you around the circle.. This has made me a bit cautious about anything that doesn't keep the nose wheel planted 

[Randy Ryan]

Tail wheel mount on a trike???

If the cables are hooked to the top of the main gear struts, the nose wheel will stay on the ground.

[Robertc]

I've had this problem before.  I stooged off the nose wheel on my Formula S before VSC in 2001 and ended up catching the
stooge line in my main gear.  I had 500 feet of line balled up at my feet.  I soon was being wrapped up in the stooge line and went inverted to unwrap myself.  I started pulling off the line from around my body, but raised my handle up as well which
brought the plane down into the ground.
The few times since, I've stooged off the nose wheel, but had thin cardboard over the line with the main gear on top of the cardboard.  The cardboard is held in place with nails.  This off grass obviously.

[James Mills]

Bob,

I'll try and post some pictures of the stooge I used with my Shark.   Plywood base, wood dowel uprights with pipe foam covering, run pin through eyelets.

James

[Elwyn Aud]

Would you be able to take the stab release stooge in the clubhouse and add another board to the bottom to make it tall enough to reach a high tailplane?

[Rudy Taube]

Hi Bob,

1. I "really" like James' idea. It seems like the perfect solution to your Trike stooge problem. 

2. I was going to suggest the method I use, please see photos, which would work well for your trike, and is very easy to use your present stooge with. But if you have the time to build a new stooge,  I like James idea better than mine for your trike! 

3. For the tail wheel stooge users, you may be interested in using the method I have been using. It works smoother than it looks, is easy to set up, it goes with any size plane, it is fool proof, it is very safe, and it does not need anything on the plane for the stooge. I have had more than 400 perfect, safe, launches with it.   

BTW I can not take any credit for this idea, I copied it from one of the guys at our flying field. The only mod I made is that instead of using wire cable inside fuel tubing, I started to use light nylon cord with a buntline hitch at one end and a bowline at the other. The cord works well on my ECL planes, you guys may want to stick with the leadout cable inside soft fuel tubing (to protect your finish) with your beryllium sphere powered planes. 

Regards, 

[Rudy Taube]

Stooge photos,

[Rudy Taube]

Sorry, seems I can only do one photo at a time. And I am not even Polish! 

I was just too lazy to make them smaller! ;-)

[Ralph Wenzel (d)]

Go for simplicity. Why not add a (very) small, closed loop at the tail and use a conventional stooge. That way, you also have some protection if you "flare" too much on landing. Might even help on a real low Inside pullout . . . 

[Perry Rose]

I use the same type stooge as Rudy except I use my field box as the anchor point. I launch a Pathfinder with no problems. As long as I stay in the circle when landing I miss the box.

[Bob Reeves]

Tail wheel mount on a trike???

If the cables are hooked to the top of the main gear struts, the nose wheel will stay on the ground.

Ya, I put a tail wheel mount in the rear of the fuselage just in case.. My first trike and wanted the option to go to a tail dragger should the nose gear make it nose heavy or I discover something about trikes I don't care for. The main gear mounts are pretty close to the CG and the struts are raked rearward. All I have to do to turn it into a tail dragger is reverse the mains, remove the nose gear and screw on a tail wheel.

Back to the stooge, Received an email from Zuriel offering to give me a stooge like the one posted by James Mills. Think I'll take him up on the offer as then (if needed) I can make it fit the airplane without modifying Elwyn's. Elwyn's works for everything we need as-is and can't see redesigning it for one silly airplane.

Thanks for the suggestions Gang, think we have an answer..