Thorp Air Command - T18.net

I went with the Curtis valve for my bowl . About $12.00 from Spruce . No particular reason for the Curtis . Any of the push to open valves should work just fine .

RB

John,
The cable to the Cessna gascolator is attached at the top, a couple of old photos of my setup



The cable is attached to the shaft behind the blue square plug and the fuel drains from the bottom of the bowl. I have a piece of tubing running from the drain through the bottom of my cowl and its not hard to catch a fuel sample when I drain the sump.

Battery box, mine is behind the pass seat below the floor of the baggage compartment. My master and starter solenoids are mounted on the aft side of the box. NOTE: the master in the photo was replaced long ago I just don't have a newer photo


enjoy

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Bruce Finney
N18JF T-18C #262
Yelm, WA USA

Guys,

I recently changed my gascolator to one made by "Steves Aircraft". It is STC'd for pretty much every aircraft out there. It is a nice CNC billet machined item that has eliminated the traditional Piper bail system to hold the bowl on. It is a 1/8 turn system that is O ringed to prevent leakage. It is a product that is worthy of being on a T18. The web page is: http://www.stevesaircraft.com


Regards,

Jim Mantyla

Just to be sure you know what I mean, the gascolator shown in your original post (pg. 2) already has the push type plunger. You can see the spring in it and the small crossbar 'tangs'. Push it up to drain fuel, and twist into the notch if you want it to drain the whole tank, hands-free. An aluminum tube with notched end does it, but it's not permanent. Keep it in your toolkit.

Les Krumel

Yes, that's it.



That is not typical of 70's homebuilts. All aircraft should have a "master solenoid" relay. Are you saying that main power from the battery is being controlled directly by a switch? The starter solenoid should be downstream of the master. As far as where to mount everything, would the starter solenoid be easier to access for service, etc. if mounted on the outside of the box? There are other reasons that it should probably be outside, in my opinion. For whatever it's worth, my master solenoid is mounted on the outside of my battery box (behind the baggage compartment). I ran a heavy wire (#4 AWG) from there forward to the engine side of the firewall, where it connects to the starter solenoid which is mounted there. A smaller (#10) wire connects at that same point and goes back through the firewall to my main power buss for the instrument panel. The starter solenoid mounted in that location provides a good connection point (the "in" terminal) for the "B" lead from the alternator also. That particular arrangement was chosen also because it resulted in the shortest wire run for the main buss supply - the heavy #4 wire had to come all the way forward anyway. These choices were to try to accomplish maximum efficiency with the least weight. I believe that many T-18s use the same set-up as I did.

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John Evens
Arvada, Colorado
T-18 N71JE (sold)
Kitfox 7 SS N27JE

I agree with John . Here is my set up I mounted on the firewall . I used solid copper bar material from the + battery terminal to the "Master" solenoid and then another short copper bar from the MS to the "Starter" solenoid . This avoided using short lengths of wire with attached terminal lugs . With the battery on the firewall it also meant a very short wire run from the SS to the starter . I also ran a ground wire from the - battery terminal to the engine block . 200 + hours and no problems to date .

RB

Your aircraft was one of many T-18s that came out of EAA Chapter 101 from Addison, IL. It is a sister ship that was built at the same time as Bob Griffith's which sported the identical paint scheme although Bob Griffith"s had an 0-320, 160 HP. Both of these gentlemen have passed on. Bob K. also built a second one that was destroyed in a hangar fire at old Mitchell Field in Addison. The last time I saw your plane was when it sold up at Oshkosh for $10,000 to on of our members who took it home and was going to rework it. I believe he was an airline pilot and I believe his son was also in our group but I can't think of his name now even though I can picture him well. Regardless, there a lot of history to it. Good luck.

Hi guys, sorry for the lateness of my reply. Thank you for all the great photos, too - they really help to explain things. I've seen the Steve's Aircraft gascolators that Jim mentioned and agree that they seem to be the best engineered and TOUGH. Thanks for the link!

jrevens - Hi John, sorry I wasn't clear. I was saying that the #4 gauge cable from the battery goes directly through the passenger cabin and under the fuel tank to the starter solenoid. Further, since there is no switch for it, that cable is hot all the time regardless of the position of the master switch. Not a good design to have in an accident so I want to isolate the battery which is in my baggage compartment. At the starter solenoid, I have a similar #10 wire going back through the firewall to, in my case, the master switch and then the main power bus. I understand your description of your setup now and I'll copy it for mine when I put the master solenoid in.

Bruce - Your picture convinced me to go to the outside of the box. It makes the most sense, doesn't it?

Rich - Wow. What is the device mounted on the outside of your battery box in the upper left hand corner (as shown in the picture with the wires hooked up)? An electrical filter of some sort?

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John Twigg N12055 SN.79 Pittsburgh, PA (KFWQ)

rjaeger - thanks for the history and insight into this aircraft! I heard that these two planes (and possibly a third) were built in a "warehouse" in downtown Chicago. Sorry to hear that both Bob's have passed away. It would have been nice to meet them. I believe Bob Griffith was listed as a "co-builder." Their workmanship seems to be a testament to them.

You have a good memory it seems. Yes, Ed Burke was the fellow who bought the aircraft - but I wasn't aware that he bought it at Oshkosh. Excellent! It's my understanding that Ed learned to fly in a J-3 cub on floats near Philadelphia and went on to fly for the predecessor to USAir and then went on to fly jumbo jets - I think a Lockheed L-1011. I'm told that Ed was well respected in aviation circles and I understand he was recruited by the FAA as part of a team to help set up the national airspace system back in the '50s after the big commercial air crash at the Grand Canyon in '56. Ed sold the plane to his son, Doug, who kindly sold it to me years later. Doug flew the plane to Oshkosh at least once and said it's an honest plane but don't use 40 degrees of flaps unless you're feeling adventuresome, haha. Ed passed a few years ago. Doug is doing well and I hope I can give his plane a good home and get it back to Oshkosh in '17.

Here's a picture of it (and some other members' aircraft) from our Chapter 45 Corn Roast back on Aug 23rd. Use the Previous and Next buttons to navigate to the other members' planes.
http://www.45.eaachapter.org/apps/photo ... =199877343

Are you from Chapter 101?

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John Twigg N12055 SN.79 Pittsburgh, PA (KFWQ)

John: DC shunt for the amp meter .

RB

Glad the Rostraver gang is still going strong. My wife and I broke down there many years ago in our Thorp and the chapter guys got us going again. It involved fabricating anew rudder cable. Super bunch.

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Bob Highley
N711SH
SN 835
KLAL

Hi Everyone, sorry it's been a while since I've posted. The fuel system is rebuilt and there is gas in the tank. The magnetos are out at a shop and I'll post more on them later. N12055's past owner, Doug, found the gascolator valve that was originally on the plane and gave it to me a couple months back. It's pretty slick and the valve has an arm that connects to the white push-pull cable inside the engine compartment (like a Cessna).

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John Twigg N12055 SN.79 Pittsburgh, PA (KFWQ)

Hi all - it was great to meet many of you at Oshkosh! The discussions were very helpful to me and I've made some progress since I got back home. The gascolator with the valve and cable are installed and I have purchased the battery solenoid and will mount it on the battery box.

The BIG NEWS is that we started the engine last week after it had sat for approximately 13 years! Many of the guys from EAA Chapter 45 came over to my house and we timed the mags and rolled N12055 outside. She didn't want to start at first, so we put some fuel into 3 cylinders thru the upper spark plug hole and the O-290G converted to a D or D2 (still unsure) enthusiastically roared to life. The engine sounds incredibly good to everyone. We had bore-scoped the cylinders and even after all that time, the walls were very clean before we tried starting her.

It took so long to get the mags timed that by the time we rolled her outside it was dark. If you see the fence in the picture, there is a 40-foot cliff on the other side of it. If the strap on the tailwheel would have failed I would have had a thrilling ride down into my neighbor's pool. I'm told you could hear the engine all over the neighborhood that night. We had a victory steak dinner for about 11 buddies and then we fired her up one more time after that around 10:00pm. I haven't heard any complaints yet, but the all the people's dogs went nuts, haha.

Looking forward to seeing many of you again at Kentucky Dam! My wife and I are driving out and I'm hoping to get a ride in a T-18 to see what its like .

John

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John Twigg N12055 SN.79 Pittsburgh, PA (KFWQ)

Congrats! That's a big deal!!
Cubes

Cubes - Sorry I missed meeting you at Oshkosh. I need some engine mounts if you have them. I have the 0-290 G case with the flat back and have the horseshoe engine mount adapter. The rubber is old and hard and the mounts are sagging. See pics.
- Do you sell the rubber mounts?
- Are there other, hidden components inside the mount like washers, tubes, etc?
- Should I change the original bolts that are 42-years old, and do you source them?
- Should I also change the original (42 yrs) AN bolts that go through tubes into the horseshoe, and do you source them?
John

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John Twigg N12055 SN.79 Pittsburgh, PA (KFWQ)