On my amphibian, when empty, each front wheel carries approximately 182 pounds. I’ve found that a healthy heave-ho on one of the wing struts will rock the plane sufficiently to give an accurate reading on the scales (after the rocking stops, of course). Be cautious that you don’t get an inaccurate reading on the scale due to stresses on the rigging caused by putting the scales under the front wheels. The scales provide a more precise measure of what your eyes are attempting to see when checking for parallel and level. The last test is to put scales under each of the front tires to confirm that the weight carried by each is nearly identical. After confirming that the spreader bars are parallel and then adjusting the fly wires to level the wings, reconfirm that the spreader bars remain parallel to one another. This will also cause your fuselage to not be aligned longitudinally with the floats. If the two are not parallel, you will notice that the nose of one float will be higher than the nose of the other. Prior to doing this check, it is very helpful to squat several feet in front of the plane and sight along the top of the front spreader bar, confirming that it is exactly parallel to the rear spreader bar. After bolting the struts to the attach points on both the floats and the aircraft, and periodically thereafter, I confirm that the wings are level, (assuming the floats are on level ground from side-to-side). Squaring up the rigging is not difficult, but I did find it difficult to find information about the techniques used to do so. Turning a fly wire just one half turn has a dramatic effect on the relationship of wing level to float level. The flying wires are amazingly effective! Mine are stainless steel in the shape of an airfoil, so they need to be kept on knife edge relative to the travel of the aircraft. Clamar does not generally recommend the use of boxing wires, but all floats use flying wires whether equipped with boxing wires or not. On some aircraft, boxing wires are also used and they reside in the geometric plane made by the top of the floats, crossing diagonally and attaching near the strut attach points on top of the floats from left rear to right front and from right rear to left front. There are two sets, one fore and one aft.

Notice the fuel line zip-tied to the centers to protect from one hitting the other.įlying (or fly) wires are essentially turnbuckles which cross from the top of the float on one side of the aircraft to the bottom of the fuselage on the other side.

Special issues associated with Clamar brakesįront fly wires as seen from behind.

Protection of rod end bearings and cables.

How do you know when your rigging is “square?”.

Edo floats maintenance manual