Legal Eagle XL in Pennsylvania

[Vince Carucci]

Most of mine look the same way. I'm not concerned. I figure there should be some indication long before a failure. The forces on the rudder/elevators are very small for steel. So I will look for rust during pre-flights, post-flights, annuals, chapter picnics, and late summer nights while howling at the moon.

[DA Miller]

As long as you got penetration in the sidewall of the big tube and the small tube I think you should be ok. Squirt a little glue or silicone in the void top and bottom.  That should take care of the H2O rust issue

[Pilotarix]

Long time no post here. The project came to a halt for a couple of days. There was just too much other stuff that required attention.

I restarted slowly with cleaning the shop and the machines, getting everything back in order. Then, I made a somewhat floppy wood frame out of a 2X4; that frame was the size of a wing 56" by 156". The only purpose of that thing was to check if I could carry a completed wing out of my basement. When we built the house, I got a second staircase installed that goes from the garage to the rear of the basement. That staircase has already been handy in many situations, and it allows me to get rather big and heavy items in the basement, aside from the fact that I don't need to carry every piece of wood through the house.
Anyhow, the wing will get out of the basement, which is good because it allows me to continue in the basement and not have to move the project into the garage.
Other than that, I cut many more hinge pieces from the stuff I welded and got closer to finalizing the ruder.

[DA Miller]

this is a test post.

[MikeWR]

Those welds look about normal when first getting started. Try to develop an understanding of what went wrong, then practice-practice-practice!

My wife bought me a Meco Midget for my birthday one year. It really increases your control. If you elect to use a standard torch, just make sure you have a nozzle small enough for thin wall steel tubes. [see the attachment for sizes]

The EAA has a BOOK and a DVD on gas welding of 4130 steel. The DVD is amazingly helpful.

I've been tacking and welding up my frame this Summer and I can see an improvement every day.

Good luck and hope to see it at AirVenture one year.

Vince

What pressure setting do you ue on your midget? I have been doing some gas welding but with a much larger torch (hence swapping to the midget) where a neutral flame was near silent, yet the MECO is roaring away... any ideas what I might be doing wrong?

[Vince Carucci]

The torch is merely the outlet device. The regulator pressures should be standard and typical for oxy-acetylene welding. If your new torch is roaring away, something isn't set/mixed right. Try turning down the gas flow through the torch.

[MikeWR]

May I ask what you consider to be 'standard'? I ask as the Smiths AW1A has different pressures to the Victor line... It was roaring with 3 psi, not sure how much lower it should go

[Dan_]

Search for "balancing the gases" on here...  You can paint the glass on the regulators black.

[Chuck in Indiana]

What Dan said, but the only torches I have ever used call for equal pressures at the regulator. I use 5 psi.
Now.
"Light the torch and adjust the acetylene flame... increasing the flow from a small flame until the flame just stops smoking... but is not roaring.
Gradually open the oxygen torch valve and adjust the flame... increasing oxygen flow so the resultant flame changes from long white, to a neutral flame = two flame cones just merge. If you add too much oxygen the flame will being to hiss-roar."

never weld with a hissing flame. That is oxidizing, and a very poor weld.
That said, I've never used a Meco, so regulator pressures may be different. (shrug)

[DA Miller]

mikwr; In what part of the world ae you located? I would suggest that you see if there is someone within easy driving distance and see if you can visit him with your torch and regulators. Many of your questions will be quickly answered.  If you are in VA I'd be glad to visit with you.

[Pilotarix]

Hi all, I was asked today if I would still work on the Legal Eagle. The short answer is currently, I don't. After the pandemic was finally over and normal life took over again, I had to deliver on a couple of older promises.  For them, I put the Legle Eagle project on hold, with the intention to restart as soon as time would allow. However, this obviously did not work out. Ultimately, I decided to go another route and go for a Kitplane from Zenith. Currently, I am finishing the left wing. The rudder and the elevator are already done. It's a great project, but something entirely different than building from scratch.
Anyhow, for now, the Legal Eagle is an ice but not forgotten. Maybe someday I will continue this project.
Thanks for all the support when I was still working on it
Christoph

[Pilotarix]

finally, here some pix of the new project

[Dan_]

What Dan said, but the only torches I have ever used call for equal pressures at the regulator. I use 5 psi.
Now.
"Light the torch and adjust the acetylene flame... increasing the flow from a small flame until the flame just stops smoking... but is not roaring.
Gradually open the oxygen torch valve and adjust the flame... increasing oxygen flow so the resultant flame changes from long white, to a neutral flame = two flame cones just merge. If you add too much oxygen the flame will being to hiss-roar."
never weld with a hissing flame. That is oxidizing, and a very poor weld.
That said, I've never used a Meco, so regulator pressures may be different. (shrug)

Trying not to put too fine a pernt on it but, the mainest idea of the balancing the gases procedure is that you are setting the regulators to what is called for at the tip, After your gases have made the trip through whatever length of hose you have attached, prevailing atmospheric conditions, whatever valve body (torch) restrictions exist ETC.

The mixture that reaches the tip is where the rubber meets the road so to speak. This routine simply sets the mixture at the tip with the torch valves fully open using the regulator pressure screws...

And...

Setting your regulators this way has the added benefits of:

• your rig will never hiss (oxidizing or burnt deposits) as long as you have set a neutral flame.
• your rig will never (hardly ever) pop at the lowest flame adjustment.
• you will always know when to go up or down in tip size.
• you are taking a giant leap to becoming and expert Oxy-Acetylene weldor, because you now know and are putting into practice something that 99.44 out of a hunnert don't do.
• it doesn't take any longer, and you walk over to your tubing joint with the rig set at minimum flame.

Sorry, I had to get all that off my chest.