Reverse Jack To Pull Tail Down

Sinistar

Sinistar

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Brad
This is for a Cessna 182.

About 4 times a year I find myself pushing the tail down to either install/remove the front wheel pant or top off the nose strut. Our mechanic sets 4 cases of oil on the tail. I set 3x60lb sandbags on the tail. I think it needs about 160lbs. But I am not fan on placing stuff on the elevator. I bought a yoga mat from Target and always place the sand bags on that first so they won't slide off or make any scrapes. But I still don't like hefting that much weight on the elevator (always up close by the elevator).

So I've been thinking.

It seems like what would work great would be a floor jack. Then fix 180lbs on it. Add a small chain. Pump it up, hook up the chain and then slowly release the jack back down thereby pulling the tail down. I think I can find some old tractor weights to keep the profile down.

In our hangar there is dirt under the tail area so using a pulley to a winch on the wall would not work (tried it - just too soft).

I'm not worried about 180lbs (downward) on the tail hook as it probably takes a lot more than that if tied down and wind gets under the tail. But maybe that is pushing it?

Curious what others use to tip the tail down to get the nose wheel off the ground so they work on things up front?
 
It is better to jack the nose up. simple auto jack.
 
I use my engine shop crane to lift the nose via the engine mount vs using something to pull the tail down.
 
Sinistar said:
Curious what others use to tip the tail down to get the nose wheel off the ground so they work on things up front?
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Per Cessna applying weight to the tail is good to go. See para 5-39(a) from a 182 MM. Have been using oil cases/sand bags for years. An alternate is to have a tiedown ring installed in hangar floor and push tail down and secure to ring. Keep it simple.

upload_2020-3-8_20-27-1.png
 
Simple block and tackle. Just need a way to anchor it to the floor (or something heavy to anchor to.)
 
Earth anchor. Rope to the tail skid. Winch knot. Some call it a truck driver knot. Pull the tail down. Easy peasy.
 
To all that recommend pulling it down via some type of anchor, I mentioned the dirt/almost mud-like floor is just too soft. I wish it wasnt but it gets really mushy in the spring when the frost goes out.

@weirdjim - I like your idea but crawling under and trying to lift 2 4gal buckets of cement seems like more work than slinging 3 sand bags up on the tail....unless you meant to use them as anchors.

You guys rock. Duh. If I place the 3 bags of sand on the floor and wrap a heavy line around it I could then use something like a 3 or 4 wheel pulley / block and tackle. It still means crawling down there. But no slinging stuff up on the horizontal stabilizer. There's a JD dealer nearby. If I could score a couple 90lb tractor weights it would be even better. Then just set it all on a fairly big piece of treated plywood sk it doesnt vanish in the spring LOL!
 
Tom-D said:
the proper lift procedure is in the revised 182 MM
Chapter 7-00-00

https://www.redskyventures.org/doc/cessna-maintenance-manuals/Cessna_182S_1997on_MM_182SMM.pdf
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lifting the entire plane (Chapter 7) seems like overkill to work on the nose gear. Ironically chapter 32 (specific to nose gear) just says to weigh down the tail or pull it down by the tail tie down ring. My manual from 1972 is pretty much the same. They must have changed to full plane hacking procedure over the years.
 
Sinistar said:
@weirdjim - I like your idea but crawling under and trying to lift 2 4gal buckets of cement seems like more work than slinging 3 sand bags up on the tail....unless you meant to use them as anchors.!
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Nope. Plywood for the mud and any sort of jack under the buckets to lift them onto a chain with s-hooks one at a time works well. That's how I've done it on the 182A Heavy (it is always loaded over gross) for 30 years. Every year.

Jim
 
Sinistar said:
lifting the entire plane (Chapter 7) seems like overkill to work on the nose gear. Ironically chapter 32 (specific to nose gear) just says to weigh down the tail or pull it down by the tail tie down ring. My manual from 1972 is pretty much the same. They must have changed to full plane hacking procedure over the years.
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Cessna no longer advises pulling the down.

so much for following the book. :)
 
James331 said:
Just put some evenly disturbed weight on the horizontal stab, you know it generates down force for its day job ;)
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my potential issue with that would be keeping the weight properly distributed....just no good practical way I can imagine to do that.

just a strong mechanical aptitude and intuition....no A&P here and no familiarity with the specifics of the internal structure in 182 horizontal stabs.
 
weirdjim said:
Nope. Plywood for the mud and any sort of jack under the buckets to lift them onto a chain with s-hooks one at a time works well. That's how I've done it on the 182A Heavy (it is always loaded over gross) for 30 years. Every year.

Jim
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Cool Jim. My original thought was 2 x 90lb tractor suitcase weights on the Jack and jack on the plywood then lift it up, hook it and slowly release the jack. Your way makes sense now...thanks for explaining!
 
timwinters said:
For those who puts weights on their horizontal stabilizer:

https://www.tennesseeaircraft.net/2016/11/13/cessna-approved-bad-training/

Paul New et. al. likely know far more on this topic than any SGOTI here. At least I'd put far more faith in his opinion than I would any here...until Jon Efinger starts coming here anyway.

point being...why take the chance?
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Thanks for sharing. My main reason to start pulling it down from the tail takedown is I figured one day I'd screw up and one of those 60lb sand tubes would wreck something. At least the sand tubes distribute the weight over a 2ftx6" area but still that's a lot of mass on the aluminum.
 
James331 said:
Just put some evenly disturbed weight on the horizontal stab, you know it generates down force for its day job ;)
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Sure it does. In flight, the CG is much closer to the CL than the main tires are, so the stabilizer's load is smaller than on the ground. And the CP on the stab/elevator is 40% back, right close to the aft stab spar, which is massive compared to that front spar. These are the reasons Cessna forbids pushing a 172's stab down to lift the nose. It cracks that forward spar.

I've used shot bags on the stab, but right over that aft stab spar and right against the tailcone.

I once built a big weight consisting of two cylinder heads off old single-cylinder John Deere tractors. Each weighed at least 150 pounds. Set them in a frame made of 2" steel angle, with strong small casters under the frame. A boat trailer winch was bolted to the frame between the heads, and the heads were separated by about 8" so the tail could go down between them a bit. The winch made it all easy.

Another fellow told me of a neat idea he saw in another shop. A taller jack, like a wing jack on a tripod, that had a padded double fork on the ram that fit under the propeller blade roots just outboard of the spinner. Lifted the nosewheel clear of the floor. That far forward, the load was reasonable.
 
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Tom-D said:
Cessna no longer advises pulling the down.

so much for following the book. :)
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Probably someone had the tiedown ring fail and bang the prop on the floor or something and sued Cessna. Tail tiedown rings get slammed against the runway sometimes and they bend and crack. Can't trust something like that.
 
I inherited a tail tie down weight when I bought my hangar, it consists of the bottom of a 55 gallon drum full of concrete, sitting on a frame with 4 castor wheels, and an eye bolt set into the concrete on the top. Wheel it under the tail tie down, pull tail down with a strap or rope, done. It works so well that I'd build one if I lost this one somehow.

Patrick
 
A few thoughts-

1) jacks fall under gravity, unless you’re talking about a screw type. There’s no “pull” from the hydraulics when you release a floor jack (maybe I misunderstood your intent).

2) I didn’t particularly like putting the weight on the horizontal stabilizer either, but I’ve done it and seen it done enough that I’m not concerned anymore.

3) if you ever crack the bulkhead that the tie-down ring attaches to, your better be sitting down when your A&P hands you the quote for the parts and labor...you wouldn’t believe what a small aluminum bulkhead can cost in parts and labor...
 
We had a little weighted cart with a pulley and rope on it, to pull the tail down for our Skyhawk. It seems that the hangar was so old it was made for tail-draggers, and to get through the door single-handedly was a real chore. But weight down the tail (pulling on the tie-down eye) and it was not a problem. Once inside, there was plenty of room. I don't miss the south line at KLUK.
 
Mines is not to reason why but I do know that the skin is thinner in the later aircraft.
 
when I am required to support the nose wheel area for extended times, I have a 2X4X24" that I used under the fuselage forward to support the firewall.
 
psween said:
I inherited a tail tie down weight when I bought my hangar, it consists of the bottom of a 55 gallon drum full of concrete, sitting on a frame with 4 castor wheels, and an eye bolt set into the concrete on the top. Wheel it under the tail tie down, pull tail down with a strap or rope, done. It works so well that I'd build one if I lost this one somehow.

Patrick
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In another shop we had that, too, but it was too tall for some airplanes like the 182 and 210, whose tails are lower to start with. There was a bar that attached underneath the drum, with a winch on on end and a strap that ran thru the bar from the winch to a small roller on the business end. Could pull a tail to within maybe three inches of the floor.
 
Omalley1537 said:
If you ever crack the bulkhead that the tie-down ring attaches to, your better be sitting down when your A&P hands you the quote for the parts and labor...you wouldn’t believe what a small aluminum bulkhead can cost in parts and labor...
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If it cracked when you pulled on it, it was likely already cracking from tailstrikes. Those things can hold the tail of the airplane in some pretty strong winds. I never had any trouble over the years I pulled tails down using that tiedown ring. But then, I replaced bent rings and checked for cracks in the bulkhead after any tailstrike. Happened often enough in the flight school. Once in a while the anchor nut inside the bulkhead (for the tiedown ring) would get knocked loose and need replacing.

Bigger problem with tailstrikes was cracking rudder hinges on the 150s and 172s. That big lead mass balance weight up top of the rudder wants to keep going down when the tail hits the pavement, and it bends the hinge brackets a bit. A few of those incidents and they're cracked.
 
Tom-D said:
when I am required to support the nose wheel area for extended times, I have a 2X4X24" that I used under the fuselage forward to support the firewall.
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I had a sturdy short sawhorse for that. Removes the worry.
 
has anyone ever sat in the back of a 182 or 172 and turned around while their friend was in the front and performing power on stalls..? That horizontal stabilizer moves and a wiggles a lot! There's an md11 flight test video somewhere out there with them stalling it and the horizontal stab is going nuts
 
2 Sand bags per side placed over the spar on the horizontal stabilizer. Remember the aft tie-down is attached to the lip of the bulkhead. Pulling the plane down by the aft tie-down puts a lot of stress on a single point. Has anyone priced aft bulkhead replacements lately?

There is a recurring AD to dye penetrate every 1000 hours for the fin/rudder attachment bolts. It would make me nervous pulling the plane down by a single bolt hole.

But that's just me.
 
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flyingbrit said:
Single cylinder? I thought they were mostly two cylinder until 1960 or so when they went to 4/6. What model was the single?
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Dunno. These heads were for one cylinder each. Did the two-cylinder tractors have separate cylinder heads?

Or maybe they were from big single-cylinder hit-and-miss engines used in elevators and such. Big, they were.
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
Prolly want to remove the tie down ring to be sure no one accidentally uses it to tie the airplane down outside.
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The stress loads are far less for tie down than pulling the tail down suspending the engine & prop in the air.

The aft tie-down eye bolt is only mounted to the lip of the aft bulkhead, & aft tail cone stringer. The bulkhead is already a watch area for cracking under normal stresses.

Aft Tiedown Mount.jpg

Completely understand everyone's minimums are different in this regard.
 
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Kenny Phillips said:
We had a little weighted cart with a pulley and rope on it, to pull the tail down for our Skyhawk. It seems that the hangar was so old it was made for tail-draggers, and to get through the door single-handedly was a real chore. But weight down the tail (pulling on the tie-down eye) and it was not a problem. Once inside, there was plenty of room. I don't miss the south line at KLUK.
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I use something similar. $10 HF furniture dolly, plywood on top, then four concrete blocks on top of that. Eyebolt centered in the plywood, and ratchet strap to pull the tail down. Low profile, and rolls out of the way easily.
 
NordicDave said:
The stress loads are far less for tie down than pulling the tail down suspending the engine & prop in the air.

The aft tie-down eye bolt is only mounted to the lip of the aft bulkhead, & aft tail cone stringer. The bulkhead is already a watch area for cracking under normal stresses.

View attachment 83488

Completely understand everyone's minimums are different in this regard.
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That bulkhead takes almost all the elevator/stabilizer loads, as the stab's aft spar attaches to it. The fin does, too, so it also takes the rudder loads. If it can't take the normal category 3.8G loading in a hard pull-up, there's something wrong. It's stronger than the stabilizer itself. I have never heard of any cracking around that tiedown ring unless someone really hammered the ring on the pavement and bent it and drove it up into the bulkhead. The ring itself has a 5/16" shank, which has a tensile strength of around 9500 pounds. We're talking about 200 pounds or so to raise the nose of a 182.

The cracking of those bulkheads happens around the top, right close to where the #1 is pointing, on each side.
 
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