Netters; I've removed and reinstalled wings on several airplanes several times over the years and my observation is that it's probably not something you would want to do if you could avoid it, but when you need to do it, it sure is better if it's designed to be done in the first place and it's even easier when it's designed to be done by one person working alone.
One of my hangar neighbors owns and flies a beautiful Grob motorglider and he flies it a LOT. Very patient man because he handles the wing folding by himself every time he flies it. He uses a sort of rolling gantry crane in the process to lift and fold the outer wing panels to shorten the span and my assumption is that unless you run out of fuel, you shouldn't ever need to land a motorglider 'out' and trailer it back in with the wings folded or removed, he only needs to fold the wings because his hangar won't accommodate the plane with the outer wing panels extended. My point is that even with hundreds and hundreds of times of doing it, and the plane being designed for it, and having rigging that's designed to smooth the process, he spends a pretty good bit of time just preparing the plane for flight and then folding the wings back up to put it away. So while it seems like a peachy-keen idea to incorporate folding wings to make storage easier, my guess is that it would soon grow old and would turn into something that would make you put off flying the plane as much as if you didn't have to mess with the wings. Of more value, in my opinion, is devising a quick but safe way to detach the outer wing panels on a KR without cutting the wing skins or dealing with wing attach nuts and bolts that are difficult to access with regular wrenches and tools. This would speed up wing handling when transporting the plane without going to the trouble of devising a wing fold mechanism that may add more trouble and complexity than it adds convenience. Just as a side note, the M-19 Flying Squirrel that I'm building was designed to have wings that pivot and then fold back against the tail, and the horizontal tail surfaces are designed with hinges to allow them to fold up flat against the vertical stabilizer to enable the wings to tuck in back there. As John Bouyea can attest since he's attempted to do that with the prototype M-19, it looks good on paper but takes a while to dismantle everything in order to let that happen. It's definitely not something you want to do every time you fly! Oscar Zuniga Medford, OR Air Camper NX41CC, A75 power, flying M-19 N7238B, 1835 VW power, under construction
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