150 Wings

[8093]

Crazy idea, but has anybody ever explored the idea of mounting the wings off an early 150 onto a 140? Im not talking about the 140A wings, I would like to have the 40 degree large fowler style flaps from the 150. I know the fuselages are (almost) identical, so it seems like it should (?) work. With the long range fuel tanks and a possible gross weight increase to 1500 or 1600 lbs, it could increase the utility of our little planes and effectively make them sort of like a mini 170B. Those wings coupled with a sportsman STOL kit and VG's plus an 0-200 upgrade could also make for an interesting STOL machine... Fun food for thought!

[8093]

UPDATE: did a little homework digging through parts manuals. The part numbers for the upper cabin skin, forward spar carry through forward spar bearing blocks all match between the early 150's and 140's. The part numbers are different for the rear spar carry through and rear spar bearing blocks, but look extremely similar. If the carry throughs are swapped and new bearing blocks installed, it looks like it could be doable. The only headache i can see is the installation of wires and pulleys to actuate the different style of flaps.

[VIP337]

Talk to David Lowe. He did that on a 140A. There wasn't enough control on the elevator and rudder.

Bill

[6183]

Personally I don't think that you can keep the aircraft legal under the type certificate for the 140 aircraft if you were to change to C-150 wings. You're suggesting a major change in the original configuration. Additionally as Bill mentioned I doubt the tail surfaces i.e. the elevator in particular has enough surface area to adequately raise the nose with the application of the fowler type flap configuration as found on the 150 type wings. If memory serves me I believe that Cessna tried to make a Cessna 140B/C, but didn't quite work out the details for stability and control with the 140 tail surfaces. That project was quickly shelved in the early 1950's when the C-170A/B was marketed as the hot item from Cessna. If you look at the tail surfaces on a 150 and compare them to those found on the 140, the 150 units are larger, and have more area. David Lowe once mentioned to me that his STC for a 150 tail wheel configuration will fly rings around any 140A in the maneuverability department due to larger elevator surfaces.