Jim Faughn's plane has a fiberglass tailwheel rod for a spring. These were popular back in the early days. They were about 3/4" diameter and made of unidirectional fiberglass rod from the little flag poles that they use on a golf course to show you where the hole is (I'm sure there's a name for that). At least that's what somebody told me, anyway.
One year at a Gathering his tail spring broke while taxiing. I had about a half a square foot of 6 ounce carbon fiber fabric that we wrapped it with to "splint" it back together as a temporary fix to get him back home. I think we got about three layers in and used Aeropoxy to wet it out. The next day he flew it and it worked just fine. In fact, he hadn't touched it years later, and I'll bet it's still on the plane now that Steve Bennett flies it. There's a photo of it at http://home.hiwaay.net/~langford/barkley99/99092693.jpg , and a photo of Marty Roberts' similar spring setup at http://home.hiwaay.net/~langford/98092022.jpg , although Marty's looks tapered. Maybe he rolled some glass around the upper end to beef it up...not sure about that. There are a lot of variables in tailwheel springs, such as the amount of weight on the tail, so each plane is probably going to need something a little different. My spring is undersized, and needs to be replaced (Larry fixed me up with just what I need, but I've yet to swap it out, like a lot of other things), but it still works. Build it, try it, and then tweak it some more if it needs it. Speaking of Jim, check out his incredible cruise pictures from his latest sailing adventure at http://members.socket.net/~jfaughn/logs_other/2007/feb/feb1log.htm . He has some incredible pictures of the area around the Keys... Mark Langford, Huntsville, Alabama see KR2S project N56ML at http://home.hiwaay.net/~langford email to N56ML "at" hiwaay.net
