Matthew Keller has a landing light on his Super Cub that is mounted on the cabane "v" of his landing gear. I have not been able to find any pictures of how it is mounted or the type of light that it is.







Does anyone know what kit this is or how the mount works for the light? Looks like a good location (with a light being an afterthought) with minimal wire to run. I am mostly interested in how its mounted rather than the light itself.

Mine is mounted with Adel clamps... no issues in 400 hrs.

akavidflyer wrote:Mine is mounted with Adel clamps... no issues in 400 hrs.

Would you mind posting a pic? Are the Adel clamps directly mounted to the light? Or is the light on a bracket, and then the bracket bolted to the adels?

Maybe like this?

I am 700 miles away from the plane right now, so it will be a couple weeks before I can get a pic. Zane posted up a mount that would do the trick!

The gear safety cable mod provides a plate that attaches to the center of the cabanas. Remove that plate, and make a new one which has a fitting TIO attach a light.

Find a light housing (look in the off road vehicle market) and install an appropriate bulb in it.

Now, making it legal on a certified aircraft......good luck.....it'll have to be a field approval.

Or don't ask don't tell.

MTV

If this is for your Savage Cub, I think it's S-LSA in the US? I'm not sure that you're limited to Part 23 type certificate for mods, someone will have to weigh in on that. For E-LSA you can mod to your heart's desire, and if it was me I'd get a quick and dirty cabane-v mount on there for the short term if you're eager to land Ohio cornfields in the dark. But for a cooler long term solution, look into modding your wingtips to get some AeroLED's in the leading edges. That's what I'm planning to do for my Bearhawk to avoid hogging out the leading edge skin.

Zzz wrote:Maybe like this?

Yes. I like that.


This is a new model Savage but they offer something similar.

Before I bought the Savage, I naturally started looking into the whole S-LSA-modification thing a little deeper. I speaking with the Savage dealer here in the states, they said all that I needed to do was basically have my mechanic fill out a form (Here: http://cub.aero/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Zlin-Form-ASTM-F2384-337-Rev-10-.pdf) and describe the alteration. Then you send it in to the dealer and they approve the mod...or not, and then they send it back to you to add to your maintenance log books.

Now, for instance: I want to upgrade the stock 8.00 tires and put a set of 26" Goodyears on it. What do I have to do? Well, because they are a part that is approved under the MEL (Master Equipment List) all I have to do is put them on and make a note of it in the log books. (the Savage comes from the factory with 26" Goodyears as a standard option).

This is the verbiage from the form on Modifications and Alterations:

This form used to assure continued airworthiness and conformance to standards by recording major
repairs and/or alterations made to a light sport (SLSA or ELSA) aircraft, airframe, powerplant, propeller,
avionics, appliance, or a component part. A major repair or alteration consists of any item not included in
either the Aircraft Maintenance Manual (AMM) or the latest approved Master Equipment List (MEL).

So, my plan is to fab something up that is similar to the factory option and then fill out the form and send it in for approval.

Here is the light that I chose
Whelen PAR-46 LED Steady Burn Spotlight


https://911custom.com/PAR-46-Super-LED-Steady-Burn-Floodlights,-Spotlights-and-Combination-Spot-Light-and-Warning-Light

I have yet to find any LED's that can keep up with HID's when it comes to lighting up the LZ. I currently have 2 lights (one in each wing) that are super bright 45W with CREE LED's and to say the least it isn't enough. I'm getting stuff together now to switch to 75W HID's instead. Maybe the high end LED's from some of the mfg's out there will provide ya enough light, but I can't bring myself to pay those kinds of prices when HID's will do it better for cheaper. Either way I'd recommend seeing someone else's in person and at night (or more preferably flying the plane) to see if it's what you're looking for.

Sorry to get off topic, just don't want to see you go through all the work to get a light on there only to not be happy with it

Zzz wrote:For E-LSA you can mod to your heart's desire,

sorry it just bug's me,

to my knowledge you can not change any thing from the kit of a E-LSA, it would need
to be certified as E/AB to change any thing.

does anybody know...
how's the reflection off the back of the prop ?

dstr59 wrote:does anybody know...
how's the reflection off the back of the prop ?

Couldn't be any worse then a Cessna with cowl mounted lights...

ExperimentalAviator wrote:

Zzz wrote:For E-LSA you can mod to your heart's desire,

sorry it just bug's me,

to my knowledge you can not change any thing from the kit of a E-LSA, it would need
to be certified as E/AB to change any thing.

I believe that is accurate. E-LSA is NOT the same as E-AB. Except you can do your own condition inspection.

MTV

Timberwolf wrote:I have yet to find any LED's that can keep up with HID's when it comes to lighting up the LZ. I currently have 2 lights (one in each wing) that are super bright 45W with CREE LED's and to say the least it isn't enough. I'm getting stuff together now to switch to 75W HID's instead. Maybe the high end LED's from some of the mfg's out there will provide ya enough light, but I can't bring myself to pay those kinds of prices when HID's will do it better for cheaper. Either way I'd recommend seeing someone else's in person and at night (or more preferably flying the plane) to see if it's what you're looking for.

Sorry to get off topic, just don't want to see you go through all the work to get a light on there only to not be happy with it

Since I haven't compared LED lights to HIDs, I can't comment on the LEDs, and I'd guess some are better than others. But my HIDs are superb compared to standard incandescents. Aiming is critical, especially for the landing light, which is focused pretty tightly--the taxi light is less critical, since by design it's a wider dispersed light. It took half a dozen landings for me to be satisfied with the landing light's aim, which was a pain in the neck, to remove and reinstall 20 screws each time to remove the light cover on the leading edge. But I haven't wanted to re-aim it since then, and that's been 10 years now.

The only question I'd have about the proposed location on the Super Cub would be the vibration it would be subjected to on rougher ground. Even cowl mounted lights, ala Cessna's newer singles, tend to get damaged by vibration as opposed to the wing-mounted lights.

Cary

Cary

Zzz wrote:Maybe like this?

when I saw that, I was all ya ya ya ya ya, slober slober slober.
took my similar appearing light housing to the hangar, to mount a similar bracket previously installed.
AAKKK !!!! no go !
you guys must all have extended gears and cabanes.
crapazoid

Cabane doesn't change man. You got wrong light or something. Safety cable bracket inverted-get rubber housing that'll fit whelen (Approved) bulb. Sooooper simple.
I'll try to remember to take pic of mine. Fan of rubber housing but whatever floats your boat.

E-LSA aircraft fall under FAR 91.319 the very same as EAB aircraft, you can modify any E-LSA aircraft to your heart's content. For major changes you have to go back into Phase 1 flight testing.

Don't know if LED or HID is brighter or better, but I was researching wig-wag lighting earlier today and found that AeroLED makes both landing & taxi LED lights with a built-in pulse feature. You just have to connect a jumper to one of the terminals, you can even run that jumper through a switch so you can select/deselect the pulse feature. Unfortunately the lights are about $450 each.

hotrod180 wrote:Don't know if LED or HID is brighter or better, but I was researching wig-wag lighting earlier today and found that AeroLED makes both landing & taxi LED lights with a built-in pulse feature. You just have to connect a jumper to one of the terminals, you can even run that jumper through a switch so you can select/deselect the pulse feature. Unfortunately the lights are about $450 each.

I got them in my cub, going to wire one up for the pulse during the rebuild. I love them, I do some night flying(and it's pretty damn dark down here, no light pollution) and they are fantastic. I can land on our un lit grass runway with no problems. It does help knowing what's out there and where. They light it up great. My generator likes the low draw too.

Timberwolf wrote:I have yet to find any LED's that can keep up with HID's when it comes to lighting up the LZ. I currently have 2 lights (one in each wing) that are super bright 45W with CREE LED's and to say the least it isn't enough. I'm getting stuff together now to switch to 75W HID's instead. Maybe the high end LED's from some of the mfg's out there will provide ya enough light, but I can't bring myself to pay those kinds of prices when HID's will do it better for cheaper. Either way I'd recommend seeing someone else's in person and at night (or more preferably flying the plane) to see if it's what you're looking for.

Sorry to get off topic, just don't want to see you go through all the work to get a light on there only to not be happy with it

That may have been true a few years ago, but LED's have surpassed HIDs in light output and, though HIDs may be initially cheaper, the LEDs can outlast them as much as ten to one, so the LEDs are actually cheaper if you consider that.

I ran these tests about 3 years ago, and while I'd say the HIDs had equal output, the light distribution was not as even as with the LEDs.



This is showing beam spread with AeroLed 36LX taxi light



100watt Q4509 on left, 55 watt HID on right



100 watt Q4509 halogen on left, 48 watt AeroLed 36LX landing light on the right.

My Husky has an AeroLed taxi and landing light on each wing, they all come on in wig-wag and all on steady for landing. Way more light than either halogen on the 55 watt HIDs. Note that the HIDs in my testing did not have an optimal reflector, however that did not effect total light output but it did make the HID beam more uneven that it would have been otherwise.

bumper