The Murphy Builders Site

I have been researchingI kit aircraft to build and recently posted a
question regarding your opinions about the Rebel, Rebel Elite, ARV
Griffon, and the Flight Caddy.

I believe I have reached a decision to purchase the Rebel.

My next question is which optional equipment, if any, should I consider?
Murphy currently offers:
extended fuel tanks
wheel pants
float attach points
split flap & aileron conversion
dual brakes
curved instrument panel
headliner
spring gear
slave tube fairing
pitot static kit
high profile tires

I think I would eventually like to go with floats, so the attach points
make sense to me.

I also think I would like the curved instrument panel, as well as the
spring gear.

Are these worthwhile options to purchase? What else is worthwhile?

I would appreciate any comments.

Thanks,
Roger
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Hi Roger, Welcome.
In answer to your questions, as a Tech. counslor for EAA I usualy tell
the new builder to sit down and make a list of what he wants to do with the
aircraft.
1. VFR or IFR?
2. Day and night?
3. Where they live (what part of the world)(high altitude or sealevel) and
the type of flying they will be doing. IE the east coast of the U.S., has a
million airports and or seaports with fuel. However the western U.S. it is
some times a long ways between airdromes.
Are you going to be running a high fuel consumption engine? Are you going
to be doing a lot of climbing or long cruize flights?
The more weight that you haul around the more power you will need and the
more fuel.
All the above make a differance in the size of fuel tanks.
4. Are we looking for speed or STOL performance? Fairings make em go
faster. But wheel pants could add weight, or even make it go slower! If
your are going to operate off of paved airstrips only, consider the wheel
pants. However in the snow and mud leave them off.
If going to high profile tires forget the pants, but you might consider
half a wheel fairing behind the wheel like the early racers.
5. Float attach fittings should make the aircraft stronger also it will
increase the resale value.
6. The flap aileron discussion will go on forever! The glider pilots like
them all in one however I like them seperate.
7. Dual brakes are great when Hand proping with someone in the right seat,
or come biannual time etc.
8. My Elete comes standard with the bent instrument panel, which I am
installing hinges to facilitate getting behind for maintenance.
9. Headliners are fine when hauling passengers with poor headsets. How
about a pond here and a pound there when totaling weight?
10. Doing much off airport work use the spring gear.
11. On my Elete I think I will be routing my controls differant so as to
not need the slave tube fairing. But I don't think it would make much
differance.
12. I will be using another type of pitot system? and you can always order
that option later.

I am building my Elete for High altitude back country work in northern
Nevada, I take off at 5000ft and go up from there. So I will be using 180Hp
with a constiant speed prop and leading edge cuffs on the wings and
stepping over the rocks and brush with at least 22" tires and a 10" or 12"
tail wheel. As you can see I am not interested in speed just STOL performance.




At 04:51 PM 12/26/99 -0800, you wrote:

I have been researchingI kit aircraft to build and recently posted a
question regarding your opinions about the Rebel, Rebel Elite, ARV
Griffon, and the Flight Caddy.

I believe I have reached a decision to purchase the Rebel.

My next question is which optional equipment, if any, should I consider?
Murphy currently offers:
extended fuel tanks
wheel pants
float attach points
split flap & aileron conversion
dual brakes
curved instrument panel
headliner
spring gear
slave tube fairing
pitot static kit
high profile tires

I think I would eventually like to go with floats, so the attach points
make sense to me.

I also think I would like the curved instrument panel, as well as the
spring gear.

Are these worthwhile options to purchase? What else is worthwhile?

I would appreciate any comments.

Thanks,
Roger
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Doug Martin
greyghost@powernet.net
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Roger

Since Doug ably commented on most of your points I'll add my 2 cents for what
little its worth.

With a Subaru engine I made my tanks smaller not larger. Even some of the 0-320
guys have reduced the fuel capacity. ie two bays of fuel on one or both wings.
Generally you don't want excess capacity that is rarely used.

The flaps only extend the same amount if you split them so split units are
reported to be not as effective for float operations etc. However I've also
heard that the ailerons stiffen up with extended flaperons.

From what I've seen the curved instrument panel does not really seem to give

much more useable panel space. Flight instruments seem to still be arranged in
two rows.

The Murphy pitot kit that I have does not include the static source and is not
heated if that matters to you. An under the wing Cessna type is probably a
little harder to accidently damage but don't know if it is as accurate.

Anyway except for maybe the float attach points, you will have a much better
idea what upgrades you want after you start building and see what others are
doing. I personally would not be too concerned about upgrades at this point
unless you are getting a credit for ordering them now. (Except for shipping, I
think many of the things you mentioned cost the same if ordered later.) I
believe MAM has also been pretty good about trading up parts as well.

The landing gear is interesting though. As I understand it the conventional gear
bungee are not supposed to flex except during a hard landing. So guys seem to
run the tires at fairly low inflation and some prefer the larger tires. When you
think about this, you might not want the large tires if you get the spring gear
since it should flex for taxxiing bumps anyway. Bigger aircraft can have some
handling issues with soft balloon tires but I've never heard any comments on
that for the Rebel. I kept the conventional gear.

Ken


BTW what is a slave tube fairing?

Ken

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Roger
I don't know if the full floor is still an option or if it's standard now.
Time consuming as it is to put in it is worth the effort for the much added
strength it adds to an already great plane.
Phil&Lisa Smith #460
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Hi Roger

I will also add my 2 cents worth in support of Ken's comments. I am now
flying an 0320 Rebel on spring gear. With this gear, larger tires are not
necessary as there is considerable give in the spring gear itself. You can
notice it right away when taxing - it is quite smooth. I went with the
spring gear because I did not plan to take the gear into extremely rough
terrain - mostly hard surface & good grass strips. For the ultimate in
toughness, the bungee gear is considered the best. I certainly believe that
although the spring gear has not given me any problems, if I did damage it,
the repair job would not be done in a few evenings. My friend Ron, damaged
his bungee gear early on before he got everything sorted out. Although it
was a shame to tear metal in the belly & lower corner wraps, the repair job
was not too overwhelming. The spring gear on the other hand, would take a
considerable amount of work. I really like the spring gear for my kind of
flying i.e. ground handling, extra speed, low maintenance etc. but there is
no right answer for everybody.

You have to decide ahead of time what kind of flying you are going to do and
build the airplane to suit. You don't even have to decide on the gear right
away because you have 2 years before you really need to know & will have
lots of time to talk to experienced builders/flyers on their reasons why
they went one way or another.

Brian #328R


-----Original Message-----
From: klehman@albedo.net [mailto:klehman@albedo.net]
Sent: Monday, December 27, 1999 9:52 AM
To: (Murphy Rebel Builders List)
Subject: Re: Advice on Rebel options


Roger

Since Doug ably commented on most of your points I'll add my 2 cents for
what
little its worth.

With a Subaru engine I made my tanks smaller not larger. Even some of the
0-320
guys have reduced the fuel capacity. ie two bays of fuel on one or both
wings.
Generally you don't want excess capacity that is rarely used.

The flaps only extend the same amount if you split them so split units are
reported to be not as effective for float operations etc. However I've also
heard that the ailerons stiffen up with extended flaperons.

From what I've seen the curved instrument panel does not really seem to

give
much more useable panel space. Flight instruments seem to still be arranged
in
two rows.

The Murphy pitot kit that I have does not include the static source and is
not
heated if that matters to you. An under the wing Cessna type is probably a
little harder to accidently damage but don't know if it is as accurate.

Anyway except for maybe the float attach points, you will have a much better
idea what upgrades you want after you start building and see what others are
doing. I personally would not be too concerned about upgrades at this point
unless you are getting a credit for ordering them now. (Except for shipping,
I
think many of the things you mentioned cost the same if ordered later.) I
believe MAM has also been pretty good about trading up parts as well.

The landing gear is interesting though. As I understand it the conventional
gear
bungee are not supposed to flex except during a hard landing. So guys seem
to
run the tires at fairly low inflation and some prefer the larger tires. When
you
think about this, you might not want the large tires if you get the spring
gear
since it should flex for taxxiing bumps anyway. Bigger aircraft can have
some
handling issues with soft balloon tires but I've never heard any comments on
that for the Rebel. I kept the conventional gear.

Ken


BTW what is a slave tube fairing?

Ken

*----------------------------------------------------*
The Murphy Rebel Builders List is for the discussion
between builders and owners of Murphy Rebel aircraft.
Archives located at:
http://www.dcsol.com/murphy-rebel/lists/default.htm
*----------------------------------------------------*

*----------------------------------------------------*
The Murphy Rebel Builders List is for the discussion
between builders and owners of Murphy Rebel aircraft.
Archives located at:
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