Tie downs

Wondering what drivers are using to secure their machines when left unattended out in the elements? Plenty of types avail but nothing better to hear actual stories good and bad.

 

 

3 star pickets 500 mm long, long tapered point, with a round disc welded to the top. Good quality 8 plait braid rope. I carry a small hatchet to hammer them in.

 

a bit of overkill but I dont have to worry about it being hit by storm force winds etc and they dont really weigh much.

 

 

3 star pickets 500 mm long, long tapered point, with a round disc welded to the top. Good quality 8 plait braid rope. I carry a small hatchet to hammer them in.a bit of overkill but I dont have to worry about it being hit by storm force winds etc and they dont really weigh much.

They'd work, but heavy to carry around and very difficult to retrieve from hard or sticky ground and requires carrying a heavy hammer to set them.This question comes up regularly and the frequent answers are the various types of angled pegs through a plate with angled holes - see surefoot anchors for an example - which pull out easily from wet ground, or the corkscrew types which are impossible to wind into hard ground.

 

The Scouts solved the problem 50yrs ago in USA - Google Scout Pegs - for a 600kg class plane they need to be 400mm long and 10mm high tensile steel. Longer to hold well in dry sand.

 

 

I use this:

 

Aircraft Tiedown Kit (The Claw) Aircraft Anchoring System. The harder you pull, the more it grips the earth. The only tie down with a mechanical advantage. [claw] - $224.95 : The Aviator Store: Your Online Pilot Shop for Local Pilot Supplies

 

 

Avweb did some tests:

 

 

 

For pegs - the old standard steel-style tent pegs at 300mm long x 8mm diameter, are sufficient for everything but cyclonic winds - Galvanised Steel Tent Pegs

 

Grinding a tapered but blunt point on the end assists in driving them in.

 

If you have trouble with penetration in hard soil, you utilise two or more pegs in this holdfast manner -

 

 

To get the pegs out, you utilise one of these nifty tent peg pullers from Hillbilly Camping Gear ... https://www.campertrailers.org/tentpeg2.JPG

 

Carry a small block of pine wood to raise the tent peg puller, if needed, for additional pull height, or to give more support to the puller in soft ground.

 

 

I use this:Aircraft Tiedown Kit (The Claw) Aircraft Anchoring System. The harder you pull' date=' the more it grips the earth. The only tie down with a mechanical advantage. [claw'] - $224.95 : The Aviator Store: Your Online Pilot Shop for Local Pilot Supplies

I use those too Dsam and have never had any hassles.I have had my plane tied down in the open when measured 100km/h storm came through and they held. I was certainly worried at the time that the plane would be across the paddock somewhere but the only damage was a slightly bent rudder which was a bit more proof to just how strong the winds were! The storm came from behind the plane though so harder on the rudder but not as hard on the tie downs as a front on wind would have been.

 

 

I use this:Aircraft Tiedown Kit (The Claw) Aircraft Anchoring System. The harder you pull' date=' the more it grips the earth. The only tie down with a mechanical advantage. [claw'] - $224.95 : The Aviator Store: Your Online Pilot Shop for Local Pilot Supplies

I don't understand why you people like getting ripped off then tell everyone where they can go and get ripped off as well when you could promote and use your very own Clear Prop store, I thought we were trying to help each other.The Claw

 

Or individual one

 

Home :: For Aircraft :: Other Aircraft Supplies :: The Claw - Single

 

 

Sorry Ian, I bought my “Claw” at a stand at Ausfly many years ago. I never bothered much keeping note of the distributor.

 

I just did a quick google check for it and copied the first Aussie supplier that came up in that listing.

 

Apologies for not checking Clear Prop. My bad...

 

 

....The Scouts solved the problem 50yrs ago in USA - Google Scout Pegs - for a 600kg class plane they need to be 400mm long and 10mm high tensile steel. Longer to hold well in dry sand.

I just realised that for some reason they don't come up when you Google 'Scout Pegs'.

They look like the image shown below and must be made from heat treated high tensile steel. The reason they work so well (on a power to low weight basis) is that the pull on the rope tied to the eye is off-axis to the line of the peg, so it's not trying to pull it out of the ground, it's trying to push it sideways through the ground - clever concept.

 

The Claw type above work very well too. Ian - I guess people might not have known you stock them, I'm sure dsam wouldn't have meant any offence ... As a suggestion perhaps where you have the Clear Prop store advert/link, maybe you could have a slideshow constantly rotating the products you sell? Just so that people become familiar with what you have available.

 

 

 

Interesting that this question has just come up now. Decmber/January edition of Australian Pilot page 60 has an article called Tied Down and Safe, by Tim Howes (Bush Pilot). The article is based on his experience and in particlular the storm at High Sierra Fly-in United States with 150 km winds over the lake bed. A walk around the following morning revealed a lot of information on what worked and what didn’t. The two best options seemed to be the Duck Bill Anchors - very effective although an expensive single use item , but if you plan to return to a place regularly and reuse them then they are possibly worth it. The only other anchor that did not move at all even in very wet soil were the Boy Scout Stakes - cheap effective light , but you need to carry a hammer.

 

The plane he flew in with was anchored with the Boy Scout Stakes and didn’t move. While the plane parked next to his , a J3 Cub which blew away, was anchored by Tha Claw, and several other users of The Claw had to repeatedly re-anchor their planes because the pins kept elongating the holes and began to pull out. He also described several other anchors that began to loosen and pull out.

 

This is only one persons experience, but I am going to try to make my own Boy Scout Stakes

 

 

I could be wrong but the boy scout stakes are just normal tent stakes so I would have thought long ones, which would b needed for an aircraft, would be very hard to remove when hammered into the ground. Or are boy scout stakes something different than normal tent pegs with angled heads

 

 

I've just had some similar to the Abe Tiedowns mentioned in the video rgmwa linked to made at a local laser cutting place, out of 1.6mm 304SS. I'll take them to a friends press brake and fold them up and get some stakes etc.

 

For 6 of the anchors, my total spend is $48, plus I'll have to get some stainless steel rope and jewellry (factor another $15 or $20) and some stakes (another $20ish) I should get out of it for <$100. I already have some dyneema rope which has a breaking strain of something ridiculous.

 

I'll do some tests and let you know.

 

 

I could be wrong but the boy scout stakes are just normal tent stakes so I would have thought long ones, which would b needed for an aircraft, would be very hard to remove when hammered into the ground. Or are boy scout stakes something different than normal tent pegs with angled heads

Yes, it's the angled head that makes them clever because the pull is off axis to the main shaft of the peg.

However they do have to be heat treated high tensile carbon steel (heat treated after original shaping). If they were mild steel like ordinary tent pegs they would just bend, both when being hammered in and also when the load is applied.

 

They're actually very easy to pull out when you want to, you just slip a loop of rope under the angled part (to the bend near the main shaft) and hook the hammer through the other end of the loop and use it as a 'pull' hammer, a couple of whacks and out they come.

 

 

BMs Savannah was at Avalon when the supercell went through there a few years ago - his tiedown pegs held (sorry, don't know what system he was using) but the tiedown points built into his wings failed

 

his aircraft was significantly damaged and has been rebuilt with tiedown points built into the wings that I have been told will NOT fail...ever......

 

BP

 

 

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions guys. I don't want to carry a hammer or heavy stakes, I have an aerobatic machine so less is better

 

I found a guy who uses the " screwit" tie downs, no hammer, no heavy stuff to secure, perfect for what I want!

 

 

Yes, I can see where the Big Screw aircraft tiedowns have added advantage in not being able to be pulled straight out of the ground as easily as plain pegs - but using just one appears to be risky, particularly if the soil is soft.

 

I would have to opine, that using a 200mm square tiedown plate, with a centre eye welded to it, retained by 3 or 4 of the screw-type pegs, would have to offer the best retention method of all - and the easiest setup to remove, even from hard ground.

 

Big Screw Aircraft Tie-Down – The easiest and strongest aircraft tie-down system.

 

 

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions guys. I don't want to carry a hammer or heavy stakes, I have an aerobatic machine so less is betterI found a guy who uses the " screwit" tie downs, no hammer, no heavy stuff to secure, perfect for what I want!

Screwits don't work in hard soil. The driest continent in the world is mostly hard soil.

Agree on the hard soils in Australia. But a good screw-in tiedown would work satisfactorily in our hard soils, if it was made from steel, not aluminium. I could see aluminium screws screwing off under the pressure of hard soil conditions.

 

Despite my reservations about posting information that is largely related to American conditions, the EAA does have a fairly good advice page on aircraft tiedowns.

 

Tying Down Aircraft | EAA AirVenture Oshkosh

 

The advice about using a tiedown plate with angled pins or screws is particularly important advice.

 

https://www.eaa.org/~/media/images/airventure/flyingin/tiedowns/image1.gif

 

If you utilise tiedown rope or ratchet straps that are engineered to meet the Australian/NZ transport tiedown standard (AS/NZS 4380:2001), then you're assured of the strength and durability of your tiedown ropes or straps.

 

 

Screwits don't work in hard soil. The driest continent in the world is mostly hard soil.

The Antartica is actually the driest continent not Australia.

Am going to try the 'screwit' units as they are the simplest the lightest and by all accounts wrk in most soils, nothing is perfect.

 

 

I could be wrong but the boy scout stakes are just normal tent stakes so I would have thought long ones, which would b needed for an aircraft, would be very hard to remove when hammered into the ground. Or are boy scout stakes something different than normal tent pegs with angled heads

You’re right, you are wrong. They are different to tent pegs take a close look at Head in the Clouds’ photo the eye at the end of the offset at the top is the actual tie down point. This effectively means that when the plane pulls on the rope the peg is pushed sideways as well as pulled up. This puts extra friction on the peg making it much harder to pull out of the ground. However when it come time to remove them and leave, you hook a rope or another peg or anything else handy under the top right near the long shaft and pull the stake out without any sideways pressure, and it comes out easily. Especially with a bit of simultaneous twisting side to side.

If the ground is hard the screwits wont even start to go in if the ground is soft they will pull out the same as pegs

 

yes the star pickets weigh 2 kg and nearly 3 kg with a hammer but we have found they work in all types of conditions

 

 

I bought steel screw tie downs at Oshkosh three years ago and have never found an airfield where they would screw in to the ground.

 

 

The Antartica is actually the driest continent not Australia.Am going to try the 'screwit' units as they are the simplest the lightest and by all accounts wrk in most soils, nothing is perfect.

You’re right Antarctica is the driest, but they don’t have much soil, only rock and ice. Tim Howes article did mention Screw in Systems very favourably, in the lakebed soil, saying that they appeared to only pull out marginally. However he also, was hesitant about using them over here with our soils. I live in South Oz and most places I go have very hard or rocky ground maybe it’s different where you are. Please let me know how you get on.

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions guys. I don't want to carry a hammer or heavy stakes, I have an aerobatic machine so less is betterI found a guy who uses the " screwit" tie downs, no hammer, no heavy stuff to secure, perfect for what I want!

Trying to get one started screwing into the ground is a joke. And if the ground is soft enough so that it does screw in, get your 5 year old to rock the plane and watch it work its way out again.