Weight

Gordie ,,welcome to the "newly obese" club. Last annual I noted there had been no real scales weight and balance done in 40 years , I had one done . . . . BIG MISTAKE ! Little Bird had gained nearly 100 pounds !!!! I made them do it again . . .same results. Might have to find a skinnier wife !

Bill James
Canton Ohio

I have seen comments that airplanes gain weight over the years and I thought that referred to people adding components over the years, but this seems too like to much. Dirt? Corrosion? Paint? Inspection covers? What else? Original weight was somewhere about 800 pounds, I have 84 pounds more than that and 18 pounds more than the note of 866 pounds in '86. I removed a heading indicator, a com radio was gone, no VOR, I added a lightweight com radio, an ELT was mentioned in the logbook but was not there. I installed a new ELT. I should have been lighter. This weight increase is a mystery....and one that may be important.

I have run into a similar situation in my M10. I thought I was removing weight when I put in a lightweight starter and alternator, and according to the "official" weight and balance, I should have removed about 18 pounds. When we did the actual W&B, I was 36 pounds heavier. As it turns out, everything that has been done to the plane over the years was done on paper and there had been no "new" W&B since the 70s. Obviously there were some errors that got compounded over the years. I suspect if all the Ercoupes had a new W&B done, almost none of the old W&Bs would be accurate. Hopefully, most would be close. For me, since I fly by myself most of the time, the 30 pounds wasn't a huge deal. I would be interested to hear from others that have had a W&B done lately.

I just had a weight and balance on my Ercoupe 415C. I was disappointed when it came back heavy,884 lbs. I will likely have to purchase an stc for 1320 lbs. I wonder, where did all that extra weight come from? I do not think it is from extra equipment. The last w&b in 1986 information was a notation in the logbook that said 866 lbs. The actual w&b paperwork is missing. (Thus the new one). If there is no more instruments on the panel where would all that weight come from? Wings were recovered and painted 1995 (superflight ii coconite).