Big news all, the belite is going to the dark side...
The Airframe is just not a good electric conversion candidate. Compared to Gabe's Gull, this takes almost 2x the power to cruise at the same speed.
As an electric plane that means really short range, in this case only about 50 mins of flight at a measly 55mph. Once you take away some margin because airplane things, that gets me an out-and-back range that's not really good for doing more than just flying the pattern.
So, I had been delaying fixing the snow damage from last year thinking about small tires, faired wing struts, wheel pants, converting the wing to in-wing ailerons etc... when an almost brand new Rotax 447 practically landed in my lap. So, one top end rebuild later, and its conversion to the dark side will be complete.
Damage pulled apart:
damage 2 by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
damage by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
Fixed!
fixed 2 by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
Fixed by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
On to the teardown. The electric system uninstalled fairly quickly, I forgot how much time I spent connectorizing the harness, and it sure made things easy. Only a few HV wires had to be cut as there were connectors on opposite ends of bulkheads that were not able pull through.
Belite teardown by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
dogbatts by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
slotax by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
The Rotax is a good bit longer than the Electric drive was, and the cooling fan pulls from the back, so I can't stick it tight to the firewall. Ill probably have to make some changes to the cowl. Here is the engine mount design so far:
motor mount by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
motor mount ISO by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr
Motor mount one side by
Jackson Edwards, on Flickr