nose gear door
 

My aircraft has the aft nose gear door. It's occurred to me that I could shed some drag on take-off if it was removed. Any opinions or suggestions on removing this door. Would it require an STC? Thanks.
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Mflb

How much drag would be induced during flight with the door removed?

There is only a short period of time after take off before the gear is retracted, and there is a greater period of time that the airplane is in cruise flight. Would there be any net gain from the door removal?

Door removal would either require an FAA field approval or STC to accomplish, and they would most likely require extensive flight testing (with calibrated instrumentation) to assure that there would be no adverse flight characteristic changes.

Uuuug on the extensive flight testing. Apparantly no STC has been accomplished and your point on getting it done hardly makes it feasable. Thanks for the input.
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MEDICAL MARIJUANA DOCTOR

There is an alternative to an STC. There's such thing as a "field approval." If you can convince an FAA inspector that you don't need that gear door, and he's willing to sign off the paperwork, then a Field Approval is like a one-time STC for that aircraft only. Good luck with the FAA.

But I do agree, that gear door is retracted at lower speed (i.e., less drag). But provides slipstream during higher speed cruise & descent.

That door, behind the nose gear, gets fully retracted when the gear goes up.

On the ground, while you are taking off, it acts as a fender, reducing the amount of debris that would get slung onto your lower fuselage, and by extension, into the rear prop.

Also, in flight, it smooths the airflow behind the gear doors. Without it, you would have a large hole.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDTDgLZ1mJE

Great footage on how the nose gear retracts! I had not thought about the debri factor. I took a rear blade nick and do not want to go through that again! Operators on Swerringen/ Merlins were removing the door panel on the mains and it made a big difference on drag at take off. We did beef up the aft wheel well panel to prevent oil caning at cruise. Thanks for the good info.
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GENETICALLY MODIFIED FOOD