Landing/Taxi Lights

Time: 8 Hours

This last summer at AirVenture I purchased my landing/taxi and position lights from AeroLed. My plan was as soon as I ran out of stuff to do this Winter I would work on these lights, that time has come! The wheel pants are almost done so I figured I would start the process of installing these lights. I would start with the landing/taxi lights first. These are specifically made for the RV aircraft and the shape of there fiberglass tips. The model is AeroSunVx and include led’s for taxi and led’s for landing. They send a wood template to use to mark the area to cut as well as the two adjustment screws. 

Once you have all the sight slots adjusted on the template you drill the two holes and clecko it in place. 

Then you can use the template to mark the area that needs to be cut.

I started with a Dremel cut off wheel followed by the Dremel drum sanding tool to get close to the line. 

Then I used 80 grit sandpaper by hand to take it right up to and removing most of the line. The plans have you put two layers of blue painters tape around the perimeter of the light to give protection as well as spacing. You then insert the light from inside the fiberglass tip to see the points that are tight. With a single layer of sand paper facing away from light you slide it between the light and fiberglass and pull outward. This sands the fiberglass to the shape of the light as you push pressure on the light. This is a very very slow process but they tell you to have patience with this so that the reveal is equal all the way around as the adjustment screws are in place. 

Once you have the light in perfect shape it’s time to mount the pivot arm to the leading edge. This arm just connect to a rubber bushing housed in a plactic piece that is the shape of the leading edge. The plactic piece gets permanently mounted and the bushing allows for the light to pivot and vibration control. You can drill holes and blind rivet it in place or epoxy it. I decided to go the later route so I didn’t have four blind rivet heads showing. I did drill two holes so that I could hold it in place as the epoxy cured. So I mixed up some epoxy/flox and covered the part and installed the light. 

While this was setting up I started work on the AeroLed Pulsar NS (Nav/Strobe). This was pretty easy to line up with the dimensions provided. They have a attach bracket that is held in place with three screws.  I decided to use nyloc nuts instead of nutplates. 

Then I drilled a 3/4″ hole for the wires to pass through. After feeding the wires through the hole you slide the light ontonthe bracket and slide it forward. There is a set screw at the aft end that holds it in place. 

I repeated the entire process on the opposite wingtip with the same results. 

After this cures I will remove the lights and clean up the edges and re-prime the tips as well as work on the lenses that cover the lights. I will also finish up the wiring and make a temporary pigtail so I can put the tips by the fuselage and test them without having to put the wings on. 

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