Armrest reinforcement
Some RV owners complain that people push too hard on their arm rest when getting in or out of the plane and then bend it.
I have seen how some people reinforce theirs with elaborate ideas and have come up with my own method that I think works best and is very elegant.
Simply put a 1/2" 0.064 aluminium angle for the full length on the straight edge facing down and back.
This have the following advantages:
- The down force is distributed along the enitre arm rest
- Can be done before the armrest are fitted or retro fitted on existing installations
- Minimal weight addition (66 grams or 2.3 oz)
- Does not change the appearance of the arm rest.
- Create a nice smooth finished edge on the bottom of the arm rest compared a thin plate, since the L bends backswards.
- Creates a lip to wrap upholstery around.
- 2 hours of work for piece of mind
- Since it is not structural you can use your home depot or hardware store variety alu angle here, so it is cheap.
Here are the components with the 1/2" alu anlge cut to length
Mark even spacing for the rivets aprox 30mm or 1"1/8
Clamp the angle so that it aligns with the lip, and test that you can get a rivet squeezer in there
Drill, debur, dimple the armrest and countersink the alu angle.
Rivet it together using your rivet squeezer
The finished products
A picture of it being fitted to the airplane. I'll see if I can get a better picture of it later. One would hardly notice it is reinforced. The only clue is the row of rivets on the armrest face.