• If You Are Having Trouble Logging In with Your Old Username and Password, Please use this Forgot Your Password link to get re-established.
  • Hey! Be sure to login or register!

Fuel bag question

chedlow

Registered User
a
I have a 5gal canvas fuel bush bag I put in the front seat but have been thinking about strapping a shorter 3 gal to each landing gear. Has any one done this? Or am I missing something that might get me killed. Here is a Pic of the larger 5 gal bag as an example. I posted on the J3 forum and some suggested posting here. 1000101960.webp
 
I have a 5gal canvas fuel bush bag I put in the front seat but have been thinking about strapping a shorter 3 gal to each landing gear. Has any one done this? Or am I missing something that might get me killed. Here is a Pic of the larger 5 gal bag as an example. I posted on the J3 forum and some suggested posting here. View attachment 110091
Can you give any feedback on the bag itself. I have looked at those but seen mixed reviews.
 
I put a gun in a somewhat similar spot with positive result. I’d start on a long runway with one side installed. Then add the other. Life’s an experiment. Color outside the lines. If your fuel bags work I may install a couple rocket launchers…

Zach
1736730114541.webp
 
It seems like anything flexible like the bag you show would present a lot of problems. How do you prevent the bag from folding over on itself? Would any parts of the bag be able to drum on the gear leg or on the bag itself?
 
Rifle case/scabbards are not considered an external load, at least in Alaska... Anywhere this would be an external load. Not only the FAA, but insurance companies are not appreciative of external loads.

About your specific question: Anything outside is subject to wind moving it around. A flexible bag will at times much out from under the tie down straps when pressures change on the bag. Even small movements will create wear, to your paint, but also to the fuel bag; imagine something causing a leak.

External loads cause drag, and slow you down. Might not be much, but when you begin slow, you really don't want to lose any speed.

For all these reasons, I would keep things inside as much as possible.
 
For what it's worth, there's no way I'd carry fuel in bags on the outside of an airplane, regardless of regulations. Waaaay too much opportunity for the bag to move around, potentially leak, or ???? And, heaven forbid, you are involved in an accident.......

But, as Tango says, this would definitely constitute an external load, at least anywhere in the FAA's jurisdiction.
 
I have many years of securing external loads here in AK. I agree with the other members I would not attempt securing a soft bag of fuel to the outside. If you must maybe look into a flat rigid ATV wheeler flat tank.
 
I had a friend at one time that ferried a J3 to Alaska. He set a 30 gallon fuel drum in the front seat with a hand pump on it and ran a hose outside and duct taped it to the cowl and into the fuel tank 🙄🙄
 
I had a friend at one time that ferried a J3 to Alaska. He set a 30 gallon fuel drum in the front seat with a hand pump on it and ran a hose outside and duct taped it to the cowl and into the fuel tank 🙄🙄
Yeah, that was the approach a couple guys took trying to move a Goose to the South Pacific to film the tv show “Tales of the Gold Monkey” many years ago. A bunch of 55 gallon barrels in the back, with a pickup and pump, with discharge run through a window and over the wing. Planned on using cross feed to get fuel to both engines. Two guys aboard, one to fly, one to “manage” fuel.

They made it about a couple hundred miles south of ANC before they wound up in the drink…..used up a great old Kodiak Western Goose in the process……
 
Spruce has a wing strut fuel tank. What could go wrong lol. But it’s hard compared to your bag. Not familiar with that bag. Is it a good one?
 
I know a guy who needed to air drop a come along to a buddy with a moose down in a swamp. They ended up putting it in a roll top type dry bag with a life jacket and strapped it to the under side of a Pacer gear leg. Not exactly the same thing as what you’re trying to do, but under might be better than on the top of the gear legs. I’ve also seen other people strap backpacks to wing struts, but I don’t know if I’d want to do that with a fuel bag as it probably weighs more.
 
Back
Top