How Many Fresh Overhead Air Vents Do You Have?

[Ryan Riley]

Random question. I'm redoing my overhead panels and I've got quite a lot of fresh air vents. Just want to see what other 4 place Lancairs have.

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[Gordon Porter]

I have 4 in total. 2 in the forward panel over front seats (pointing straight down) , and 2 in the aft panel over the passenger seat. If I recall correctly, Bill Harrelson said he had 2 up front facing the windshield.

I have an ES.

Gordon

[Ryan Riley]

Gordon, thanks. Right now, my plane has 8 overhead. Two facing the windshield, four over the front seats and two in back. They're the really nice aerospace eyeball machined aluminum vents, but it makes for a cluttered panel. My plan is to convert the two windshield facing ones to red lights for night flying, and then have four overhead vents with LED lights for loading/unloading at night.

[George Wehrung]

Random question. I'm redoing my overhead panels and I've got quite a lot of fresh air vents. Just want to see what other 4 place Lancairs have.

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I also have four. Two right over the front seats and two eyeballs over the rear seats. The other space is taken up with oxygen ports. And an oxygen flow control valve


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[Tom Sullivan]

I know I'm late to the game, but this info may be of value. I had 4 eyeball vents, maybe 1.5" openings. In the turbine, you have to close the door to start or you will fill the cabin with jet fumes. While in Florida during my early flights (during ground ops and initial take-off) I had times my wife would turn her vent onto me because I was sweating profusely when the ambient temps were in the mid 80's. The air coming from my A/C was cold, but just not sufficient enough to cool me down. Out of curiosity, I checked the air flow with the complete overhead panel removed later that summer while working on the plane at home. I was blown away the sheer volume of air I was seeing.

I found some 4" vents common to the trucking industry (I own a heavy duty truck dealership). After measuring the "open surface area" of my small vents and these much larger vents it was clear this would be a tremendous upgrade. The area of the 1.5" was 1.77", while the 4 " was 12.56; 7 times larger when doubling the opening size. I modified the overhead panel for these large vents and we found a night and day difference in cabin comfort after the upgrade.

Tom

[George Wehrung]

Tom,

Was increased air flow at idle? I also have those small gasper vents. My oxygen system also runs through that area.

Jorge


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[Ryan Riley]

Tom, that's an awesome recommendation. Do you have pics of them? Are they the vents that fold flat or are they eye vents that twist close?

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[Tom Sullivan]

They are flat. Pictures below. The airflow was increased from the fan, not the vent. So the airflow really isn’t any different if the engine is off, idling or at cruise. Maybe my fan for my A/C is larger than most but in my case I clearly increased air flow by 6 to 8 times!

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IMG_2539.jpeg (74.28 KiB) Viewed 3484 times

[Ryan Riley]

Tom, how do you seal the air when you don't want the air (aka winter)? With mine, I only have the eyeball vents which totally seal. The vents you have look like they won't be air tight. Do you have a lever that closes the air behind the back seats? I'd really like to use the 4" vents, but I like a warm cabin in the winter/flying high!

[George Wehrung]

My other question is: is there an increase in airflow while at idle?


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