The International Cessna 170 Association

has any one purchased the carbon fiber wheel pants? There was a guy selling them for the 120,140,170s. they appear to be exact copies of the original wheel pants. I'm considering buying a set as I don't need to have polished metal ones.

14 years and holding up just fine.

thanks!! those look great. Do you notice any difference between the stock OEM pants and the carbon fiber pants?

Cameggs wrote:thanks!! those look great. Do you notice any difference between the stock OEM pants and the carbon fiber pants?

I have never had a pair of oem pants so should not comment but will anyway. I can say the oem pants are a lot easier to polish , but these do not dent like oems. There is no mud scrapper on these like the oems, I suppose if you wanted one you could adopt a scraper. I think the edge in speed gained from pants would go to the lighter carbon fiber ones.

what speeds are gained with 'pants on'? i'm curious about getting faster in mine and i get i could do a lot by getting a reduction in tire size first off ... yeah 8.50's but even with a 'normal' tire what will the pant give?
i had no idea CF pants were such a thing these days... kids

I normally saw 3 or 4 MPH difference when I took the wheel pants off vs on while using 600 tires.
I never ran any other tire size to know how much worse 8:50s or 8:00s are vs 6:00s

I don't know if anything is going to really affect the 120mph cruise number of a 170. If you installed every speed mod available you might get an extra 6 or 7 mph. but I digress


The carbon fiber ones look much better than the fiberglass ones but still not as nice as the aluminum ones.
But..
- You can stand on the CF ones
- They wont dent from rocks or other hazards
- They wont crack from use or vibration
- They are just as light as the aluminum ones.

The only thing you can't do is polish them, if you're into that.

Just curious, what is the going price (US) for the carbon fiber pants and mounting hardware?

thanks for the info, my 170 is painted, I'm have no interest in polishing them. I am running 800 tires now, I only go in and out of nice grass strips and paved runways so I have no need for the larger tire. my winter project will be the CF pants. I'm going to order them today. Thanks again

Most wheelpants (and all the originals) will only accommodate 600X6 tires.

Where does one find these CF wheel pants?

Dave,
Matt Lahti’s website is down. Might try his email found here.

I tried the email link and it came back undeliverable so it looks like we may have missed our chance on these.

I have reached out to Matt on Facebook. I'll advise back here what I hear back.

These are on my short list of acquisitions. My original metal wheelpants are beaten to death and the mounting plates were lost to the sands of time somewhere around Freeway Airport or Hyde Field between 1979 and today.

There is definitely a market for wheel pants and especially backing plates. I hope your contact works out and he is still making them.

I just spoke to Matt. He is still making the CF wheel pants. He can be contacted on his cell at: 248-762-one-eight-three-six.
His e-mail is eight8november at gmail.com
Hope this helps.