Additional Baggage Compartment.

We have two folding chairs with aluminum frames that weigh less than 6 pounds each, but they are bulky. When camping with folding bikes etc. it was a struggle to get them in the standard baggage compartment. After doing appropriate weight & balance calculations, I decided to make a door in the rear baggage wall so that I could pass the chairs into the aft fuselage area & strap them down to an aluminum angle rack.

On talking it through with my friend Jim, who is building a Rutan Defiant, he suggested fabricating a tray out of 1/4" foam, hot glued together & covered with one layer of bid on each side, complete with plywood hard points for mounting. He helped me in the construction & it turned out to be less than 3 pounds & very rigid. I then mounted the tray on a couple of .063 angles across the longerons, with an additional small angle on the central upright, just aft of the baggage wall. The door is big enough to get a single chair in. The second one goes in after sliding the first one over.