Rear diagonal shoulder belt

[Nev]

Has anyone considered mounting rear inertia reels to the the cluster above the rear cargo compartment? My idea is to locate both reels close to the center top of the “cathedral “ ceiling so that the shoulder belts cross the passengers torso to the outside. It would keep the reels away from the flap cables and behind the passenger heads. I’m not sure if the reels would be rearward enough to provide the correct angle, but at any rate it may be better than lap belts alone.

CC02BE6C-33D2-411C-9A68-D287B4BA8D3D.jpeg

[alaskabearhawk]

http://www.mykitlog.com/users/display_log.php?user=yeeeha&project=527&category=0&log=288995&row=2

[Mark Goldberg]

Nev - did you see the mounting tabs up in the cluster above the door frame? You do have tabs there for shoulder harnesses on both sides. Diagonal one strap shoulder harness. Mark

[Nev]

I didn’t write the post very clearly sorry. I can see the mounting for the front seat inertia reels Mark. I was wondering about mounting rear inertia reels for the backseat pax at the cluster in the “cathedral “ ceiling.

[whee]

The diagonal would be going the wrong direction and therefore would not aid in keeping noggins away from the side of the airframe. Also, the angle is really bad. IMO it wouldn’t be worth doing.

[Nev]

Good point Whee. I’m trying to keep heads from arcing forward primarily.

[500AGL]

Personal opinion, but I'd recommend you add straps (flat bars spanning tubes) as needed now to allow 4 point harnesses front and back. Ideally a 5 point in front, but at minimum a 4 point front/back.

Link to older post regarding front seat harness. Perhaps do a similar thing for the back. See post 6 or so, from Alaska Bearhawk.

https://bearhawkforums.com/forum/tools-technics-and-best-practices/14254-inertia-reel-mount-location-4-place

[whee]

Good point Whee. I’m trying to keep heads from arcing forward primarily.

Just sharing my thought process. The back seat passengers only have the seat frames of the front seat to bash their faces on if they come forward. In the factory seating position how tall do the rear passengers need to be to hit their head on the back of the front seats? I didn’t think it was a significant concern since few of my back seat passengers would be tall. My main concern is the rear passengers hitting their heads on the sides of the airframe so I went with 4 point harnesses.

Last summer there was a Cessna 210 that crashed sorta near me. Nobody was wearing shoulder harness but only the pilot and co-pilot suffered significant injuries. They both smacked their faces on the instrument panel and suffered spinal cord injuries. At least one of them is still in a wheel chair.