The International Cessna^® 170 Association

Just aquired a wing from the east coast and when it was opened up we weighed 12.8 pounds of mud dauber nest. Probably another pound or two of pulverized dirt from nests we didn't weigh. Wonder how many of your stateside planes have gained 20 or 30 pounds or more of weight over the years????

Recently, Ol'Gar and I undertook to begin the annual inspection of Deana's C-150 which has been sitting in my hangar for the last 5 years. We removed about that much and thought we'd found them all ...until we opened up the belly to investigate rudder-cable tension problems and discovered another 1 or 2 lbs. We ended up pressure-washing the entire interior of the fuselage, tail, wings, and control surfaces. The amount of mud we got out of that airplane changed the elevation of my airfield. (I had, for the last 5 years, appreciated the little airplane as a "dauber decoy" ...as it appeared they favored it over my more-active airplane. Ol'Gar got motivated to get it flying again when he overheard me call it that.)

We finished by fogging the entire interior of the airplane with a gallon of WD-40* using a fogging-gun and air compressor, the application of which chased two returning wasps out of the wings. Ol' Gar postulated that mud daubers were an endangered species until we invented the airplane.

* WD-40 was used to "dry" the airplane interior after the pressure-wash. If you use that stuff for such purpose, beware of it's "explodability" when fogged. Keep all sparks and electrical equipment shut down/away. ACK-50 or Corrosion-X is probably a better long-term anti-corrosion treatment, and safer to apply. In either case, use respiration-equipment and/or consider prevailing winds to avoid instant pnuemonia. Do not breathe any of it and do it OUTDOORS if you value your hangar.

gahorn wrote:....(I had, for the last 5 years, appreciated the little airplane as a "dauber decoy" ...as it appeared they favored it over my more-active airplane....

Nawww! They were just avoiding the WD40 fumes in the 170! Deana's 150 is probably now dauber-proofed for the next 100 years!

jrenwick wrote:Nawww! They were just avoiding the WD40 fumes in the 170! Deana's 150 is probably now dauber-proofed for the next 100 years!

HAY JOHN U GIVE ME AN IDEA. We (Deana says it wasn't her idea) just bought a two-bay boat house with a lift in each side. Evidently the folks who previously owned it were fond of them little mud totin BA#$%^RDS cause the thing has about a thousand blobs stuck in every nook and cranny. I am going to look for WD40 in a 55 gallon drum, mix it up with water like George does and squirt the whole inside with the stuff...........

I wonder how the little monsters survived for millions of years without all the housing provided by human devices.

flyguy wrote:

jrenwick wrote:...We (Deana says it wasn't her idea) just bought a two-bay boat house with a lift in each side. ...

Since you have more boats than lifts and can only use one-at-a-time.... it sounds as if you now own a HANGAR-DOOR operator! (Let's get your hangar finished!)