Vance, Here is a nose gear failure in regard to our discussion
of experimental aircraft landing gear strength and G ratings.
Looks like the Tr1 is not the only airplane with nose gear problems :-)
BTW In your next design I think you should attach the nose gear to the
engine instead of the fuselage similar to the QuestAir Venture.
Paul Lamar
"He made a low pass to have a look at the field. It's a real smooth, grass strip. He came in nose high and touched down on the mains. The nose wheel came
down, the strut buckled, and that's it. I did see that the nose strut is totally inadequate for that big old O-540 engine."
The pilot provided a detailed wreckage diagram and notes that outlined his observations. According to the diagram, the main landing gear touched down
240 feet beyond the approach end of the runway. The nose gear touched down 359 feet further beyond the approach end of the runway. Along the
subsequent 165 feet of the wreckage path, the pilot noted ground scars that illustrated "the nosewheel appears to have locked" and "locked again." The
pilot further documents ground scars from propeller and nose cowling strikes, and where the airplane nosed over and came to rest inverted.
In a telephone interview, a representative of the kit manufacturer was asked about the numbers of Compare [sic] kits delivered in either the nosewheel or
tailwheel configuration. He said:
"Almost all are tailwheels. [The accident] airplane is the only one with a nose wheel. I don't know of any piston powered CA6s that are nose wheels. The
nose wheel hasn't been very popular. There was one other nose wheel airplane in Canada, but it was destroyed in a stall accident. The problems we've had
with the nose wheel aircraft have all been pilot induced. There was a Comp Air 3 that was delivered as a nosewheel, but it's a taildragger now."
The manufacturer's representative was asked if the company still sold the Comp Air kits with the nose wheel configuration. He said:
"Yes. But the nose wheel we would sell you would be the one from our turbine-powered airplanes, not the one from [the accident airplane]. It's a
completely different design. It's for airplane's that weigh up to 6,000 pounds. That's the only one we offer anymore, it's very heavy duty. The one on [the
accident airplane] was only for airplanes up to 3,200 pounds gross weight."
Examination revealed the nose gear was a fixed, non-dampening tube bolted inside a tri-pod airframe mount. The nose-gear tire was a free-castering,
non-steerable type, with no brakes installed. The gear was twisted and bent aft 90 degrees at the point where the tube entered the mount.
Disassembly of the nose gear revealed the threaded end of the wheel-pant mount screw on the right side rested 1/8 of an inch from the sidewall of the tire.
Circumferential scoring of the tire was noted directly across from the screw. The swiveling attach point for the wheel mount was forward of the tire. The
distance from the swivel-mount bolt to the ground was 4 inches. The distance from the bottom of the wheel rim to the tire's contact patch was 4 inches.
Tire pressure was measured at 11 psi.
According to a vendor for the tire manufacturer, the tire pressure recommended for the nose-wheel tire was 50 psi."
The AirCraft Rotary Engine NewsLetter. Powered by Linux.
http://home.earthlink.net/~rotaryeng/ http://www.linux.org