Another item for the 'this could happen to you too file', although this one fits
in the 'if you are not lucky' rather than the 'if you are dumb enough' class.
During a splendid flight over the part snow covered Welsh Mountains yesterday
I flew through a patch of fairly severe turbulence, presumaby rotor related
to the strongish (30kts) upper wind. On downwind to Kemble I found the U/C did
not want to go that last bit down, with the lever stopping stubbonly 1cm from
its detent. Thumping it , taking a run at it and foul language for the length
of the leg were of no avail, so I left the circuit to gain a bit of height and
give it some serious stick, (actually pushing the lever down with my left hand
while thumping it hardest with my right), which I am pleased to say eventually
did the trick.
During building I had seen the discussion surrounding Mod 51, which
adds a supporting bracket between the U/C lever (LG12) and LG08P to which it is
normally attached by 3 fairly closely spaced bolts. The discussion revolved
around the significant stress on this joint if the plane is trailered on a dolly
with the U/C retraced. Having no intention of using that sort of trailer and
in the spirit of thinking light during the build I avoided this mod.
It is clear however that turbulence can produce sufficient strain on
those 3 bolts (which incidentally I had retorqued at the fairly recent 50 hr
check) to open up the joint. The difficulty I had in doing anything about it is
a fair indication that those bolts were not loose, but simply not up to carrying
the mass of the U/C through that sort of turbulence, which recorded 2.5g
on my g meter.
In the light of this I would thoroughly reccommend that everyone
includes
mod 51 (cost =A32 or so) in their build or better still that Europa make
it standard.
Happy Landings! David Joyce
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