 |
Matronics Email Lists
Web Forum Interface to the Matronics Email Lists
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
t.j.vanduin(at)gmail.com
Guest
|
 Posted: Thu Oct 02, 2008 2:55 am Post subject: Allegro 2000, cracked gear leg. |
 |
|
Fellow-Allegro-owners / Mr. Thom Riddle,
Since one month I am the possessor of an Allegro 2000, built in 2001, which I bought from a
first owner in the Netherlands. I'm located in France. After the purchase I found your Allegro list
on the internet. I went through all your mails and would very much like to join you as a member
of the list.
At the innerside of the left gear leg I found a crack about 4 inches from the clamping area over
the total width of the leg. Too risky to keep flying!
Replacing both gear legs by stronger (and .1 inch thicker) ones is possible, but this requires to
remove partially .025 inch of material at both sides of the legs (the thickness) and also to
remove this material from the mating socket surfaces on the fuselage.
I quote Thom when he concludes that lastmentioned job is going to be no fun at all and don't
know whether Thom and myself are the only ones to deal with this problem until now.
I could not find any follow-up info about his rework- and replacement job on the Allegro list
and am very interested to learn more about his experiences in this matter.
On the other hand, as only one leg of my plane is damaged, and so many Allegro's are still
flying with the old design legs, why shouldn't I try to find a replacement leg of the original size?
Any comments in this matter is very much appreciated! ( I would like to fly again asap and safe).
Theo van Duin
[quote][b]
| | - The Matronics Allegro-List Email Forum - | | | Use the List Feature Navigator to browse the many List utilities available such as the Email Subscriptions page, Archive Search & Download, 7-Day Browse, Chat, FAQ, Photoshare, and much more:
http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Allegro-List |
|
|
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
Thom Riddle
Joined: 10 Jan 2006
Posts: 1597
Location: Buffalo, NY, USA (9G0)
|
| Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2008 3:00 am Post subject: Re: Allegro 2000, cracked gear leg. |
|
|
Hello Theo,
We replaced both main gear legs on our Allegro. It turned out to be less trouble than I had expected. We did NOT remove any material from the sockets where the gear legs fit into the fuselage. All the material removal was from the gear legs themselves where they fit into the sockets. We used a powered belt sander for this work and it went more quickly than I had anticipated. I suggest you do the work carefully, removing equal amounts of material, as required, from opposite sides and opposite edges. Sand and test the fitting, then sand some more and test again. Do not remove more material than necessary to get the leg to fit.
Once you have them fitting nicely, I suggest you put a piece of thin rubber (like the material that a tire inner tube is made of) above the leg where it contacts the outboard part of the fuselage socket. Without this rubber, the bending leg makes contact with that sharp edge at the top of the socket putting unnecessary and undue amounts of stress on the upper part of the gear leg. The strip of rubber, perhaps 3-4 cm wide and the full width of the socket, should be glued in place on the upper surface of the gear leg or to the inside of the socket in that area. It does not have to stick outside the socket, which would be ugly, but it must come close to the outside edge of the socket to absorb the stresses of the bending gear leg.
After replacing the gear legs in this manner we flew the airplane more than 300 hours with no more gear leg trouble, before selling the airplane last month.
| | - The Matronics Allegro-List Email Forum - | | | Use the List Feature Navigator to browse the many List utilities available such as the Email Subscriptions page, Archive Search & Download, 7-Day Browse, Chat, FAQ, Photoshare, and much more:
http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Allegro-List |
|
_________________
Thom Riddle
Buffalo, NY (9G0)
Don't worry about old age... it doesn't last very long.
- Anonymous |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
You cannot attach files in this forum
You can download files in this forum
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group
|
Get Email Distribution Too!
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
