bc12d landing gear repair

[Kbollaert]

Re: bc12d landing gear repair

I'm looking for the tube thickness for the 1-1/2" dia. forward tube: Found a dent on the leading edge that's within the allowable limits for repair (per AC43.13-1B). Thanks.

[vic]

Re: bc12d landing gear repair

Somewhere I saw tapered axles for sale but can't find the site again, was I dreaming?

[Guest]

Re: bc12d landing gear repair

I think who may have been dreaming but hope I am wrong.

I never found a source and began application for PMA to make some.

Then I ran into a DER who said that he could give approved data to use for duplicating one axle at a time for repairs.

That sounded less expensive and involved than a PMA.

About 6 months later I moved and bailed out of the Taylorcraft landing gear repair world.

Dave R

[PA1195]

Re: bc12d landing gear repair

Maybe ask UNIVAIR what tubing and axles they use for their replacement Taylorcraft gear.

For example: http://www.univair.com/taylorcraft/v...ing-gear-left/

[johnmarrs1]

Please respond if you know of any method successful to eliminate toe-in of a BC12D mains, freshly covered and scary to fly.

[astjp2]

take the main tires off,
put the aircraft on jack stands, placed at the inboard side of the axle
anchor the tail down good
take a 1-1/4" schedule 40 pipe 5' long and slide it over the axle, up to the jack stand
reef on it hard enough to bend the gear to where you want to go.
have 2 or 3 friends hold the airplane from falling off the jackstands.
Use 2 pieces of 1" square tubing with a .750" hole precision drilled into it that square and the metal tube is 3 feet long and slide over the axles and measure your toe
when you get it bent to 1/16" toe in, you are done
reassemble the wheels onto the mains

[mike lutz]

Over the years I have straightened several gears like was described above with good results. If you encounter some ripples in the fabric use a heat gun to shrink the wrinkles out gently. All mine were Ceconite fabric covered, or Polyfiber.

[Robert Lees]

I did the same some years (decades) ago...I was in the position of the gear being uncovered, so I used a smidgen of heat at the lower cluster. But still used a bloody long bar!

Great minds think alike!

As an aside, a very experienced aircraft engineer* once told me that 4130N is better formed cold....it has more tolerance in cold bending than many other steels, including 1025 (which is essentially mild steel). He demonstrated this by cold-bending a 4130N tube of 7/8 inch diameter and (I think 0.038 thickness or thereabouts) around a formed mandrel of about 8 inch radius, and a 90 degree bend. There was some minor deformation, but he taught me about dye-pen and magnaflux NDT at the same time. There were no cracks.

In return for this lesson, I calibrated all his torque wrenches for him (I was in that trade at the time).

Rob

* Former Chief Engineer at Auster during the 1950s. I received the lesson in about 1991, just after buying my Taylorcraft! He's still around today!