Landing Gear Retraction Cable

bartonte

bartonte

New member
Anyone know how the Landing gear retraction cable is attached in the wing. I need to change the eye fork holding the cable to the left gear strut. I assume that it can be threaded through. But not If there is a swag fitting on it.

My mechanic noticed how tight the cable was when we did the gear swing last annual. I did some measuring today and it has the wrong size eye fork. That wrong eye fork makes the cable 3/4 inch too short.

The cold temperature makes it hard to spend much time in the hangar.

Thanks for the help.

Tim
Rockford, IL
 
The cable is attached to a reinforced nose rib. They used a NAS1435 "fork" bolted to the rib. On the end
of the cable a MS 20164C "ball" is swedged. The ball rests in the fork. Pull the upper gear fairing off and you'll see this. Unbolt the fork and lower lug. Pull the fork out where the fairing was removed. Cut the cable and salvage the fork and lower lug. Using the proper length cable, swedge a new ball on one end. reinstall fork. Feed the other end back through the leading edge and reinstall lower lug. Reinstall both ends. Don't forget the little spring that takes up slack with the gear down.
Presto......you're done!
Dan
 
Thanks Dan

That was what I was afraid of. Was hoping to just replace the eye fork. You saved me from ordering the parts and then not being able to use them. How the wrong size eye fork was installed in the first place is beyond me. I bet the upper one is the wrong size too.

Tim
 
I'm pretty sure the club has the drawing of that attachment in the wing. If needed I can also root through my pile of drawings. Oh by the way, while you're doing this look at the drill stock reinforcement thats attached; that's what the cable pivots on and I have found several weird, and often ridiculous, replacements for that pivot.

Some people add a small turnbuckle to the cable to provide adjustment; I think that's unnecessary if the cable is made correctly and it adds mass to the cable out there in the wind. There's a home made drawing of that turnbuckle/cable at the club but I don't know why it would be an overall improvement.

The installation manual for the Petton wheel covers re-routed the cable and did employ a turnbuckle but it was used for keeping the strut length in specs for the modification which was required (?) for keeping the wheel doors in adjustment. They also used a metal pulley where the cable bent and increased the diameter of the cable. I don't see any point in mixing the factory method and a later STC modification.
 
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