I believe that Scott is 100% on-point here.  You need to make sure that the actuator is not pushing on the gear when fully extended -- the gear cylinder must fully bottom out.  Same when retracted, although that's a little more obvious since the wheel will be in the wrong spot.  Scott's approach is good.  You pressurize the system and make sure that you can slip the connecting bolt through.  I mention pressurized since the cylinders are slightly longer when hydraulic pressure forces the rod to one end.  The connection of the end plug to the barrel has some "give".  I did this and had to remanufacture my spacer sleeves to make it all work.

 

One thing that was not mentioned, which I contributed to the ancient paper LML which Jim and Linda Frantz administered before Marv, is that the nose gear also needs to be able to swing freely when the gas strut and hydraulic cylinders are disconnected.  The 320 has a bolt which pulls the nose strut mounting blocks together, and there is a sleeve which goes over the bolt to set the spacing between the blocks.  If the sleeve is too short, the blocks are too close and there is too much pressure on the pivot bearings, creating friction which resists nose gear delpoyment.  The actuator can push through this friction but the gas strut cannot.  The failure mode here is a secondary extension mechanism that will not do its job.

- Rob Wolf