Mailing List lml@lancaironline.net Message #17020
From: Ian B. Crowe <ian.crowe@sympatico.ca>
Sender: Marvin Kaye <marv@lancaironline.net>
Subject: Front oleo castering
Date: Sun, 05 Jan 2003 18:56:05 -0500
To: <lml>
I have had my front oleo rebuilt by Lancair and it appears that it has excessive "Stiction"  that is a combination of inherent stickiness and friction.  This manifests itself in a tendency to overshoot the required rudder inputs to maintain a straight line on landing and take off. Has anyone had any problems here?  If so what did you do to solve it or improve it.  Today it would not caster at all on a lightly snow covered surface.  All it did was to skid over the snow in the straight ahead position.  The oleo was depressed enough to be out of the self centring device.
 
I have also found that the amount of pressure in the oleo is critical to ensure that the oleo comes out of the self centring feature when fully loaded by the weight of the plane, yet at the same time has enough pressure to firstly maintain an adequate extension and subsequently to engage the self centring device.
 
Another problem we have had is the fact that with the right tank about  1/4 full and the left tank full the amount of aileron input required to keep the wings level was quite high, even with the trim fully applied to raise the left wing.  I understand that we should not reach the situation with one tank full on the pilot's side and the other side empty.  Has anyone done the same thing and found the aileron control forces to be high?  It flew well with both tanks full so I am inclined to think that the situation should be avoided by better handling of the side to side fuel consumption.
 
Ian Crowe
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