REFLECTOR: Incident at PDK

[Chuck Jensen]

Don,
 
It's good to hear that things are in relatively good order---in the
whole scheme of things, fiberglass is easy to fix.  You didn't say which
runway it was, but if I was a betting man, I'd put my money on the
runway being 02/20?  With anything more than a light breeze out of the
west, a person is always in for a ride and with strong gusty
winds.....well!!  It must be the air tumbling over the buildings to the
west or somethings, but there's alway an interesting ride into 20.
People sit on the 2nd story balcony of the restaurant there and get
their entertainment watching GA aircraft attempt smooth landings.
There's always a groan when someone actually greases one, otherwise let
the ballooning, bouncing and porpoising begin.  Approach almost always
uses 20 for GA...sadists.
 
Regarding the shimmy you mentioned, I highly recommend Ken Mishler's
nose gear pin.  Works like a champ.  I believe its available through
Velocity, even though I bought mine direct from THE MAN.

Chuck Jensen 

-----Original Message-----
From: reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org] On
Behalf Of Donald Royer
Sent: Monday, May 14, 2007 11:37 PM
To: reflector at tvbf.org
Subject: REFLECTOR: Incident at PDK



Wednesday May 9 I made a VFR flight from Zephyrhills Florida to
Peachtree-Dekalb airport (PDK) in Atlanta. The problem occurred during
the landing. As shown in the report, there was a gusty wind and the air
was very turbulent. There were several other distracting factors that
are really not relevant to this report, and the net result was that I
made a hard landing. In retrospect, I feel that it was not all that hard
and I have had harder landings in the past without damage, but this time
the nose gear broke. One possible contributing factor may have been that
I was flying with the CG essentially at the aft limit and the resulting
nose high attitude may have caused the nose gear to slam down especially
hard, or maybe it was commutative fatigue from several severe cases of
shimmy in the past, but shimmy was not involved this time.
 
The initial break was about three inches above the fork, right in the
lower bend in the leg. That seems to me to be a rather strange place for
a break, but it is clear that that is what broke first. The broken end
of the leg then dug into the asphalt runway (it left about a three inch
hole in the runway) and this caused a second break. The second break was
in the weld at the top of the pivot bolt tube. When the plane came to
rest the stub of the leg was pointing backwards, and the nose of the
plane was on the ground.
 
The reason that the report says that it occurred on a taxiway is that
while sliding down the runway I came to a turnoff and turned off and
cleared the runway before it stopped. Of course, they still had to close
the runway while the nose wheel and fork were retrieved.
 
Epps Aviation retrieved the plane and let me work in their shop and
loaned me tools for the next two days. Other than the gear leg itself, I
was surprised at how little damage was done. There was the expected
cosmetic scrape on the bottom of the nose and the nose gear doors were
in sorry shape, but they were still attached. The pivot bolt bushings,
the captivator, and the canard bulkhead were all undamaged which I think
says good things about how tough these Velocities are. The only other
damage was to the tip of one prop blade which looks like it probably
struck the nose wheel. It doesn't look too bad and I think that it is
repairable, but I will want an expert opinion before I fly with it.
 
A new gear leg was overnighted up from Velocity. It has been installed
and the plane is back on it's wheels and tied down outside until I can
get back to finish getting it airworthy which should not take more than
about one more day. One thing that will have to be addressed at that
time is, that for reasons that I don't understand, the old fork doesn't
fit properly on the new leg. I can't tighten the Belleville washers.
 
One last thing. There has recently been a discussion here about bent
pivot bolts. This one had to be cut out. 
 
Donald Royer
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