Month number 2...

I haven't really got a lot done this month due to to being busy with other things in my life such as working on the house and getting some new dogs. Its been just over a year since we lost our precious little dog Chloe who was 18 when she died in her sleep after a long illness. We still haven't got over the loss but the 2 new ones should help. We picked them both up from the RSPCA and the border collie cross, Ki-Ki, is approx 12 months old and the little fox terrier cross, Sooty, is 10 and a half years old. Ki-Ki was found wandering the streets and Sooty was surrendered by her owners as they were moving into an apartment that didn't allow dogs. How you can hand in your pet after 10 and a half years has got me beat but humans will be humans.



Anyway onto the Searey. I have spent a lot of time on the electric landing gear this month trying to modify it for a couple of different reasons. I mentioned last month that I wasn't happy with the amount of over centre with the gear fully extended. (see photo below)

Click photo to enlarge
Even though the electric actuators would hold the legs from collapsing in the event of a bumpy landing etc, its really not the correct way to engineer it. I am also not happy with the possibility that the retraction bar would be pushed into the lower bulkhead if a microswitch failed when the gear is retracted possibly warping or breaking something... not a nice thing to happen in flight! See photo below to get a better idea of what I mean...

>Click photo to enlarge
After both sides were assembled and operational I called another local Searey builder, Paul Williams, to have a look at it and get his opinion. Paul has a lot of engineering experience having invented and patented a unique drying furnace among other things and of course building his own Searey. He suggested we check out how much travel the actuators have in each direction so we can establish if we can move the bracket on the retraction bar to get not only more over centre, but at max extension to make sure it will hit the internal limit clutch before deforming the bulkhead or breaking something else. After a preliminary measure up we now believe this is achievable.

In March I will be making new stainless steel brackets that attach to the retraction bars to see if I can achieve the above result. Unfortunately these modifications hold up the building of the rest of the Searey but it is well worth it to get such an important part of the aircraft as good as possible. There has been many cases of Searey undercarriages failing on either landing or taxiing so I am determined to make sure mine is not one of them.

Will update this blog when the gear is modified to my satisfaction.