best gear woods

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douwe blumberg
Posts: 25
Joined: Sun Mar 05, 2017 5:46 pm

best gear woods

Post by douwe blumberg »

Hi all,

question. what are some of the best woods for the "jenny" type gear V's?

and why...

Douwe
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taildrags
Posts: 637
Joined: Tue Mar 07, 2017 10:39 pm

Re: best gear woods

Post by taildrags »

Douwe;

Disclaimer: I've never built a set of the Jenny-style wood gear legs and my airplane doesn't have them, but they use hickory for axe handles because it's stronger and more flexible than white ash. Oak might be another wood choice for strength and flexibility. Those who have actually built gear legs and flown/landed with them will have better input than me but you got me to thinking about woods for this application.

Oscar Zuniga
Medford, OR
Air Camper NX41CC, A75 power
split gear/die springs
Tools
Posts: 32
Joined: Wed Feb 22, 2017 9:22 pm

Re: best gear woods

Post by Tools »

When I rebuilt 2RN’s gear, I used southern yellow pine from a pallet.

I think proper fitment, like the legs being the right thickness, or shims being added so a good tight fit is achieved is more important than the species.

I fly off very rough unimproved fields so did go with the SYP for its strength, which is equal to oak. I think spruce would be fine, which it was at first, if it fit well, which it didn’t.

Tools
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