Gear up Landing!

Today (April 11, 2005) I was finally able to go flying after an absence since Thanksgiving day. I'd changed my exhaust system, rebuilt my cowlings and made a few adjustments to my electrical system and time just hasn't been on my side lately. Anyway, after finally getting everything buttoned up and ready to go I did some taxi tests to get used to the plane again. The engine runs great after finding and fixing the air restriction in the fuel injection air intake. My static RPM is now 2350. At about 5:30pm this evening I decided to take flight and stay in the pattern to get a few landings under my belt and make sure the temps were looking good. I'd been running on the ground for a while so the oil temp was already a little high. I told the tower I'd be doing a couple of full stop landings and I took the active runway. Takeoff power was noticeably improved and climb out was excellent. No squawks other that higher than normal CHT's around 430. After reaching pattern altitude the oil temp was 230. Leveling off I saw a steady decrease in temps so I attributed the high temps to the extended ground runs. My first landing was a little hot and I didn't use the speed brake. I taxied back and was cleared for another lap around the pattern for landing. Temps were much better now - CHT's were 400 and oil was back to 210. After landing I taxied back to the active and requested a couple of touch and go's and was going to call it a day. I felt more and more comfortable with the plane the longer I flew and the next landing was a squeaker. I applied power for the go around, raised the gear after lift off and accelerated. I pulled up at the end of the runway for a high climb and was having a ball with all this power! And feeling pretty good about myself too! CHT's were high 300's and oil was now 190. I was cleared for another touch and go and had a couple of planes waiting at the threshold for me. As I crossed the threshold and set the mains down I held the nose off for a bit and then let it come down. I was already thinking of the takeoff. Then the weirdest sensation hit...

In all my days of flying I have always thought of myself as a well disciplined pilot. I've been careful to preflight and diligently run through the checklists. Today I screwed up. That sensation I felt was the nose continuing to fall to the runway because I had completely failed to do my landing checklist and hadn't lowered the nose gear. I was almost in a state of shock those last few milliseconds before the nose hit the runway. I knew what was coming and I just waited for it.

The plane slid for a couple of hundred feet I guess. I had landed hot again, not using the speed brake. For some reason I was thinking I should try to get the plane to the side of the runway so it would be easier to get cleared once I stopped. I had complete control and was able to steer it very well to the side of the runway. In hindsight this could have been a real problem. As I came to a stop a very light cloud of fiberglass dust entered the cockpit along with its familiar smell. The tower called me to see if I was OK and if I needed the fire trucks. Before answering I flipped the nose gear switch and the plane rose to its rightful position without hesitating. I called and said everything was fine and that I'd be able to clear the runway on my own power. I taxied ahead to the first turnoff and then made my way back to my tie down.

As I taxied back I was asking myself "What did I do wrong?" and of course the answer was immediate. I failed to fly the plane. I let myself get carried away in the moment and didn't go through the proper procedures. I had done the landing checklist on the three other landings but this time around I was completely caught up in how much fun I was having.

I stopped the plane and got out to look at the damage. The hockey puck is completely gone and the metal plate on the nose gear is gone as well. The nose bulkhead has been ground down about 3/8 to 1/2 inch and an area about 2 square feet of foam is exposed starting at the nose gear, 6 inches on each side of the gear opening and about 12 - 18 inches long. The nose gear strut was undamaged other than the front 6 inches of my gear door being ground off. I think the repair will go fairly quickly. And I'm very glad I didn't have fully retractable main gear. The repair to the nose will take a day - I'd hate to think what I'd be doing now if the whole belly of the plane had slid along the runway...

So I need to apologize for all those times I said a gear up landing wouldn't happen to me. I think I might have even said in the Cozy Canard Forum that a gear up landing is due to poor pilot skills by not following checklists. Boy, was I ever right. I feel pretty stupid now that its happened to me, but I thought I'd better share my stupidity and hopefully encourage others to remember to be diligent in flying your plane. Always do the landing checklist and don't rely on a warning device to keep you from making this mistake. I have the warning device and I never heard it if it did go off. I tested it on the ground afterward and it worked fine - maybe I just didn't hear it or maybe the fast landing didn't set it off as designed. In either case I was totally unaware of the situation until that sensation of the nose dropping too
far hit me.

Here are some pictures of the damage. I've already begun making arrangements for the repair and hope to be back flying within a couple of weeks.

As you can see from the damage pictures, the strut sustained some damage with the NG2 steel plate completing being ground/sheered off. Once that was gone the bare strut started to grind away. About 3/8" of the strut was removed and that made me a little uncomfortable. While probably all that was required was a layer or two of BID to strengthen the area up, I decided I wanted a new strut and ordered one from Featherlite the next day. I had it by the end of the week and started to make the two ply BID wraps. Dale Rogers kindly offered to help with the damage repair, so on Friday afternoon (4/15) we pulled the strut out and looked at what the repair to the nose would require. I measured the thickness of the foam that was removed and it turned out to be just a hair over 1/4" at the deepest point. The area where the nose bumper mounts (just forward of the F0 bulkhead, shown in the picture as the two small square shaped holes) would require a new plywood piece.  I decided the best and quickest fix would be to repair the entire area with 1/4" plywood with the edges sanded to match the curvature of the fuselage. Dale and I secured the nose of the plane on a saw horse and decided to meet the next morning at 10am for the repair.

Saturday the 12th was a slightly warm day (mid to upper 70's) which made it nice for glassing outdoors. I arrived a few minutes before Dale and started to sand off the paint around the perimeter of the damage about 2". Just as I finished that Dale showed up and we started to measure the plywood. We cut it out with a jig saw and laid in into the area for a test fit. It was going to be perfect. We decided to round the edges as best we could before floxing it in place. It took about 20-30 minutes to get a shape that looked reasonably right, so we then mixed up some flox and buttered the bare foam and bulkhead edges where the plywood would mate. We used a few finish nails to hold it in place while the flox cured and then did a few more minutes work getting the contour to match.

We cut two layers of BID cloth and glassed those to the plywood and surrounding glass that I had sanded paint from to get a nice overlapping joint. It was a bit difficult glassing upside down and before we finished my arm was pretty wet with epoxy. In all we spent 4 hours getting the repair complete and I went home to do some chores. Here is a picture of the repaired nose prior to final finishing and repainting. Some of the micro has been added to contour the nose, but not all.

While taking apart the old hardware (NG15, NG3, NG4, foot, etc) from the old strut I realized the steel parts were showing sighs of rust even though they had been painted black prior to attaching them. The strut was built probably 7 or 8 years ago, so I was concerned about reusing them. I looked at Jack Wilhelmson's web site - he makes a lightweight electric nose gear system similar to the one I had purchased from Steve Write. Jack sells the NG3 and foot parts made of stainless steel and I decided to order these to prevent the corrosion from reoccurring.  Jack also sells a new tapered roller bearing NG3 that is superior to the stock Brock part and should eliminate any wear of the nose gear hinge as is found on many EZ's. Since I had to rebuild the strut anyway, now would be a good time to replace my stock NG3 as well (even though I haven't noticed any wear yet). Well, this whole project came about because I forgot to lower the nose and it sure would be nice to have an automatic system to lower the nose if I should ever forget in the future. Wouldn't you know, Jack sells one of those too! OK, I should have stopped right there and said good enough, but Jack's gear extension motor is much lighter and compact than my Wright systems. I would be nice to get rid of a few pounds in the plane instead of always adding...but my system has worked fine and never given me a problem...But I'll have the plane apart anyway - why not just retrofit the whole system and take advantage of the prewired harness that Jack has for his system. I vacillated like this for a couple of days before finally deciding to give Jack a call. He had just returned from Sun and Fun but was willing to answer all my questions about the gear motor and auto retract system. I decided to order the whole package and sent him a check that afternoon. Jack told me I'd have to wait a week or so before my order would be ready to ship, so realizing it would be two weeks before I'd be working on the plane again, I decided to finish my backyard BBQ awning and paint the kitchen for my wife! To see the details of the new gear motor installation go here.

While I had the plane down for this repair, I took the opportunity to relocate my rudder pedals once more. The details can be seen here.

So, approximately 5 weeks after the gear up accident, the plane was flyable again after an extensive fix and upgrade.

Last Updated on August 29, 2005