bildan wrote:
On Jun 24, 10:28 pm, cavelamb wrote:
Dan wrote:
Drew Dalgleish wrote:
On Wed, 24 Jun 2009 08:13:28 -0500, Dan wrote:
I'm looking for a simple design for nose wheel steering for
retractable gear. Any ideas?
Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired
Have you considered just having a castering nosewheel? That's what I
have on my floats and it works pretty well steering with the brakes.
Yes, differential braking is probably the simplest method. I'm not
discarding it, just poking around at options.
Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired
Thisis an interesting pic.

http://www.infinityaerospace.com/Oriion_TS_gear.jpg
Not a lot of detail there, but the steerable strut seems to poke thru the top
and would meet with a steering link (tiller/thingie) there.

I keep thinking about the "T-Bar" idea. If the rudder pedals had
control horns extending below the pedals hinge line with push rods
attached that extended forward to ball bearing rollers that pushed on
the right and left of the "T-Bar", that would provide the reverse
action to make the steering work right.

A push on the right pedal would pull back the push rod and roller
attached to it and the left pedal would push it's pushrod and roller
forward to turn the "T-Bar" to the right. When the gear was
retracted, the pushrods wouldn't have anything to push on.

If the nose gear strut was directly below the pedals, the pedals could
just have "spurs" with rollers on them.

Here's my fantasy design. Two tiny motorbike master cylinders, one on
each rudder pedal, and one slave cylinder on a horn each side of the
nose wheel.
Then the wheel could rotate and retract, and the hose pipes from brake
flexibles, would just flex. (Difficult to make this light enough, I
imagine.)

Brian W