Friday morning I had a part time sim side job cancel at the last minute, so out to the aiport to RVate!!!! BEAUTIFUL Wx after three days of drizzle. Warming up on the ramp a Bellanca Viking flew down the runway at 5 feet, talking to another plane somewhere else on the field. After a few moments I figured out they were trying to see if the nosegear was down and locked. Well, I'm the only one warming up with a skill set that might be useful, so.... "Hey Viking, RV on the ramp with 500 hours of formation if you want an in-flight inspection." Reply: "I've got a few thousand myself, please come up!"
The nose gear door blocked some of the view from the side in the normal parade position, but going a little acute solved that, and I could see the right pieces of strut were correctly overcenter and locked. "Looks locked to me." His wife in the pax seat was taking pictures - her first formation it turns out <grin>. They broke off, landed, and said everything was fine on the rollout over the radio. Fifteen minutes later when I was on downwind I saw where they were pushing their plane back in their hangar, so I drove over after landing. Turns out their gear deployed uncommanded and they didn't get a lock light on the nosegear. Yikes! He said he was a T-38 IP in a former life and they were on their way to a lunch when the gear came out on its own. They returned to the field and orbited, calling on the radio for eyeballs. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Got to do something productive!!!! Special thanks again to the ex-USAF and NAVY aviators on my field who taught me formation all those years ago. That and the value of keeping my mouth closed until I had information they could use (and didn't currently have).
At lunch another Viking owner on our field said that uncommanded gear deployment isn't uncommon on older Bellancas, and that a newer power pack design fixes that. He had it done on his.
A good RV flight... ;^)
The nose gear door blocked some of the view from the side in the normal parade position, but going a little acute solved that, and I could see the right pieces of strut were correctly overcenter and locked. "Looks locked to me." His wife in the pax seat was taking pictures - her first formation it turns out <grin>. They broke off, landed, and said everything was fine on the rollout over the radio. Fifteen minutes later when I was on downwind I saw where they were pushing their plane back in their hangar, so I drove over after landing. Turns out their gear deployed uncommanded and they didn't get a lock light on the nosegear. Yikes! He said he was a T-38 IP in a former life and they were on their way to a lunch when the gear came out on its own. They returned to the field and orbited, calling on the radio for eyeballs. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Got to do something productive!!!! Special thanks again to the ex-USAF and NAVY aviators on my field who taught me formation all those years ago. That and the value of keeping my mouth closed until I had information they could use (and didn't currently have).
At lunch another Viking owner on our field said that uncommanded gear deployment isn't uncommon on older Bellancas, and that a newer power pack design fixes that. He had it done on his.
A good RV flight... ;^)
Last edited: