9A main gear leg stuck in Weldment

The title pretty much says it all but here are the details. This past weekend I deburred and cleaned up the gear legs and weldment holes as best I could. I slid the legs into the weldment so I could ream the final holes size to .311. Well, the first leg went in a little tight as I expected. I lined up the hole and reamed the hole easily enough. However I couldn't get the leg to come out again. I have tried lots of penetrating oil and lots of effort (twisting the weldment around the leg) I have been able to move it out about a quarter of an inch but its getting harder and harder to move. Does anybody have any ideas as to what I can do to get this leg out? I considered a machine shop to see if they could press it out but I thought somebody here might have another idea.

The second leg went just fine and I was able to slide it in and out with little effort.

The sockets are precision honed for a close tolerance fit. If one is excessively tight it is often because of a small amount of contamination between the leg and socket (it only takes a little bit).

I recommend you do not continue rotating to try and get it out. That will usually just lock it up more.
I have had success with a large hammer (3 lb) and a large diam drift punch (bronze rod 3/4 to 1 inch diam). Having it pressed out would be another option if you can get the entire assembly out of the fuselage.

How about driving it out with a brass head rivet set from Avery #1038 on sale for $12? Or heating the weldment with heat gun and maybe some dry ice on the leg?

Awesome!

Wow, you know I never even considered using my rivet gun! That is a brilliant option. I will give it a try as soon as the rivet set arrives.

I knew somebody on this site would make my day!

Zuldarin said:

Wow, you know I never even considered using my rivet gun! That is a brilliant option. I will give it a try as soon as the rivet set arrives.

I knew somebody on this site would make my day!

Click to expand...

That is what I usually use but didn't mention it because the 3X (and particularly 2X) guns that most people have are a bit wimpy on something of this much mass (they work fine on stuck bolts)
I have a 4X that usually works. If you have access to a plain old air chisel, it might do better than a 3X rivet gun.

Heat and cold just before you hit it with the rivet gun. (As mentioned above)

Heat and Cold

Thanks again for the advice. I don't have a pneumatic chisel but I can get one. I have tried heating the weldment when the whole assembly had cooled down to about 40 degrees (no dry ice on the leg) and it just seemed to tighten up. Maybe adding the ice will do the trick.

Stuck legs

I used about a 2' length of 3/4" iron pipe inserted
into the base of leg. This lever used with a back and forth twisting
motion combined with a downward force did the trick. Use grease
next time when reinserting to protect the legs from rusting
Into the gear leg support.

Make sure that you put some grease on the gear legs before inserting them in the mounts. Clean shiney legs and mounts will cause galling of the leg and mount, the reason you cant get them out.