ORIGINAL: rcjets_63

Hey Sluggo,

Yeah, it was a bit of a hard touchdown at 1:38 and the plane bounced up in the air. The gear didn't collapse (which is always good) and the plane taxied back. If you check out the video at about 2:06, you get a head on view of the plane (see picture below). The wheels are tilted in about 12 degrees after that landing (the wheels in the unflown tiger-stripe model are vertical - see photo in post ) so the landing gear did sustain damage - likely bending of Strut 2 or the axle/housing.

Of course, no landing gear can be built strong enough to repeatedly absorb the worst landings we can all do on our bad-landing days (and I certainly have had a few of those). However, the design of this gear is fundementally not very strong as it relies on a single a small pin to to transfer all vertical forces from landing. While it didn't shear in this video, there was other damage to the gear and it's quite possible that the lugs (through which the pin fits) which are made of aluminum, would be damaged as well not to mention any damage done to the upper part of the gear (the retract shaft and the retract downlock/mechanism).

Regards,

Jim