Hi,
It appears to me that someone tried to make the gear / struts from scratch and gave up.
Most struts have a torque link design that keeps the ram (the rod with the nylon sleeves) in the main tube.
Check out the drawing in this link and you can see what I mean. How to lock the ram into the tube looks challenging. Not sure how Id go about that.

Is there a spring in the upper tube? Im guessing no.

http://www.robart.com/RoboStruts/Spa...arts/660SP.pdf

Cheers.