Avid Stretch Landing Gear

[OLDMNSX 3]

Gentlemen,

On a stretched Avid where do we want the landing gear axel in relation to the wing leading edge, with a level fuselage?  Who out there has a flying stretched Avid Flyer?  If you are using the stock gear or other gear, how are the handling characters?  I am going to do the Randy Tyler 18" stretch on my B Model (modified), using an APEX engine. When I make my gear made should I put the axel plumb with the leading edge, 1" forward, etc?  Placement of the axel will effect a lot of things, tail heaviness for ground handling, getting the tail up on takeoff, nose heaviness on landing using heavy breaking and could also increase propensity for ground looping.  

My old Luscombe 8A with a C-65 had very nice ground handling characteristics, I sold it and purchased a 8E with a C-85 which was much more nose heavy and more sensitive to Rudder input with the mains on the ground.  

Thanks to all of you who contribute to this forum. "Without all of you and your experience, the rest of us would have to reinvent the wheel"

Thanks, Brad

[SuberAvid 617]

Hi Brad,

I built the bungee gear for my Avid+ and the cabane gear for it now, and will use the bungee gear on the Mini Plus.  Both are built from the same jig I built using the Airdale wide gear as the template to position the axles in relationship to the fuselage, which I am pretty sure positions the axle in the same place as the original Avid stock tail dragger gear.  I flew the Airdale gear on my Avid MKIV and also on my Avid+ and now have flown both of the tall bungee gear and the taller cabane gear.  The axle position seems to be very good to me; not too far forward that your tail is extremely heavy but far enough to allow for good braking. The Mini+ is pretty much identical in fuselage length to the Avid+ so I expect it to handle very much the same.

Hope that helps.  If you need the horizontal dimension from the leading edge of the wing to the center line of the axle I can get that for you.

Randy