Steel Bungee Install (1h 30m)

I recently decided there wasn’t enough work to do on the plane so it would be a good idea to replace a perfectly good part with a different one. Or at least that’s how it might seem with the idea to replace the nose gear’s corded bungee with a steel one. But I had two reasons for doing this. First, it seems like everyone hates the cord bungee because it breaks easily. Second, I could not turn my nose wheel at all using the pedals either on the ground or off the ground, and the steel bungee would remove that problem since it works exactly opposite to the cord: it doesn’t apply pressure to the nose gear block. You can read about the steel bungee at this link.

With the engine mount on, I had some fears that it would be hard to get the parts installed but it turned out to be not too bad. First off, I primed and painted the steel spring.

Here are the straps that hold it in place. Note the small nuts on the end, this caused me some confusion because the install pictures show a huge coupler being used and I thought I was missing them. I’ve since seen that the instructions have been updated with a note that there has been a change.

If you have a 701 you have to drill out the top of the nose gear but in the 750 a screwdriver under the plastic top does the trick.

A hole saw was then attached to the saddle so that it could be dropped into the hole so we could mark the strap holes. Some safety wire was used to make sure we didn’t lose it inside the nose gear.

A pencil inside the strap holes gave us a centre location and using a very long #30 drill bit we had some pilot holes.

A 1/4″ bit with an extension got us a bit closer to final size (looks like Allen snapped a cheeky action shot while I wasn’t looking)

and then the holes were enlarged to fit the straps.

The saddle rod went in next, it has to go in such that the bottom saddle rests on the internal cross tube inside the nose gear. The engine mount is in the way to prevent rod going in straight but there is enough give in the rod to bend it away from the frame and into position.

A lot of my friends talk about cutting the cord but I don’t think this is what they mean

At this point the plane needed to be supported

We removed the bungee so that we could drill two extra cotter pin holes which are used to keep the straps in place.

With the straps held in place, we pushed the pin back in, through each of them and cotter pinned. The plastic lining went in the hole next and then the spring. This was slightly difficult because the engine frame is in the way and so is the strap bolt on whichever direction you decide to move the spring to. But by holding the strap out a little you can bend the spring enough to go into the nose gear hole.

From there its a simple matter of putting the bolts on the straps and saddle and adjusting for tension. As a test Allen bounced the plane a couple of times and you could see the gear move up and down quite well against the spring. With the nose both off the ground and on the ground I can move it with my hands on the pedals quite freely, a massive improvement on how it was before. I should say though that we also ground the nose gear block down a little for more movement, and for full rudder deflection in the air. We also, this time, remembered to liberally grease the block before putting the gear back in.

All in all, I think a very worthwhile upgrade and while I didn’t have any experience with the cord I’m glad I did it.