The working height was set to make it easy for me to stand outside and reach in, but that wasn't high enough to allow inserting either the mains or the nose gear.
My plan was to raise the fuse by alternately lifting the fuse so I could shim the aft support, then using that as a lever to raise the forward fuse so I could shim the forward support. By alternately working forward and aft and using some 2 x 6's I had, I was able to raise the whole fuse about 4", which gave enough clearance to install the main gear legs.
The thin stuff on top is some 1" pink foam insulation from the hardware store. I was also using that as a support when I pushed on the aft fuselage from below to lift it high enough to slide in the shims.
Forward shims. At this point I was high enough to get the gear leg in, as you can just see in the upper right corner of the picture.
Gear legs being installed. I did have to shim it a bit higher after this to give me space to put the wheels on.
The axle had to be polished a bit. No corrosion since I've had it stored in my shop which is dry and clean, but there was something on the surface (protectant) that I needed to polish off so the inner mount and bearings would slide on.
Parts out and ready to start assembly. The wheels and brakes that came with the kit are Matco single piston units. Ken Stitt told me he was very disappointed with the braking performance on his RV-7 and switched to Grove dual piston units. My A/C is a bit lighter and a bit slower, so I'll give these a try. The Groves are a simple upgrade if these don't work like I want.
Starting to assemble the wheel.
Brake caliper. Took me a while to figure out how all the bits went together.
The inboard support bracket needed to be reamed - there was powder coating in the hole and it was a tiny bit undersize. I also had to run crocus cloth through the through hole in the axle to get the bolt to slide into place.
Everything assembled. I don't know if these brakes are different than the originals specified on the plans, but I had to remove some material from the wheel pant bracket to allow clearance for the upper arm of the brake caliper unit.
Axle bolts. The come pre drilled for cotter pins and also have the nutplate already installed to provide a place to mount the outboard wheel pant support bracket.
Installed and ready to go. Once it's torqued, you need to drill the axle for the cotter pin.
Starting on the nose gear mount. I didn't think to ream this hole out when I installed the motor mount, so I had to get creative trying to enlarge it enough to get the bolt in. I couldn't get any sort of drill in there (even an angle drill), so I used my drill bit and a pair of vise grips to enlarge it by hand. Worked surprisingly well.
Bearings for the nose wheel prior to packing. I just pack them by hand.
I asked Nick what kind of grease to use and he told me he uses high quality marine grease to resist corrosion, so I followed his lead. We'll see how well that works.
Nose wheel before installing the tire.
And here is a shot of how everything goes together.
Nose gear fork installed below the upper limit stop. There are two holes on the upper side of the yoke that will receive a pair of allen screws that provide the limit stop action. They allow the gear to rotate to about a 90 degree angle, but no further.
Everything more or less assembled. I still hadn't set the breakout force on the yoke yet because I didn't have a spring scale at the time. I did that yesterday afternoon after picking up a scale.
Starting to look like an actual airplane.
