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TB20 Gear failure

We all enjoy poring over other pilot’s emergencies, well this time I have one of my own:

A landing-gear failure is something you train for but hope never happens… Yesterday on the second of three planned flights to dust off the COVID cobwebs, my landing gear failed to deploy at Lee-On-Solent EGHF

I heard the gear motor but the ‘locked-safe’ greens didn’t come on though the TEST button lit them- I asked Lee Tower to check, but they told me the wheels were NOT down at all. The motor had failed and the circuit breaker would not reset.

Heading home for Shoreham, EGKA, slowed down and pulled the Emergency Landing Gear release. I felt the gear drop but still no “greens”. Gave the plane a good shake and managed to lock both main gear down but the nose wheel remained stubbornly stuck. Flew low past Shoreham Tower who could see the nosewheel was unlocked at about a 30degree angle and looked askew.

I was lucky to have a very expert Training Captain (Terrence) in the right hand seat, who advised against any more extreme manoeuvres lest we dislodged the gear we did have, so we prepared for a landing without nose gear, knowing we’d plough a furrow with the front cowling but live to fly another day.

We chose the (Notammed closed) runway 24 Grass as the wind was 230/17kt -perfect for a low slow approach and a gentle spark-free scrape.

Shoreham ATC swung into action asking us to hold nearby while they cleared a huge digger/crane from the top of the dyke at the end of the runway and prepared emergency services.

An alarming blue light reception committee assembled below – four fire trucks a heavy rescue tender, an ambulance, a critical care car and a policeman (with a breathalyser.)

Cabin secured, hat on and safety harness padded with my jacket for the sudden stop…

“Final, two greens”… The approach was low and slow, skimming the top of the dyke at 49kts ground speed, Terrence cut the engine and fuel while I stalled as gently as I could onto the main gear keeping the nose up, up, up, immediately hit a bump, sagged back onto the grass, nose still skyward, keeping straight with rudders, then rolling out for the inevitable crunch…

The crunch never came! Without me realising, the nose wheel had bounced down, up again then snapped down and locked when we hit the bump in the grass, so we lowered gracefully onto it using less than a third of the runway.

By the time the nose came down, the prop had just stopped windmilling, but only just. Horizontal as luck would have it.

The chasing fire crews screeched up to us high-fiving and incredulously congratulating us – everybody had seen the nose wheel swinging in the breeze when we landed!

Terrence and I had lunch and a pint, then found the engineers at KB already had the plane on jacks and tested and they were on the hunt for a new gear motor, the original having provided thousands of landings over 28 years.

I can’t express my gratitude for the calm proficient way Shoreham ATC and Rescue services put their emergency plan into practice… Had the expected outcome happened there’s literally nowhere I’d have felt safer.

Grateful as I am for the £12 land-in-a-field places I love to visit, the value Shoreham give for £24.30 plus VAT is beyond compare – even if I did only use a third of the runway this time 😉

Here are a couple of videos on Facebook

Videos on Facebook…

And some pictures of the reception committee :



TB20 IR(R) 600hrs
EGKA Shoreham, United Kingdom

Well done! Great outcome. Congrats.

EDDS , Germany

What a fantastic outcome, and fantastic story.
I was on the edge of mu seat, and as a fellow owner my heart was pumping too.
Congratulations on all angles of this.
Well done!

United Kingdom

Very well done! Thank you for sharing!

always learning
LO__, Austria

What a great outcome! Watching the video is amazing. If you hadn’t raised the noise that little bit after initial touchdown the wheel couldn’t have bounced into position!

Did you take the time you had to read the POH section before attempting the landing? I ask because it’s something that I’d never have thought to do until I saw another pilot do it. If you’ve two pilots onboard and plenty of time, it’s worth pulling out the poh and reading the relevant emergency section to see if there is any more advice than what you remember in the stressful situation. You never know what nugget you might find in there!

EIWT Weston, Ireland

@dublinpilot

Yes, “read the POH” is excellent advice and indeed I would have, except I haven’t flown for nearly nine months until this week due COVID and moving house so I JUST this week revised the emergency procedures, and particularly landing gear as the plane has been in use by my partner for IR renewal and recently had a failed gear relay.

I’ve previously done the emergency gear release successfully as a drill and will
Have another try when the gear motor is fixed to be certain the nosewheel is free. Why it wouldn’t lock this time is not yet established.

Looking back, I wish I’d gone beyond the POH and tried to lock the nose gear down by manouvering in an actual stall with the wind behind us… but that said we’d manouvered to the edge of comfort to lock down the mains and I strongly agreed with my passenger’s point that better to have a known 2 gear landing than risk further damage or unlocking the mains.

Our engineer thinks I’d probably have got it locked if I had kept trying.

Hard to say… from the video it looked like it took a proper jolt to bounce it in.

Interestingly I have an old friend who says he had the identical failure in a TB20 at Biggin years ago and his front gear also locked on touchdown!

Last Edited by NealCS at 14 May 16:41
TB20 IR(R) 600hrs
EGKA Shoreham, United Kingdom

Congrats, that video is amazing! Well done. From your description I take it the TB20 does not have a manual extension procedure, IOW freefall is the only option?

Congratulations Neal on such an excellent outcome. I will remember that trick should my TB20 gear fail in this way in the future.

Just glad I flew home in my TB20 first this afternoon before reading this. It was strange to hear the tower asking if I had the gear down on final – I haven’t heard that for a while. Maybe they read about your experience today.

As you say, it makes a huge difference when you have a problem to be able to land at a fully equipped airfield with trained staff.

@172driver – the TB20 has an emergency gear release lever (more like a knob that pulls a cable) that basically just releases the hydraulic pressure holding the gear in the retracted position. You must then rock the aircraft a little to entice the wheels to lock down, helped by the pressure in the oleos. There isn’t any manual pump mechanism.

Last Edited by DavidC at 14 May 19:29
FlyerDavidUK, PPL & IR Instructor
EGBJ, United Kingdom

Well done Neal and thank you for your great report!

Yes there are lots of GA airfields where this sort of thing could easily total the plane.

The TB20/21 has no manual gear pump but it has a valve which bleeds the pressure in the system and the main gear drops under its own weight (unless poorly lubricated – a very long story in TB circles) while the nose gear uses two gas struts which are a “mandatory replacement” on every Annual (but many people don’t do that – another long story in TB circles, especially as they are only about 30 quid each).

Greasing the gear well is crucial.

Because the nose gear extends into the airflow, you have to fly slowly to make it lock. I don’t recall what the POH says (IIRC it is 80kt or so) but a TB20 can easily fly at 60kt, especially for a short time.

The videos here indicate when the pump may need changing or repairing, but you see that only on jacks, which you won’t see if it is done without you present.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Thanks for those links Peter

From memory the recommended Airsoeed is 97kt IAS

-Quick check of POH and relieved to say memory serves correctly :)

We were well below that over the fence and nose down but still no joy.

TB20 IR(R) 600hrs
EGKA Shoreham, United Kingdom
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