Piper Lance II gear does not retract properly

R

Remmy

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Jul 26, 2020
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Rem
Dear all,

i am flying a PA32RT300 Lance II and I am constantly facing an issue with the retractable gear. When after departing I put the gear selector „up“, „sometimes“ the gear either retracts as it should (ca. 10 sec). But in more cases it acts „weird“... In some cases, NOTHING happens when selecting „gear-up“, i.e. 3-greens, no red operation light, not gear movement... In other cases the red gear-up-light goes on with still 3-green lights... either nothing happens for a while (2-5 min) before the 3 green lights disappear and also the red light goes off. Or the gear starts retracting veeery slowly and finishes the operation within 1-3minutes... in this case, one after the other green lights goes off, but never in the same order/sequence... In other words... it sometimes takes forever and obviously one or more wheels are still not fully retracted. Not a very pleasant status especially during take-offs when the workload is anyway high... not to talk about the flight performance with gear-down... This always happens in flight/operation as during annuals,the gear works perfect... I had my plane in the shop, powerpack was replaced, some relay was replaced and pipes were cleaned... powerpack seems to work (hard to hear during departure but Amp-meter shows high activity while activated)... auto-extender is removed so I can NOT override the air-switch-system anymore to check... as I would like to avoid the mechanics to spend (expensive) hours Performing „try-and-error“ I am wondering if you might have an idea... my next move would be to have the pressure switch checked (as this seems to be the only part not being replaced)... do you know, if the system still carries and operates the diaphragm even though the auto-extender was removed ? I very much appreciate any of your ideas... please help ! Thank you
 
Sounds like you need someone familiar with Piper retractable aircraft. Wouldn't hurt for you as the owner to get a maintenance manual with wiring diagrams and do some learning/troubleshooting on your own. There are specific forums that can be a resource, like Cherokee Chat.

Good luck.
 
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Hey, I’m in a similar boat, totally different plane, Commander. My gear goes down fine, up sometimes, at times nothing for 1+ minute, etc, very similar to your description.

‘They’ say, the actual gear up switch(attached to handle) is robust & unlikely, I have a spare. My pump & hydraulic system seems fine, checked. I think connections are called ‘Molex’ in various places, checked as able, some taken apart, cleaned, dielectric greased. Various solenoids were replaced.

Right now one of the last suspects is my ‘up pressure switch’. I have a replacement inbound, depending on the type they can be hard to source. I’d think easier for your model.
 
Hmmm... thanks for sharing your situation... really sounds very familiar even though it’s a different plane... good luck !! To both of us...
 
One thing you might want to do is connect the aircraft to a vehicle with jumper cables so the voltage is higher during the ground swings. The voltage in the system will be closer to the voltage during flight when the issues occur as opposed to battery voltage.

We recently had an aircraft whose gear would fail to come down in flight unless cycled. It was totally fine and worked 100% of the time using just aircraft battery power on the ground. The minute we hooked up ground power the gear wouldn’t drop.
 
WAG over the net. Think "Hoof Valve". :)
 
This sounds like a worn hydraulic seal bypassing fluid. It only takes one O-ring in one actuator to do it. I've encountered it myself.
 
Does your Lance II have the Backup Gear Extender system installed like earlier Lances? If so, it sounds like the system may be keeping it from going up after takeoff until you get to higher speeds. Pull the lever all the way up and lock it into the Override position and see if it continues to happen.
 
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