RC India

I wanted to build lightweight landing gear and all i have now is stainless steel 2mm bicycle spokes.

Rods required should be around 1.5mm diameter. Is this enough for a 150gm plane? Or do i need thicker rods for this?

Any other lightweight but as equivalent strength and bendable material i can use for landing gear?

Wire inside casing of old discarded cycle tire, from any puncture wallah.

I have used 1.5mm spring steel rods (Push rods on Kinetic Hobbies) for landing gear on a 250gm plane and they work very well. However it's a two piece design, like in the Avispad (http://www.rcindia.org/electric-planes/avispad-from-depronbiofoam-(auw-680gms)/).

Thanks vishal bhaiya and kk sir, 
Ill buy the spring steel from you vishal bhaiya, its removable landing gear so needs to be strong material because the landing gear isnt permanently attached to fuse it will bend easily.

try an old umbrella - some of the finest 1.5-2 mm spring steel wire.

cycle spokes bend too easily

Will try that too sir thank you :salute:

Go to any spring manufacturing unit in your industrial area. They can make & give you under carriage according to your specification.
Regards,

@rcneil21
Pl see this.
http://www.rcindia.org/tools-materials-and-building-techniques/undercarriage-for-models-under-1kg/msg193614/#msg193614 (http://www.rcindia.org/tools-materials-and-building-techniques/undercarriage-for-models-under-1kg/msg193614/#msg193614)

Hope it helps.
Regards

for 150 gms plane cycle spoke or rickshaw spoke(heavy duty) is enough. just 2-3 rupees.
Ive used it in planes upto 500gms with no issues.
Anything more will actually add weight to the plane..

Ashok.P

Thank you KK sir.
Ashok sir i was advised not to use cycle spokes because it is too heavy, i havent compared it to lighter landing gear material so couldnt understand the difference.

Firefox cycles have spokes that are lightweight and super strong, the are powder coated in black so gives false notion of it being carbonfiber. Unfortunately their store didnt have any available, because the tires are manufactured by kenda and arent supplied with spare spokes.

21 gms. Pl see my UC thread.

for 4-6 inches they wont weigh much. that's the max length you are going to use if im not wrong.
the weight penalty is worthy than the endless search for spring steel wires in my opinion.

Ashok.P

Kinetic hobbies carries 1.5 mmx300 mm spring steel rods i am buying from them.

Thank you everyone for helping me out, especially KK Iyer sir.

Really appreciate it a lot :bow: