Emergency Gear Crank Cable 560247-501.

[captfrank]

Can't tell what to do except just ensure your maintenance person does not retighten the Aluminum nut too tight and break it when reinstalling. See picture attached.

[Guest]

21 hours ago, Ragsf15e said:

This is another part that scares me. At least Mooney recently made a batch of intake boots, but this cable is grounding if it’s bad and there’s nowhere to get one?!

Another part for Mooney to work on.  @Jonny

[captfrank]

 

Emergency Gear Crank Cable 560247-501 for 1977 Mooney M20J (same as on electric gear M20C-M20F)

Help! Does anybody have this part with the outer sleeve intact? Often the shaft gets messed up, but the sleeve is intact. My sleeve is bad due to a cracked nut, but the shaft is good. My mechanic says we simply need a new sleeve, and he will remove the roll pin from the fitting on the end and replace the shaft into a replacement sleeve. My search for a complete replacement is not paying off.  The picture shows a messed up shaft, but apparently a good sleeve. My sleeve has the bad nut. I will pay, of course, if I can use it.

Frank

Broken nut on Gear crank cable 560247.501.pdf

[N201MKTurbo]

I hate to suggest a less than perfect solution, but that nut only holds the cable I place and doesn’t need to be tight. The cable in my 77 J doesn’t have wrench flats, just ridges for finger tightening. If you were to put that cable on finger tight and than do some creative lock wiring to hold it in place, it should be OK. Of course verify the emergency extension works, even while pulling on the cable after lock wiring it. Make sure it disengages in all conditions too. 

[captfrank]

Rich:

That is good to know information. Does yours with the knurled nut for finger tightening have accommodations for wire tieing? 

Thanks, Frank

[N201MKTurbo]

4 hours ago, captfrank said:

Rich:

That is good to know information. Does yours with the knurled nut for finger tightening have accommodations for wire tieing? 

Thanks, Frank

No it doesn’t. What I was suggesting is putting a few wraps around the cable and tie it to somewhere on the disconnect mechanism to do the job of the nut.

[N201MKTurbo]

Well yesterday I was finishing my landing gear inspection and the last item was the emergency extension. At about turn 50 the crank quit turning. The cable is FUBAR! 

I'm going to try to fix it. I found the magic search words Flexible Shaft Core.

[Ragsf15e]

22 minutes ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Well yesterday I was finishing my landing gear inspection and the last item was the emergency extension. At about turn 50 the crank quit turning. The cable is FUBAR! 

I'm going to try to fix it. I found the magic search words Flexible Shaft Core.

Well, I do feel sorry for you. But I also know you’ll find a way to fix it. Probably legally too, so this might help the rest of us out! 

[N201MKTurbo]

2 hours ago, Ragsf15e said:

Well, I do feel sorry for you. But I also know you’ll find a way to fix it. Probably legally too, so this might help the rest of us out! 

I hope so…

[N201MKTurbo]

OK, Here is what I know now.

My cable is jammed in the housing and there is no way to get it out.

I was able to harvest the ends by cutting the core about 2 inches back from the ends, clamping the core tightly in a vise and using a claw hammer to pull them off. I opened up the crimps by clamping a 3/16 drill bit into the vise and tapping the ends gently onto the butt end of the bit, then pulling them off the bit with the claw hammer a few times until they came off easily.

The housing is SS White PN#  HC103 bare metal 0.297 housing. The core is SS White HS107 0.187 CW core. FWIW SS WHite invented the flexible shaft for a dental rotary tool (drill) in the 1870s. Their main business is still mainly dental bits and burrs and other dental supplies. But their side gig is speedometer cables.

The end ferrules are standard, but the nuts are not. A standard speedometer nut is 5/8-18 these cables are 5/8-26. I will harvest the ferrules and nuts and re-use them. 

The ends are a bit unique. They were obviously made from standard involute spline shafting and couplings. The problem is I cannot find this size anywhere! It is the ISO Involute spline standard with an OD of 0.300" with 12 splines. I can find 1/4 inch and 3/8 inch, but no 0.3"

So the housing and core should be here next Wednesday. I will use the existing ends and ferrules and re-crimp them on the new core and housing. I'll let you know how it comes out.

Wish me luck... 

 

[N201MKTurbo]

One thing that occured to me for the folks with stripped splines. You could punch the roll pin out of the spline shaft. Have a machinist drill a new hole in the bad end and flip the shaft and re-pin it.

I normally wouldn't suggest these kinds of repairs, but these things are made of unobtainium and there is no other choice. 

I did find quite a few machine shops that can make these spline shafts, either rolled or cut. 

[Ragsf15e]

3 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

One thing that occured to me for the folks with stripped splines. You could punch the roll pin out of the spline shaft. Have a machinist drill a new hole in the bad end and flip the shaft and re-pin it.

I normally wouldn't suggest these kinds of repairs, but these things are made of unobtainium and there is no other choice. 

I did find quite a few machine shops that can make these spline shafts, either rolled or cut. 

Could the machine shops make enough to make yours work?  Definitely opp?

Did you happen to ask Mooney just to see what they say?

Good luck, we’re all counting on you!

[captfrank]

This is a follow-up to my prior posts concerning the broken nut on the cable due to, I believe, the mechanic overtightening the nut. My cable was fine. I took the unit to a quality machine shop known by another aviation mechanic (AI). The results are in the picture. A new nut was machined and slid on the cable. The opening for the nut to slide over the ferrule was larger than the original. Pins were inserted in the back of the nut to close the gap.

See the pictures. One is of the broken nut, and the others are of the new nut.

Much trouble for me from a hamfisted mechanic.

Frank

 

[Fly Boomer]

On 4/28/2023 at 8:33 PM, captfrank said:

This is a follow-up to my prior posts concerning the broken nut on the cable due to, I believe, the mechanic overtightening the nut. My cable was fine. I took the unit to a quality machine shop known by another aviation mechanic (AI). The results are in the picture. A new nut was machined and slid on the cable. The opening for the nut to slide over the ferrule was larger than the original. Pins were inserted in the back of the nut to close the gap.

See the pictures. One is of the broken nut, and the others are of the new nut.

Much trouble for me from a hamfisted mechanic.

Frank

Man, that is some creative repair work.  Congratulations. 

[N201MKTurbo]

So the saga of cable repair continues. I received the new cable housing last week and it was perfect. I received the cable core today and it is the wrong direction. It is what is called left hand lay cable, I need right hand lay cable. It turns out that Record Technologies in Canada where I bought the core, is actually the manufacturer of the cable. They bought the SS White cable division. They discontinued manufacturing the right hand lay 0.187 cable 5 years ago. Nobody makes it any more. So, I'm kind of screwed. 

But then I discovered that weed wackers use a 5mm right hand lay drive cable. It is only 0.009" bigger and it fits in the housing. I'm trying to find out who sells it in bulk. 

[EricJ]

2 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

So the saga of cable repair continues. I received the new cable housing last week and it was perfect. I received the cable core today and it is the wrong direction. It is what is called left hand lay cable, I need right hand lay cable. It turns out that Record Technologies in Canada where I bought the core, is actually the manufacturer of the cable. They bought the SS White cable division. They discontinued manufacturing the right hand lay 0.187 cable 5 years ago. Nobody makes it any more. So, I'm kind of screwed. 

But then I discovered that weed wackers use a 5mm right hand lay drive cable. It is only 0.009" bigger and it fits in the housing. I'm trying to find out who sells it in bulk. 

You could add gear cables to your list of stuff to make on PMA, along with the intake boots!

[N201MKTurbo]

2 hours ago, EricJ said:

You could add gear cables to your list of stuff to make on PMA, along with the intake boots!

I wish, when I actually retire and they quit bugging me about microscopes that don't focus perfectly all the time...

[Ragsf15e]

What do you guys think would happen if someone ordered one of these from Mooney?

[N201MKTurbo]

1 hour ago, Ragsf15e said:

What do you guys think would happen if someone ordered one of these from Mooney?

I would imagine that Mooney would order one from Dukes and Dukes would say they don't make them anymore.

[N201MKTurbo]

I found a company in China that sells 3/16 CW RHL flex drive core. They only advertise 1m lengths. I contacted them and asked if I ordered two if I could get it as a 2m length. They said No Problem. So it should be here on Tuesday. They market it for RC boat propeller drive cables. I had a brother in law that was into RC boats. Those things are brutal on their drive shafts. Those boats will spin those shafts more in 30 seconds then the life of a Mooney emergency retract cable. 

[Ragsf15e]

24 minutes ago, N201MKTurbo said:

I found a company in China that sells 3/16 CW RHL flex drive core. They only advertise 1m lengths. I contacted them and asked if I ordered two if I could get it as a 2m length. They said No Problem. So it should be here on Tuesday. They market it for RC boat propeller drive cables. I had a brother in law that was into RC boats. Those things are brutal on their drive shafts. Those boats will spin those shafts more in 30 seconds then the life of a Mooney emergency retract cable. 

Maybe you should have bought 10m and gone into business?!  This one is spooky because there’s not much of a workaround if you can’t get this part.

[N201MKTurbo]

Here is the old cable and the new housing with the new core that is wound the wrong way.

[N201MKTurbo]

One funny thing, Record Technologies who manufacturers this stuff has this Special Grease to use to grease the cables when you assemble them. If you go to their website they sell small containers of this grease. In small print on the labels is "Aeroshell 22"

[N201MKTurbo]

I have the crank assembly out and it turned kinda hard. I took it all apart, cleaned and re-greased it with Record Technologies Special Grease and it spins like a top now.

[Hank]

59 minutes ago, N201MKTurbo said:

I found a company in China that sells 3/16 CW RHL flex drive core. They only advertise 1m lengths. I contacted them and asked if I ordered two if I could get it as a 2m length. They said No Problem. So it should be here on Tuesday. They market it for RC boat propeller drive cables. I had a brother in law that was into RC boats. Those things are brutal on their drive shafts. Those boats will spin those shafts more in 30 seconds then the life of a Mooney emergency retract cable. 

Let us know how it works. If it's good, please share your source!