Another cause of nosewheel shimmy

We have a shop that's proved that shimmy isn't inevitable in Cessnas, as
other shops have tried to tell me in the past.

The nose gear started to shimmy after 18 months solid as a rock. Turned out
to be water in the wheel, trapped between the two halves and acting like a
wheel weight.

How it got in there is a bit of a mystery. Usually, it's from pressure
washing but we don't do that and we also don't fly in the rain very often.

--
Roger Long

We have a shop that's proved that shimmy isn't inevitable in Cessnas, as
other shops have tried to tell me in the past.

The cures of nosewheel shimmy in Cessnas ought to be well known but are
apparently not. You only start with the shimmy dampener and wheel balancing.
Equally important are torque link shimming and steering collar shimming. When
all of these are properly attended to there will be no shimmy.

Turned out
to be water in the wheel, trapped between the two halves and acting like a
wheel weight.

Now that is unusual.

John Dupre'

The more I learn about Cessna nose gears, the more I am convinced that the
shimmy damper is just a safety device to keep things from going wildly out
of control when something else goes wrong with the system. Make everything
else right and you probably could get along without the damper. A gear with
a good damper and other problems will shimmy, just not destructively.

--
Roger Long

I installed the new Lord shimmy damper and have been pleased. Made no
other adjustments other than the shimming of the damper when installed.


That is great but remember that the damper only dampens it does not cure
shimmy. So you still have shimmy going on but perhaps at a lesser magnitude
but all the things that wear and cause shimmy are still wearing.

John Dupre'