MLG engineering / shock absorber axles

this is probably a little off topic but since there are so many hornet enthusiasts here, I thought I'd give it a try

so back in 2007 I started making a really detailed 3d model of the hornet, with every movable part rigged for animation and what not, and it became my pet project. but it quickly got obvious that it would take too much time for me to make it the way I wanted, it felt like making a real plane from scratch. alone. so every now and then I'd go back to it and make something new, learning new tricks in the process, but what really killed the project was the main landing gear.

so the main landing gear has many different rotation axles for extending/retracting itself as well as for the wheels and the shock absorber. but without knowing the exact position/rotation of those axles I never managed to align all those axles properly to each other so the gear operates properly while the shock absorber piston action stays correct.

I've studied quite a few models from fsx add ons, but most of them (if not all) just have the main arms eyballed in position, and the piston moving as if it was attached to a spherical joint in order to stay aligned to its casing. I didn't do it with the dcs hornet since I'm not sure if I can import it into 3ds max, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's not mechanically accurate.

I've also collected many pictures online, even took some myself back in miramar, but you can't do much more than understanding the general concept and then extrapolationg and eyeballing from pictures. what I lack is technical documentation

so the problem is that the shock absorber doesn't actuate in the same plane as the main joint of the landing gear arms and the arms themselves are also at an angle, so it's pretty hard for me to make this work.

does anybody knows how any of this works, or has some useful piece of information?

Not sure exactly what you are looking for but send me a PM I can try and answer what you need , I have 11 years working on the hornets gear .

Having built a scale model of a landing Super Hornet a few years ago I found that when the gear is weight off wheels the main wheels are canted outwards and appeared to be toed-in. Does this sound right Ace? It appears this straightens out when the gear compresses on the ground?

DCS F/A-18 appears to have the cant but I haven’t looked for the toe-in.

Not sure exactly what you are looking for but send me a PM I can try and answer what you need , I have 11 years working on the hornets gear .

hey thanks a lot man. I'll put together some pictures trying to explain this better and send it to you

Not sure exactly what you are looking for but send me a PM I can try and answer what you need , I have 11 years working on the hornets gear .

sent you a pm, let me know if it reached you.

also, in case anyone else knows anything about it, I've put together this video trying to explain the issue:

(in case it doesn't work, here's a direct link to youtube)

cheers