Main undercarriage train for an aircraft

A main undercarriage train for an aircraft, comprising a left-hand and a right-hand undercarriage which are retractable substantially laterally from an "undercarriage down" to an "undercarriage up" position and which are disposed symmetrically on respective sides of the longitudinal plane of symmetry of the aircraft, each said undercarriage being interchangeable and comprising:

• a leg which supports a member carrying at least one wheel, a pivot mounting each of said undercarriage legs on the aircraft on a pivot axis which passes through a plane symmetrically inclined with respect to said longitudinal plane of symmetry of the aircraft, each said leg having an internal leg bore;
• damping means and alignment means associated with each said member for keeping the plane of said at least one wheel parallel to the longitudinal plane of symmetry of the aircraft in the "undercarriage down" position with the leg, the damping means and the wheel-carrying member on one of the undercarriages being identical to those of the other undercarriage;
• each said undercarriage leg having a plane of symmetry which passes through its said pivot axis of said pivot mounting on the aircraft, and each said undercarriage including a bush having an internal bush bore, said bush being retainable in either of two predetermined positions in said leg bore in the undercarriage leg thereof with the axis of said internal bush bore being perpendicular to said plane of symmetry of said undercarriage leg;
• a shaft passing through said internal bush bore, said alignment means being pivoted on said shaft, the axis of said internal bush bore being off-set with respect to the axis of said leg bore in which said bush is retained, thereby to compensate for the angular displacement between the longitudinal plane of symmetry of the aircraft and the inclined pivot mounting axis of said undercarriage leg, one of said two predetermined positions being displaced through a certain angle from the other of said two predetermined positions and the other of said two predetermined positions being obtained from the one of the positions by rotating said bush through said angle about the axis of said internal bush bore, the left-hand and the right-hand undercarriages thus being totally interchangeable.

An undercarriage train for a vehicle, comprising, leg support means including a shaft;

• a bush having a cylindrical internal bush bore and a cylindrical outside surface portion, said bush being rotatably mounted on said shaft which is received in said internal bush bore;
• a support for at least one wheel, said support having a hollow portion, said cylindrical outside surface portion being rotatably mounted to said support and received in said hollow portion;
• and
• said internal bush bore having an axis which is offset with respect to the axis of said cylindrical outside surface portion;
• said leg support means including an interchangeable wheel carriage for supporting said shaft, said leg support means having a designated position relative to a longitudinal plane of symmetry of said vehicle;
• rotation of said cylindrical outside surface portion through a certain angle permits positioning of said bush in either of two predetermined positions thereby providing for the interchangeability of positions of said interchangeable wheel carriage from one side of said plane of symmetry of said vehicle to the other side thereof, and permitting a change in the orientation of a plane of said wheel relative to a plane of said leg support means.