Undercarriage – (plus Wheels, tyres and brakes) Overview

The undercarriage or landing gear is the structure (usually wheels) that supports an
aircraft and allows it to move across the ground or water. The assembly usually has
wheels and shock absorber apparatus, but sometimes skis for snow or floats for
water, and skids or pontoons (helicopters). To decrease drag in flight some
undercarriages retract into the fuselage.

Aircraft with at least partially retractable landing gear did not appear until 1917, and it
was not until the late 1920s and early 1930s that such aircraft became common. By
then, aircraft performance was improved to the point where the aerodynamic
advantage of a retractable undercarriage justified the added complexity and weight.

Wheeled undercarriages come in two types: taildragger, where there are two main
wheels towards the front of the aircraft and a single, much smaller, wheel or skid at
the rear; or tricycle undercarriage where there are two main wheels (or wheel
assemblies) under the wings and a third smaller wheel in the nose. Most modern
aircraft have tricycle undercarriages. Taildraggers are considered harder to land and
take off, and usually require special pilot training. Sometimes a small tail wheel or
skid is added to aircraft with tricycle undercarriage, in case the tail strikes the ground
during take-off. The Concorde, for instance, had a retractable tail "bumper" wheel.

As aircraft grow larger, they employ more wheels to cope with the increasing
weights. The Airbus A340-500/-600 has an additional four-wheel undercarriage
bogie on the fuselage centreline. The Boeing 747 has five sets of wheels, a nose-
wheel assembly and four sets of four-wheel bogies. A set is located under each
wing, and two inner sets are located in the fuselage, a little rearward of the outer
bogies. Tricycle undercarriage aircraft are usually steered by the leading wheel(s)
when taxiing. On the Boeing 747 the two inner bogies, and on the Boeing 777 the
last two wheels on each leg, are also steerable with the nose wheels in order to
reduce the lateral stresses on the undercarriage.

Some planes use wheels only for take off and drop them afterwards to gain the
improved streamlining without the complexity, weight and space requirements of a
retraction mechanism. In this case, landing is achieved on skids or similar simple
devices. Historical examples include the Messerschmitt Me 163 and the
Messerschmitt Me 321.
An unusual undercarriage configuration is found on the Hawker-Siddeley Harrier,
which has two mainwheels in line astern under the fuselage (called a bicycle or
tandem layout) and a smaller wheel near the tip of each wing. On second
generation Harriers, the wing is extended past the outrigger wheels to allow greater
weapon loads to be carried.

A multiple tandem layout was used on some military jet aircraft during the 1950s
such as the Lockheed U-2, Myasishchev M-4, Yakovlev Yak-25, Yak-28 and the
Boeing B-47 because it allows room for a large internal bay between the main
wheels. A variation of the multi tandem layout is also used on the B-52
Stratofortress which has four main wheel bogies underneath the fuselage and a
small outrigger wheel supporting each wing-tip. The B-52's landing gear is also
unique in that all four pairs of main wheels can be steered. This allows the landing
gear to line up with the runway and thus makes crosswind landings easier (using a
technique called crab landing).

For light airplanes, a landing gear which is economical to produce is a simple

wooden arch laminated from ash, as used on some homebuilt aircraft. A recent
addition to this type of gear is the fixed-gear RJ.03 IBIS canard homebuilt aircraft.
A-380 Nose U/C
A-319 – Main U/C
Executive Jet Nose U/C
Antonov 225 Main U/C
Shuttle Atlantis

Piper Cherokee
Boeing 777

A-380
Boeing 747

B-52
Harrier

Boeing 747
A-340

A-330
Vulcan

Vulcan
Valiant

Valiant
Valiant

Valiant
TSR-2

Wessex
Me-109G

Spitfire
Spitfire

DH Chipmunk
Avro Lancaster