Ooops
 

I am fairly new to flying the Skymaster but had a unique experience yesterday.

I taxied to the run-up area of my airport following a 172. The 172 decided to take up the middle of the area so I needed to "squeeze in". As I made my sharp turn into the area everything was fine, the plane turned on a dime and stopped just the way I wanted. The nose wheel was at max deflection to the left. In order to straighten the wheel I applied power to the rear engine, and pressure to the right rudder pedal.

The resulting "SNAP" caught my attention and my right foot went to the floor and there was no longer any pressure on either pedal.

I shut the plane down and after further evaluation, found the rudders to be operating but no control of the nose wheel. After the lady in the tower stopped laughing, the nice guys at the FBO came out with the Tug and took us back to the hanger.

I have the AP coming to the hanger on Wed to take a look.

Has this happened to anyone and if so, what went wrong and most importantly, how do I prevent it in the future?

Sounds like a push-pull rod let go or an attachment on the steering system has broken.

Please keep us posted as to what your A&P finds as we may all suffer a similar fate at some point.

A note in my service manual calls up a Service Kit SK337-45 to rework the bellcrank so if you are in there, you might want to check that as well.

Regards - Dave