A lancair legacy nose gear retracted on takeoff at about 75 KTS damaging the propeller. The gear sel...

Narrative:

We were departing the runway after stopping for fuel. I was flying the airplane from the right seat. The aircraft owner was controlling the engine power from the left seat. The roll was normal until the airplane gathered speed close to liftoff. The nose dropped unusually and there was a scraping noise. The attitude was corrected with pitch control very quickly and the airplane lifted off. The landing gear retracted and the takeoff continued. The malfunction was not understood completely at this point. We thought possibly a tire had failed; or a strut had collapsed. The engine was developing power and running smoothly. The gear was extended in flight and inspected by another aircraft. It was reported to look normal. We flew to our planned destination. We flew a low pass and had the gear inspected by ground personnel. It was reported to appear normal. We then landed with a normal gear indication. When the propeller stopped rotating we could see that the tips were bent from ground contact. Conjecture after the flight suggests that the gear selector could possibly been inadvertently placed in the up position while on the ground; possibly by catching on a pant cuff. The system is designed to not retract until reaching 75 KTS which would be consistent with events. The position of the gear selector was not noted to be abnormal by the crew.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A Lancair Legacy nose gear retracted on takeoff at about 75 KTS damaging the propeller. The gear selector was possibly accidentally raised during preflight.

Narrative: We were departing the runway after stopping for fuel. I was flying the airplane from the right seat. The aircraft owner was controlling the engine power from the left seat. The roll was normal until the airplane gathered speed close to liftoff. The nose dropped unusually and there was a scraping noise. The attitude was corrected with pitch control very quickly and the airplane lifted off. The landing gear retracted and the takeoff continued. The malfunction was not understood completely at this point. We thought possibly a tire had failed; or a strut had collapsed. The engine was developing power and running smoothly. The gear was extended in flight and inspected by another aircraft. It was reported to look normal. We flew to our planned destination. We flew a low pass and had the gear inspected by ground personnel. It was reported to appear normal. We then landed with a normal gear indication. When the propeller stopped rotating we could see that the tips were bent from ground contact. Conjecture after the flight suggests that the gear selector could possibly been inadvertently placed in the up position while on the ground; possibly by catching on a pant cuff. The system is designed to not retract until reaching 75 KTS which would be consistent with events. The position of the gear selector was not noted to be abnormal by the crew.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	983592
Time
Date	201112
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Lancair IV/IVP
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Takeoff
Flight Plan	None
Component
Aircraft Component	Gear Extend/Retract Mechanism
Person 1
Function	Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Flight Instructor Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) Flight Crew Multiengine
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 45 Flight Crew Total 7300 Flight Crew Type 7
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Ground Event / Encounter Ground Strike - Aircraft

A lancair legacy nose gear retracted on takeoff at about 75 KTS damaging the propeller. The gear selector was possibly accidentally raised during preflight.