Pintle exotic metal alloys. For World War II aircraft with sideways-retracting main gear units, carefully set-up "pintle angles" for such axes of rotation during retraction and extension allowed the maingear struts to be raked forward while fully extended for touchdown and better ground handling, while permitting retraction into rearwards-angled landing gear wells in their wings to usually clear the forward wing spar for stowing while in flight. Pintle A pintle is a pin or bolt, usually inserted into a gudgeon, which is used as part of a pivot or hinge. Other applications include pintle and lunette ring for towing, and pintle
Hinge between structural components, typically in an effort to reduce sensitivity to earthquakes. The primary reason for using a hinge, rather than a simpler device such as a slide, is to prevent the separation of adjacent components. When no bending stresses are transmitted across the hinge it is called a "zero moment hinge". People have developed a variety of self-actuating, self-locking hinge designs for spacecraft deployable structures such as solar array panels, synthetic aperture radar antennas, booms, radiators, etc. Hinge A hinge is a mechanical bearing that connects two solid objects, typically allowing only a limited angle of rotation between them.