"A" Model Nose Wheel Shimmy

This is how I do it,

get yourself a fish scale (0-30 lb range)
Remove nose wheel pant
Make a little bracket from 3/4 x3/4 aluminum angle with a couple holes to screw it to the wheel pant attach bracket nut plates.
Make another hole in the angle for the fish scale to attach at the appropriate location for pulling (see your plans).
Raise the nose wheel off the ground by pulling the tail down (a helper or weight from the tie down ring or both).
With nose wheel off the ground, pull the fish scale direct laterally slowly increasing tension until the wheel assembly “breaks” free. Note the tension immediately prior to the break.
Make adjustments to big nut and repeat until tension is set according to plans.

BTW, I have an RV10 nose wheel/fork/tire custom modified to fit my 7 nose gear leg. So my breakout force is closer to RV10 specs. So far, it’s been working good. I’ve had severe gear shimmy which initially I assumed as from the nose gear but cameras confirmed it was main gear shimmy caused by too much tire air pressure due to faulty pressure gauge. All is good now.

BTW, I love my nose dragger configuration with bigger tires all around.

YMMV
Bevan.

Just Did This on My -10

I used a luggage scale purchased on Amazon; I pulled the airplane out of the hangar to a tie down point on the ramp and used a ratchet strap to raise the nosewheel. Be prepared to drill a new hole for the cotter pin - one sixth of a revolution of the nut drove the breakout force from about 13 to 55 pounds, so it only needed a 1/12th revolution. My symptom was not shimmy, but a yaw to the right while in cruise when exceeding about 165KTAS. You could feel the nosewheel breaking free and inducing the yaw. Surprisingly there wasn't a reduction in speed.

==dave==
N102FM

Another approach is to send the nose wheel and tire off to Anti Splat and have them do their modifications which include changing to sealed bearings, truing the tire and doing a really good dynamic balance job on the entire assembly. They send it back and then you do the re installation including using the recommended breakout force as a minimum.

Bear in mind that there is frequently grease/oil that comes out of the zerk fitting or other paths and when that gets on to the Belleville washers it lubricates them, reducing friction and decreasing the breakout force. Some people's solutions can vary including checking and re torquing the force frequently (I think probably the most common solution) or actually pre greasing the surfaces and then setting the breakout force so any leaking grease doesn't change things. I don't know if the latter is approved by the factory. Check with people who know more than me!