Many moons ago on the Vanguard the procedure was that the handling pilot on take off used to apply the footbrakes for a couple of seconds to stop the wheels from spinning before calling for the undercarriage to be raised.
The manufacturer thought that the forces on retraction might, over time, cause damage to the undercarriage. If however an engine failed on take off then the pilot called for undercarriage up straight away, to remove the drag as quickly as possible.
When base training a simulated failure might be done a dozen times in a detail so the procedure was for the trainee to call for the undercarriage keeping his feet on the floor, the training captain discretely pulled and released the handbrake to stop the wheels before the gear was raised.
I think you're all probably ahead of me here, the rubber marks were clearly visible ten years later.
Last edited by Seat1APlease; 13th Sep 2007 at 22:26.
Reason: I meant on the rudder to control the swing not on the floor