Took advantage of the cold outside to chill and shrink the newly machined pin for the landing gear crank. This pin is designed to have an extremely tight fit in the landing retract crank. My machinist had used a 10 ton press to push the damaged pin out. Since I don't have anything as powerful as that I wanted to ensure that I had the greatest chance of success by using temperature difference. Since it's -32 C outside, there's a lot of temperature difference from when it was machined. I also heated up the aluminum crank arm that this pin fits into. I used a propane torch and gently heated it to get the maximum potential difference in temps between the two pieces. I prepared some wooden blocks to fit into my vise to protect these pieces and to provide room for the pin to protrude once it was pushed into place. I practised the motions and prepared everything for this critical activity as there would be no second chance. Wearing gloves I pulled the pin back in from the cold and brought it to the nice warm aluminum crank. It just dropped right in. There was no effort at all. I couldn't believe how much expansion there was on the warm aluminum and how much contraction there was on the cold steel. Within seconds the aluminum had contracted and the steel had expanded. The pin was as snug as a bug and it didn't require any effort with the vise. It would have been interesting to see if the pin would have dropped in if the aluminum hadn't been heated.
I then added the safety wire to the cap screws that connect the arm to the shaft and reinserted the assembly into the wing and reconnected the retract linkage.