I believe they could be lowered manualy for maintenance Vic. The wing opposite has the bar still attached holding the wing up fast. I think I recal seeing some pictures this way.
When I painted the rear wheel assy I noticed the little triangle shaped tow ring is just a block, so I opened it. Then taking another look at the wheel I saw I could open it up all the way thru the caster section, so I done that.
Working on the wheel wells I was gonna replace the cylinders with scratch built, but then you can't see in there unless mounted on a mirror. So decided if I can't see it without picking the thing up, I'm not gonna stress myself with fussing over it. But I may add rods up to the doors from the kit cyls.
I'm attaching a quick pic of the NAS LVK site. The Livermore airport, LVK, has two runways, 25R L, 07R L and are almost inline with the old NAS flight line on the right of the big pad in the photo. This site is now the Lawrence Livermore National Lab.