OK, went by autozone and bought electrical contact cleaner, then by CVS to get compressed air
Cleaned off all three door uplock switches (2 main, + nose). Nose one is kinda hard to find at first, located behind strut in the tunnel area. Cleaned off the microswitch on powerpack, plus any other electrical connections I could find under panel (hey, I was there anyway).
Flew the plane and the same issue. Then tried to see if the hand pump would close the doors in the air, and it does !
So, the symptoms appear to be this - gear down, no issues with gear coming down, locking place, and doors closing, get green light, all is good.
gear up, doors open, gear goes up and locks into place, doors close, up light comes on for a couple of seconds then extinguishes and handle does not kick back to neutral. You can manually move the handle back to neutral (and light comes on), and the gear doors open up slightly (kind of like in one of herb's videos). If you leave it in neutral but use hand pump you can feel it pump easy for a few strokes and then get stiff, a flyby confirms that the gear doors did go up and are staying in place.
I got back on ground after many cycles of replicating above, and cleaned again, then repeated above - everything consistent. At least I can now put up my gear and shut my doors (using hand pump) and fly to a better mechanic.
If anyone has thoughts, please feel free to share.
In any case, I will post again once I figure out resolution.
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