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New elevator!

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Posted (edited)

I followed Joey's lead on this one and over the past month I modified my elevator to MKiv specs.  I haven't flown with the new elevator yet because the birds have been walking the past few days but as soon as the weather breaks I'll take it for a spin!  It will be nice to not run out of elevator at slower speeds and also be able to trim off the stick forces.  I have a 15 lb weight hanging from one of my tow bar attach points to help with the stick force, hopefully this mod will allow me to remove it.  We'll see! 

Edited by thebriman
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Posted

Nice I think you are going to really like it especially when in slow flight. Did you do the trim tab too?

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Posted

I did.  My set up is a mirror of yours.  Although I believe Lowell's fabric skills are a touch better than mine.  This was the first time I did any covering, I did have a few imperfections and wrinkles in the tapes.   

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Posted

I flew the Avid with the new elevator for the first time today!  What a difference.  I only flew for about half an hour, but the results were dramatic to say the least.  I have plenty of trim authority for cruise and climb and descent.  I am going to have to get used to not having to haul back on the stick all the time especially on final!  On a bright note I did all the flying without my 15 pound ballast weight on the towbar attach, so that thing has a new home gathering dust on the shelf in my hangar.  I did a few stalls power off and on and noticed that the stalls are sharper and more crisp, which with more pitch authority was expected.  The tail comes alive almost as soon as power is applied on the takeoff roll.  I'll do some more flying later today and explore it a bit more.  But so far I have nothing bad to say about this mod.  

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Posted

Sounds almost exactly like my flight report! I actually have more up trim authority than I need. I forgot to reset it once for take off and I had a handful of airplane on takeoff! My takeoff setting is 3 bars down on the indicator from the top. One thing I haven't done and probably should is trim it full nose up and see how it flies in case the motor ever runs away. I think if that ever happened I would have to pull on flaps to get the nose back down. Glad your happy with the results. I know it was the best mod I've done to my plane so far.

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Posted

I am amazed that there is seemingly no provision for trim on the Model C.  Using the flaperons works in cruise, I suppose, but at lower airspeeds it appears no trim is possible since the flaperons would be at their TE-up limit.  From various posts I have read, the flaperons' chief effect is in changing the moment contribution of the wing, in part because the CG tends to be well forward of the wing-tail aerodynamic center in these birds. 

Sorry if I appear as a ghost.  I'm new, and am not sure I'm set up properly.   - Turbo

 

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Posted

I am amazed that there is seemingly no provision for trim on the Model C.  Using the flaperons works in cruise, I suppose, but at lower airspeeds it appears no trim is possible since the flaperons would be at their TE-up limit.  From various posts I have read, the flaperons' chief effect is in changing the moment contribution of the wing, in part because the CG tends to be well forward of the wing-tail aerodynamic center in these birds. 

Sorry if I appear as a ghost.  I'm new, and am not sure I'm set up properly.   - Turbo

 

I put an aerotrim in my kitfox not sure how it works yet but looks nice.

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Posted

The control forces are very light on these planes.  Not much trim is needed really.  Adding just a tiny bit of flaps will give nose down trim, easy to loop a light piece of bungee cord around the joy stick and tied back to the seat truss works for nose up trim.  Higher up on the stick you put the bungee, the more pull it gives you.  Very simple and does work well.  JImChuk

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Posted

This is what I have.  Pretty simple. This is for nose up. Flaps for nose down.

IMAG0347.jpg

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Posted

I flew with a bungee 350 hrs and I have to say electric trim rocks! Where it really shines is with a full 15 degrees of flaperons on a really slow approach. It wasn’t until I could trim off the huge back pressure with full flaperon that I started to really explore 45mph approaches and really short landings. No doubt it was a spendy mod though. 

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Posted (edited)

I flew with a bungee 350 hrs and I have to say electric trim rocks! Where it really shines is with a full 15 degrees of flaperons on a really slow approach. It wasn’t until I could trim off the huge back pressure with full flaperon that I started to really explore 45mph approaches and really short landings. No doubt it was a spendy mod though. 

If you want to go with a Bowden cable controlled trim tab for the flaperons, it is easily done..  I copied mine off of another designer - but the the cable changes the trim tab automatically by the same amount of flaperons you apply.  It is attached to the flaperon control lever on one side.  This don't trim for cruise flight tho - bungee will do that.  But is it cheaper - maybe not with the cost of Bowden cables?  I have another trim tab that is electric for trimming in cruise, takeoff, landing, etc.  EDMO

Edited by EDMO

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Posted

Gotta say: I like the elegance of Bandit's solution!

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