Virg wrote: > Pitch sensitivity is an overblown item, Virg
Now that I have put over 1100 hours on a KR2S, and almost 300 on a KR2, I feel qualified to say that there is a pretty large difference in pitch stability between the two. Yes, the KR2 is entirely controllable, but then mine is flown at the very forward end of the CG envelope. Having said that, I did PIOs (pitch induced oscillations) for many of my first KR2 flights.
Jim Hill, who put several hundred hours on his KR2 before he broke it in half and extended it to become a KR2S, once said "let go of the stick?...You can't let go of the stick...YOU'LL DIE if you let go of the stick!
By contrast, my KR2S is simply not an issue to fly. Keeping the CG forward cannot be overstressed, either way. From my experience, any speed penalty is practically impossible to quantify.
To answer the question of how to lengthen the horizontal stabilizer, Troy Petteway did it (and reported a big improvement in stability) by adding 6" onto the tips of the stab by simply adding foam, sanding to shape, and wrapping with two or three layers of carbon fiber. That plane is still flying, last I heard. He also decreased the size of the elevator to lessen the over-control tendency. See http://www.n56ml.com/troy/ for photos, both near the top and near the bottom (actual construction of both horizontal stab mods and "new airfoil" wings.
One thought on rebuilding the elevator is to simply cut it in half and remove it, and built another one from the template set at the bottom of http://www.krnet.org/as504x/ . Build the new h/s spar with a "ship lapped" joint in the middle, with a widened bellcrank plate as a metal splice joint. The aft deck is non-structural, so turning some of that into a removable fairing will provide access to the bellcrank for dealing with the hardware.
There are other ways to deal with it, but this is one way I'd consider... Mark Langford m...@n56ml.com http://www.n56ml.com _______________________________________________ Search the KRnet Archives at http://tugantek.com/archmailv2-kr/search. Please see LIST RULES and KRnet info at http://www.krnet.org/info.html. see http://list.krnet.org/mailman/listinfo/krnet_list.krnet.org to change options To UNsubscribe from KRnet, send a message to krnet-le...@list.krnet.org
