Folks,
I'm about to do final assembly of my first Fancher Imitation (Fuse, Wing and Stab completed)
and I've just noticed a potential issue with the stab thickness shown on my set of plans.
My plan set was ordered from Steve Moon of UltraHobby and show the stab as being
1/2 inch thick however, elsewhere on this forum the stab is shown as being about 1 inch thick.
Can anyone out there clarify before I glue the stab in place?
Thanks,
Kevin
The original has/had a 1" thick deeply airfoiled stab and that is what is shown on the plans. I don't know what the Ultrahobby plans show, but I expect it is 1/2" thick and flat with a round LE. Either would probably work fine, but since you have it built I would suggest going ahead and using it. My Imitation XL has that sort of stab and it qualified at many NATs with no real problems.
I will allow Ted to speak for himself of course, but in general I am not a big fan of the 1/2" thick flat stab. Many times it works well, and occasionally we have run into problems. These are minor problems, generally "princess and the pea" sort of problems. It usually manifests itself and slight difficulties with getting the bottom of square maneuvers perfectly flat. All of the local flat stabs have ended up with turbulators applied near and on the LE, which more or less fixed it. But a whole lot of airplane have been with that sort of stab, since it was what Paul Walker used on the Impact, and most of them flew fine.
I think the ideal stab shape is about 1/2" thick with an "arc" airfoil and about a 1/16" LE radius. AND the corners rounded off at the elevator hinge line.
Brett
Topic: Preferred Imitation Stab Thickness (Read 2594 times)