Tail Setup - A-Tail Rudder w/ Dedicated Elevator

ArduPlane
1

Thoughts on setting up a plane that has a traditional elevator with “A-Tail” type rudders?

vtol

Thanks in advance for the help.

2

If you have seperate surfaces for elevator and rudder, just use rudder as rudder and elevator as elevator, no matter at what angle the rudder is.

3

Ok. So then just add a rudder to elevator mix? With the rudder at an angle there will always be an up/down elevator effect

4

There are two rudders. One will create a little up elevator effect, while at the same time, the other one will create a little down elevator effect, for any given rudder deflection. The forces are cancelling each other out. That is why an a-tail or v-tail is working at all.

5

Maybe it’s just this airframe? When flying as a fixed wing manually I had to add .5% down elevator on left rudder and 1.5% up elevator on right rudder to get it to yaw without a nose departure.

Thanks for the feedback! It’s close enough I’ll let the autopilot handle managing the tiny effect I see without mixing.

6

I guess the airframe has two servos for the rudders, so it could be a slight difference in servo travel. I think the autopilot will be able to handle those small corrections.

7

The throws are identical, but we didn’t build this one and it almost looks like the hinge on right rudder is out a tiny bit further than the left.

Thanks again - I’ll post after some flight testing with FC active.