T

TerryWighs

Well Known Member
Left elevator seems to need alot of weight added (none has been removed), and I pressume because of the electric trim...Right elevator will need lead removed.
Question: balance in trail by removing lead while the Rt.and Left elevators are connected at the horns, or should each seperate elevator be balanced individually??? When left and right currently connected, from a small amount of lead removed from the rt lead wt....it is balanced in trail. Is this adequate and correct???

Thanks
 
i hope so

i had the same thing and figured as you did. when bolted to gether they are near perfect. i think that is correct as well, that they balance as an assy. we'll see
 
Don't balance until after paint. Paint will make them tail heavy. Over balance (leading edge down) is better than under balance. Individual balance is ideal, but not necessary.
 
I balanced mine individually. Like Mel said, leave heavy, then drill out some weight after you paint. Trim the right weight like the plans tell you and leave the left weight full size. It worked out well for me. I just drilled into the weight on the inside edge to bring the elevators into balance.

Roberta
 
Balancing

FWIW, I balanced mine individually. I made them with the counterbalances approximately 1/4" down deflection. Flew like that until I broke the plane down for paint.

After paint, the elevators were approximately 1/8" down deflection on the counterbalances. I left them in this position and didn't mess with trying to get them perfectly level.

From my experience, the paint didn't have as much affect on balance as I thought it would.
 
robertahegy said:
Trim the right weight like the plans tell you and leave the left weight full size. It worked out well for me. I just drilled into the weight on the inside edge to bring the elevators into balance.
Click to expand...

Glad I read this! Is this what everyone is doing?

Mike
 
If you are going to paint, don't remove much but if you are not going to paint, then remove as plan suggest.

Also, if you are in the process of building the empennage, I suggest to rivet a AN3 size nut plate in the tooling hole next to the weight, this way if you ever need to add any amount of weight, you can just bolt it to this nut plate.

As for balancing, Vans told me that the best way is to balance them individually, though not 100% necessary as others have suggested.
 
Mel is Correct..

... as always.

My -4 was built 14 yeas ago without paint. It was well built and balanced. I finally painted and added a trim servo. The port elevator required about 270 grams and the stbd needed about 165. That equates to just shy of a pound.
 
When I did mine on the RV7, one left came out slightly trail heavy and the right was nose heavy I was slightly concerned and added nutplates to the tooling holes just in case. When I connected them they were close. The interesting thing is when the tail was on the ground its trail heavy but when lifted into the flying position it goes the other way.

So in what position do you need to get them balanced in?
 
Vonsmallhousen said:
When I did mine on the RV7, one left came out slightly trail heavy and the right was nose heavy I was slightly concerned and added nutplates to the tooling holes just in case. When I connected them they were close. The interesting thing is when the tail was on the ground its trail heavy but when lifted into the flying position it goes the other way.

So in what position do you need to get them balanced in?
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Are you checking while the push/pull tube is attached or disconnected?
 
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