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Tail hight

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Larry Noel

Active Member
Joined
Nov 26, 2014
Messages
44
Location
Huntley, Montana
Are there any Sonerai 2 flying that added the 2 inch height to the turtle deck but not the tail? If so how did it effect your airplanes controllability?
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I added 2” to the height of the turtledeck on my IIL without raising the height of the tail, but I did add some area (maybe 10%) to the vertical stabilizer when I squared up the tail (to make it more P-51 like). The airplane has always flown well, but was fairly neutral in yaw stability. If I had to do it over again, I’d probably add at least 2” to the height of the tail.
 
My airplane started with a stock height turtledeck, got raised 2" so my father whos was about 4" taller than me could fly it, and now it is back down to stock height. During this last go-around I added some area, but no height to the vertical stabilizer, but didn't change the rudder. I agree with Fred that it is pretty neutral in yaw stability and I should have added area and height to the vertical and built a new rudder. I would probably go even taller than the 2" Fred mentioned. Here are a couple side views of the Sonerai 2. In the top one I have two curves for the vertical tail, the smaller one is as shown on the plans, and the larger one is the whole vertical and rudder scaled up so that the tailpost is 4" taller. The bottom one is just the larger tail profile. I think I'd go this route if I were to build again.
1611706230311.png
 
When I bought my Sonerai II it came with the raised canopy and turtle deck. It's 47" from seat pan to inside of the canopy. The vertical fin and rudder needed to be increased. see attached drawing. So I raised the fin 6" and brought that height forward 6" Also raised the rudder 6" and brought that height aft 3". Fin increased area by 40%, Rudder by 3".
Before increase if you depressed a rudder pedal the aircraft would yaw 20 degrees and stay there when pedal released. After fin increase the aircraft will still yaw 20 degrees but yaw reduces to 5 degrees when pedal released.
Bil438

Are there any Sonerai 2 flying that added the 2 inch height to the turtle deck but not the tail? If so how did it effect your airplanes controllability?
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My turtle deck was raised 2-3 inches hard to remember, I flew it like that for 100 hours, it always required rudder input even in straight and level flight. After looking at RV's I decided to increase the fin size and added some rudder chord. All in all I raised the fin 6.5 inches. What a world of difference that made. Feet off the rudder pedals in cruise, just like RV!
 
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