October 2, 2008

I've been thinking about how to shape the elevator wing tips for a while. There's no real guidance on how to shape the curve around the tip. From responses I've received on the Falco forum and by other builders, it seems the best way is to take a shot at rough sanding it and then skin the elevator. Later after the stabilizer is done to the same point, attach them together to get the full wing tip lined up and do the final shaping then to make sure everything blends together well. I used the old equal segments curve to give myself some idea of where to start with the shape. I used the end of the elevator spar for the dimensions.

I drew the curve on the forward edge of the tip lamination and started carefully sanding with the stationary belt sander. The aft part of the tip becomes really skinny and the trick is to make the transition from the more rounded front as smooth as possible. Here's what I ended up with for now. I thing the middle parts will have to be skinnied up a bit and the aft end probably even skinner to match the station six rib a little bit. Not a bad rough start to get the skin on there to do the final sanding once the stabilizer and elevator are mounted together.

  |   Empennage Assembly Menu   |   Home