Overview of Chapter 11: elevators

In Chapter 11, we build the elevators.

The original plans have elevators designed to go with the original GU canard. The Roncz canard has very different set of elevators, so the original plans are pretty much useless for Chapter 11. The plans to build the Roncz elevators are included with the Roncz canard plans subset.

Ok, so let's go to those plans and purchase all the hardware listed - not so fast!! 

The Roncz elevator torque tube hinge point is located at the very bottom of the torque tube circumference (red circle pointed by red arrow below). 

As the elevator pivots about this hinge line, the torque tube moves forward and aft - requiring a fairly large cutout through the fuselage wall (as outlined in red below).

So what's the big deal? Well, with 3 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit drop for every 1,000 feet of altitude - it can get cold! And having two golf ball size holes on the side of the fuselage pouring really cold air in is not fun! So what's the fix?

The Cozy girls (www.cozygirrrl.com) sell a custom elevator bellcrank that offsets the pivot point to be concentric with the torque tube (where it passes through the fuselage wall). This allows for a much smaller cutout and hence less cold air in. 

So using two of these (a left one and a right one), we end up with something like this... where the red arrows are pointing to the torque tube offsets that pass through the fuselage walls.

With that said, the process of building the elevators sounds complicated... but once all the hardware is figured out and the steps are outlined, it's really not that hard. Let's get started!