Originally Posted by Cougar Zeke

Has anyone tried using flaperons with the 262?

I have revision #3 done up as a nacelle lander and really want to slow it down as much as possible before I land it on the grass at my field. In an effort to keep the weight down, I don't want to install flaps if possible so I was thinking of trying flaperons.

Thoughts?

Maybe I'll try it out for you next time I'm out. I have been thinking of trying it anyway, now that I have this thing tamed a little. I do have one suggestion, though, which is to lay light weight fiberglass with WBPU on the bottom half of the intakes. That has really strengthened them up on mine, plus they're a lot more slippery.

Oh ya. I have all three of mine completely glassed with PolyC. I have multiple layers on the intakes and on the bottom of the cowls. The nose cone, too!

That would be great if you can try out flaperons. Much appreciated!

Here is a picture of #3 which is ready for paint.

Thanks!
Andy

Originally Posted by Runnikee

My question is where do I get adapters to make the fans fit onto the motor shafts since they are bigger than the cheapo GWS motors? The shafts I have now are 3.17 diameter. Or is there a fan unit that will fit this motor shaft

You might try Caliber hobbies, they carry all the GWS stuff and might have a 3.2mm adapter for the GWS rotor.

If not, Hobbyking, balsa products, and lots of other places will carry adapters and matching 64mm rotors for a 3.2mm shaft

Originally Posted by Cougar Zeke

That would be great if you can try out flaperons. Much appreciated!

I mixed mine for spoilerons, but only used them as brakes after touchdown, never tried them in flight.

In general, spoilerons increase sink rate with decreased ground speed, so you don't slide as much, but you impact harder. The plus side is that they reduce tipstall tendancies, so you can really push the envelope in terms of coming in slow with the nose up and get away with it. Careful, though, becasue they tend to reduce roll authority-- you'll need to rely on the rudder.

Flaperons give you both reduced ground speed and reduced sink rate, which is what you want; but they dramaticly increase tipstall tendancy so you have to be careful to keep the nose down and stay above the new lowered stall speed or you're in for a world of hurt.

Originally Posted by rdeis

You might try Caliber hobbies, they carry all the GWS stuff and might have a 3.2mm adapter for the GWS rotor.

If not, Hobbyking, balsa products, and lots of other places will carry adapters and matching 64mm rotors for a 3.2mm shaft

Thanks, rdeis. I guess my question then would be how do I know what diameter I need to get for the inside of the fan? Or would I be better off just getting an entirely new fan unit?

Wow! Good info rdeis!

I would think that flaperons would decrease tipstall, but I guess there's only so much wing area to hold up the airframe.

Sounds like a perfectly timed flair at the bottom is in order on the first couple of landings until I can get the feel for the flaperons. I love a challenge!

Okay, got the flaperons set up on the flap switch. I'll try it out up high at first. If it seems to be okay, we'll give it a go on landing. Starting out about 3/8" down or a little more set.

I'll charge up tonight and try to get out on the way to work.

Looking good on the new model there CZ!

Thanks dldV! Standing by to hear of a successful implementation!!!

Originally Posted by Runnikee

Thanks, rdeis. I guess my question then would be how do I know what diameter I need to get for the inside of the fan? Or would I be better off just getting an entirely new fan unit?

Look, if you are a newbee, the smart thing to do is get the complete unit, shroud, motor and impeller. Like I recommended few posts back.
That way you do not have to ask yourself any metaphysical questions

Originally Posted by Galand

Look, if you are a newbee, the smart thing to do is get the complete unit, shroud, motor and impeller. Like I recommended few posts back.
That way you do not have to ask yourself any metaphysical questions

I wasn't trying to develop any metaphysical questions, just avoid waiting out the HobbyKing experience and shipping time. It's 80 degrees with light winds in March in Indiana. Haven't seen weather like this during this time of year in over 30 years, so I was hoping to have a quicker solution. I was also hoping to use the motors I've purchased as opposed to HobbyKing motors, but I'll look into the link you provided. Thanks again!

akf;ldjadskl

Originally Posted by Runnikee

Thanks, rdeis. I guess my question then would be how do I know what diameter I need to get for the inside of the fan? Or would I be better off just getting an entirely new fan unit?

The stock fans for the GWS-262 are 64mm rotors.

Originally Posted by Cougar Zeke

Wow! Good info rdeis!
I would think that flaperons would decrease tipstall

No problem!

*Flaps* generally decrease tipstall because they are located on the inboard portion of the wing. *Flaperons* generally make it worse because they are on the outboard portion of the wing.

When flaps droop, the TE goes down, causign the AoA of the affected part of the wing to go up. If all else is equal (it's close enough for our purposes here), whichever part of the wing has the highest AoA stalls first. Since your flaperons are *way* outboard, that's a tipstall. And, since they are separate control surfaces, you can almost gurantee that they won't drop exactly the same, so one tip will stall before the other-- guaranteed fatal close to the ground.

Spoilerons do exactly the reverse, so they make tipstalling harder. (Actually, since spoilers make the affected part of the wing almost quit working, they make stalling in general harder. You tend to fall out of the sky before you get to stall speed...)

On the other hand (getting purely theoretical now, dLdV will know something real) most of us have extreme forward CG locations to dampen the thrust-pitch issues. If your CG is far enough forward, it's very hard to stall the airplane on a typical landing approach because the elevator won't be able to hold the nose up at stall speed. I think that may be why people haven't reported a lot of success with flaps.

I'd search back in the thread for more discussion about flaps and how well the different implementations did or didn't work.

The flaperons seemed to work out OK, nothing scary happened.

This morning we had dense fog, but I took the plane to work and flew at lunch. Wind was 8 to 12 mph, choppy above the trees, and almost but not quite crosswind to the runway. Takeoff was good, did a couple laps, and hit the flap switch up high. The plane slowed and descent steepened, but no real problems were evident, so pulled 'em back up. Took another lap and hit flaps again on the downwind leg, pulled some elevator to keep the nose up, steered with rudder over the runway, and got a nice landing. It was steeper but slower than usual, nose high. No control problems were evident.

Repeated the flight, it went just the same, so I judge the flaperons a success. They will even be useful to me. Our field is about 300 yards long, and there are tall trees at both ends. I like being able to land steeper with slower ground speed. It's usually hard to get this thing slowed down. It felt like the flaperons will help with that.

rdeis, yep, the cg is pretty far forward from what the manual calls for. The plane is pretty well powered, it lifts off beautifully after 10 or twenty yards of steadily increasing throttle. I don't even touch the elevator.

Here's a couple pics to give an idea how much deflection was in.