Brodhead Pietenpol Association

I'm about to drill holes for the part that supports the rudder bar. Before I do that, I want to check on the amount of travel. If I place the rudder mount in the location as planned, I'll have just under 4" of rudder travel pushing forward. Is that enough? Photo #2.

I'm also adding a photo (#3) showing the most aft stick I have in a slight right bank when the bar connecting both control sticks hits the top of the bolt at the rudder bar attachment. I already discovered I need to add a block of wood under the forward and aft torque bar supports to help with this (which were in place for the photo). I can pull back more, but travel left and right will stop when hitting the rudder bar post.

I'm also adding a photo (#4) of banking left and wondering if I need to notch out the board under the passenger seat as I've seen others do.

Adding a photo showing the forward block of wood I added (#1).

Thank you!

John C

I don’t know how much travel to have at the rudder bar, but I think a lot of people are using the control surface limits used in he UK.

http://www.lightaircraftassociation.co. ... CAMPER.pdf

Several months back, Oscar and I posted information regarding Aileron stick travel, the use of stops, etc.

It turns out that during flight, the stick CAN NOT STRIKE THE FLOOR, as your knees create a defacto stop. That said, several DAR's will require stops be added to the plane... meh

One practical consideration is that the ailerons will NOT achieve full travel, unless, of course, you're standing on the seat. In which case... never mind.

IMHO the aileron horns need to be modified to enable full motion of the ailerons. (I've laid this out using SolidWorks, but have not completed it yet.)

I am not using a rudder bar on my steel tube fuselage and tail, but I understand your concerns. I had the same question as I was positioning my rudder pedals. I clamped them in place and connected them by string/line to the rudder. I then checked to see if my position allowed movement of the rudder in accordance with the UK numbers mentioned earlier. And it did.

I would recommend a similar exercise for you. Find a way to clamp or temporarily fix the rudder bar in position, connect them to the rudder and see if that position gives you the required rudder movement.

Just my $.02. YMMV.

Thank you everyone for the responses. I read previous posts with Tom and Oscar about this and I'll work it out.

John C

One other thought. Since it is a direct line from rudder bar end to rudder horn, you could do this -

You could measure a straight piece of line attached to the rudder horn. Measure from a fixed position (anywhere along that line is acceptable - even a small rod or stick clamped to a fixed position along the line would work), the amount of line length it takes to move your rudder the required amount. If the length of line/string movement is 4 inches or less, you should be good.

I hope that makes sense. If not, it would not be the first time I wrote something that people read and went, "Huh!?!"

John,

I knew that I had drawn this out in the past. Does this help? I have the full size of this in pdf if you want to see it.

Thank you Terry. The image is fine.

John C