Center of Gravity Position

From: leop12345 <leop_at_lyradev.com>
Date: Sun, 15 Jul 2007 20:01:53 -0000

Being just first year indoor endurance fliers, SO's and ministicks,
my daughter and I have become comfortable, but not expert, with
adjustments to the wing incidence, decalage, warps, and prop thrust
angles for a given CG position (as specified by the plans). In
designing our own planes, we can use various formulas for determining
the initial CG position but we want to learn how to determine,
through our test flights, the best position for the CG. We have read
how the GC position affects the climb out under higher torques,
stability, and other things. We have had some small success (flight
times) with moving the CG from the plans' positions. However, aside
from testing all possible reasonable CG positions with flight times,
we do not yet have sufficient experience and wisdom to set up a
course of adjustments that will hopefully converge on a good CG
position for our own designs.

We realize that the optimal CG position, just like other adjustments,
will be a compromise between climb, glide, and descent. Can anyone
give us tutorial (or a pointer to one) on determining, through flight
testing, the optimal CG position?

Thanks,

Leo
Bloomington, IN
Received on Sun Jul 15 2007 - 13:03:00 CEST