A better chioce of words on my part would have been to say I prefer a wing shorter than 22', for a number of reasons; Transportation, on-man rigging ease, fabrication ease, moving the wing joint to an area of considerably less stress or bending moment, smaller component to remanufacturer if damaged, storage etc.

--- In This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., russell wilson wrote:

why can you not have a 22' wing?

On Mon, Dec 17, 2012 at 7:59 AM, Philip Lardner wrote:

**


**
Hi Ekolbs,

I've more or less completed a 3-part wing design / analysis for my own
project. I've chosen to split my wing at Rib #5, giving me a 15' centre
section and 14' outer sections (approx.) I still have to sort out how I'm
going to secure the trailing edge of the wings, where the flaperons hinge,
and how to split and connect the flaperons themselves. It's all still on a
lot of sheets of paper, but I'll scan them in and post them up shortly. I'd
be really interested to see what solutions you've arrived at independently
- it might give me some ideas!

I'm interested that you're going to build in a second set of drag spars
into your outer wings - are they strictly necessary - what are you reacting
them against on the centre section of wing? I was planning on simply
building in some means of connecting the rear of the ribs to transmit the
compressive / tensile forces from the outer wings to the inner section. I
will be using carbon rods in this 'rear-spar' along the wing.

There's an outfit Electravia who operate out of the Sisteron Aero Club, in
France where I trained this year, who specialise in electric motors for
light and ultra-light aviation. It might be worth looking at their website
and talking to them - www.electravia.fr - the Alatus glider that
they worked on is quite similar to the Carbon Dragon and may offer some
ideas. I'm semi-considering doing something similar down the line (as a
retro-fit) after I get my project finished. I like the idea of a pop-up
motor behind the pilot, and am planning to build in a proper air-break
system (upper and lower wing surfaces) in the main wings, just in-board of
Rib #5, which should keep the air flow over the H-stab clean and free up
the area behind the pilot's head for a motor assembly. All just ideas and
sketches at the moment.

All the best,

Phil.

PS - what's your real name!?

---

*From:* This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. [mailto:
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.] *On Behalf Of *ekolbs
*Sent:* 16 December 2012 13:44
*To:* This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
*Subject:* [Carbondragonbuildersandpilots] 3 Piece Wing



I cannot have a 22' wing so have been working on a 3 piece wing (paper)
design. My design has a 12' center section. By the time you get out 6' from
the centerline of the glider, the bending moment has dropped of
significantly. The center section would be skinned to resist torsion and
drag effects. The outboard wing sections would have the mid 40% section
covered with fabric, similar to the original design, with a drag spar. My
hope is to incorporate a very light engine (powered parachute type or large
RC or two RC engines) strictly to get to altitude. The other advantage of
this is that it allows my empty weight to go up to 254 lbs. Hope to
generate some discussion with this.