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Rudder Cables too long?

claycookiemonster

Well Known Member
Just like sitting in an unfinished fuselage and making airplane noises, another cherished moment is the first time you can push on a rudder pedal in an unfinished fuselage, and the rudder moves!
Except, when I ran the rudder cables through all the proper grommets and tubing from the rudder horn to the cables that run from the firewall through the "S" at the pedals, they're VERY slack. It takes almost full rudder deflection to get any movement at all, and if the pedals are reversed, almost nothing happens at the other end until full opposite deflection.

Is something going to take up this slack? I feel like I have an extra 6-8" in each side.
 
There's a stack of washers on the eyebolts that pass through the firewall on which the forward end of the rudder cables are attached. If you put the washers on the forward side of the firewall it will take out the slack. The plans say to use them as required on either side of the firewall. I think most of mind ended up on the forward side.
 

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Just checking……. Unless you are sitting in the airplane with *both* feet on the rudder pedals, they will fall aft and create the slack that you described. With both pedals forward the slack will disappear. If you have 6-8 inches of slack, something is awry. The washers up front won’t fix that.
 
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The VS was removed, so the cables have nothing on the far end right now. I'll try to get down off the ledge and wait and see when the VS and rudder go back on. Thanks for pointing out the washer remedy.
 
At the risk of being a bit prickly, do note that "the washer remedy" is really just a matter of following the instructions. This is from page 8-63 in my manual, which is the very end of the "rudder pedals" section:

Attach the eyebolts on the F-852B Forward Rudder Cables to the Firewall Assembly using the 1/4 holes previously match-drilled from the F-801L Backing Plates (See DWG 60 & 81). While the rudder is held in its neutral position, vary the combination of washers between the fwd and aft side of the Firewall Assembly to adjust the rudder pedal position to vertical (See “Side View”, DWG 81). If the rudder pedals need to tilt aft more, position more washers on the fwd side of the firewall. If they need to tilt fwd more, move washers from the front side to the aft side of the firewall.

My experience was similar to that noted before, basically all of my washers ended up on the forward side of the firewall. Looks kinds ridiculous, but it's per the plans...
 
Right. I'm in the good/bad position of doing a project 8, and so it's hard sometimes to see what I need to do, and what has already been done. The rudder pedals were already hung and the cables were already attached to the firewall. Seeing that, I skipped the exact directions on how to do that, and simply attached the rest of the rudder cables. Now that I look closely, all the washers are aft of the firewall, so I have slack I can take out.
 
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