What's new
Van's Air Force

Don't miss anything! Register now for full access to the definitive RV support community.

RV-10 Rudder Trim Issues

mikelupo

Active Member
Patron
I recently purchased an RV-10. It has a small piece of wood glued to the right-hand side of the rudder (inducing left rudder). I noticed while flying it that I had to constantly apply right rudder to keep the ball in the center. So I removed the small static wooden rudder trim piece, added a mechanical rudder trim system $200 from Aerosport products. Flew it, trimmed it up and viola! I thought...problem solved. On to the next nit! Till next time I flew it. Now, when I fly it it needs a ton of left rudder. I cannot put enough left rudder into the Aerosport rudder trim system to overcome it.
What the **** is going on? Why is my trim need changing on a per-flight basis? It's as if I need that little wooden trim piece back on the rudder again.

Surely at least one of you has had this problem before.
 
Make sure the clamp on spring attach arms have not slipped.

Geoff is pretty responsive to his customers, give him a call.
 
It is possible that your nose wheel breakout force is too loose. The prop slipstream pushes the wheel to the left, requiring right rudder. Also, if the breakout force is at spec, if you lift the nosewheel off the ground in anything other than parallel to the runway, the nosewheel will stay in that non-straight orientation during the whole flight, changing the trim required. With the 10, the plane is still accelerating when the nosewheel comes off and it can be a challenge to keep it tracking straight with all that torque, especially if you are trying to get the nosewheel off the ground as soon as possible, as is recommended with RVs.

The nosewheel nut needs to be re-tightened 2 or 3 times in the first 100 hours and some builders don't do it and instead address the issue with more trim tab. This creates a drag penalty as well.

Larry
 
Last edited:
Make sure the clamp on spring attach arms have not slipped.

Geoff is pretty responsive to his customers, give him a call.

Thank you. I'll check and will reach out to Geoff if need-be. I didn't think they had slipped when I glanced below the panel. Those arms seem pretty sturdy to me once you peel the sticky off and then tighten the clamps. :)
 
It is possible that your nose wheel breakout force is too loose. The prop slipstream pushes the wheel to the left, requiring right rudder. Also, if the breakout force is at spec, if you lift the nosewheel off the ground in anything other than parallel to the runway, the nosewheel will stay in that non-straight orientation during the whole flight, changing the trim required. With the 10, the plane is still accelerating when the nosewheel comes off and it can be a challenge to keep it tracking straight with all that torque, especially if you are trying to get the nosewheel off the ground as soon as possible, as is recommended with RVs.

The nosewheel nut needs to be re-tightened 2 or 3 times in the first 100 hours and some builders don't do it and instead address the issue with more trim tab. This creates a drag penalty as well.

Larry

Hi Larry, I think this described the situation pretty accurately. It's like there is a "Variable" in play and of course the nose-wheel is the culprit. I'll check on this and report back in-case anyone else has this issue. I won't see the RV again till almost Dec so it will be a delayed response.
 
I will second what Larry said. Are you getting any kind of “shimmy” while taxiing or landing? I had my plane in for paint recently. I noticed after paint i needed right rudder, even though i had a wedge. It was just a coincidence. I lifted up the nose wheel and determined i only had about 16lbs of torque on the nose wheel. I tightened things up and extra right rudder problem solved.
 
An easy way to tell if the nose wheel is too loose is how the plane reacts in a turn while taxing. If the plane will come out of a turn without application of counter turn brake, the nose wheel is too loose. Time to tighten.

Also if by chance you do lift the nose off the ground with an off center nose wheel position a quick stab of rudder will usually center the wheel.
 
Last edited:
These are bandaid fixes for the real problem. The third wheel is on the wrong end of the airplane! :D
 
Back
Top