I'd like to make my Monarch 94+ into a flaperon model. Any suggestions?

Similar to what Sherman Knight did

From : Don Stackhouse

As far as making this into a flaperon model, my advice is DON'T !

We tried a bunch of experiments along those lines in the 2 years of work that eventually led to the 'CX'. If any of them had panned out we would have been able to market a flaperon Monarch much sooner.

I've read Sherman's article, we had tried similar flaperons before then with disappointing results, and that whole approach of using conventional chord flaperons on the inboard panels only resulted in performance penalties at both ends of the envelope. To get enough lift increase at low speed to offset the drag of the hinges and the extra weight, the flaps need to be full span, sealed on both surfaces, and very wide. This requires structural mods inside the wing to replace the strength lost due to the flaperon cutouts and the servo wells. You can add reinforcement to the outside of the wing, but the design of these is tricky, and they add a significant amount of weight, much more than internal reinforcements applied during the initial skinning of the wing would add.

Add-on flaperons will provide some improvement in roll authority, and provide some glide path control capabilities which might be useful for spot landing or precision endurance tasks. If you are willing to give up a small amount of penetration and a larger amount of low speed capability, they might be an acceptable tradeoff. My personal opinion is that conventional flaperons are not worth the trouble. If the performance increase is what you're after, I would recommend you buy a Wizard wing add-on, then build your '94+ wing as light as possible for use on those really light air days.

Don Stackhouse @ DJ Aerotech