I wanted to add one thing to the discussion. In looking at all of the number the one thing that is missing is the Actual Cross Section of an Airfoil that would be required to encompass the existing Tube Diameters of the Horizontal Stabilizer & Elevator. See the Green Number with Question Marks, the thicker Cross Section would result in a larger Load Factor. Would it be 1.1 or 1.5, I don't know. The only way we could determine that is to build scaled mock ups of both to determine the exact Load Factor. Just FYI, my wife just walked out of the room, her only comment Damn your are an Engineer!
As you can see from the Sketch, I have been cogitating the issue. FYI you can click on the picture and get a more legible photo of it.
By the Way Merry Christmas & Happy New Year to All Ya'll ! ! !
dkshow wrote:These are quite draggy airplanes. I think the best way to make a SS go faster would be to take the shocks and the gear off... All those round tubes hanging out there in the breeze pulls incredibly hard in the wrong direction. Unfortunately, we sort of need the gear for the landing part unless you only plan on doing it once. Try this, drive down the road at say 65mph, now stick a broom stick out the window and see how tough it is to hold it. Just the struts alone is a lot of drag. I'm not sure the best way to reduce it but I think you could pick up a bit of the top end by working on losing some of that drag. Didn't Troy say in the beginning that the SS wing was 10 slower and 10 faster than the Highlander? That could have been before the SS gear I suppose. I think horsepower and the right prop is the key to a faster SS honestly. Everything is a trade off, do you want to go fast or leave the ground fast.
I'd love to have the best of all worlds, something tells me I don't have enough money.