Hi folks,

I've just finished hingeing the elevator on my Venture 60 and have used Robart hinge points for the first time. I unfortunately don't have access to a drill press, so to drill the hinge holes I use a combination of my Dremel and a 50/50 mix of caution and concentration.

After some very careful measuring and drilling, and reading through the excellent [link=http://www.airfieldmodels.com/]Airfield Models[/link] Robart installation instructions, I got the six 1/8" hinge points installed. The hinges all pivot at 90 degrees to the plane of the stabiliser and the elevator and stabiliser mate together with very little pressure so I think the hinge holes are correctly aligned (does need
a bit of extra pressure for the last few millimetres of the hinge points due to the flaring around the hinge.)

OK - enough of the history and on to my question. Visually the elevator attachment seems to be spot-on. The hinge gap between elevator and stabiliser is tiny and consistent. The top and bottom surfaces of the elevator align perfectly with the top and bottom surfaces of the stabiliser when in the neutral position. The thing that concerns me is the 'stiffness' of the hinges. The elevator isn't binding - I can move it between maximum up and down deflection with no sticking, and the amount of force required to move the elevator is constant throughout the full travel - but the amount of force required to move the elevator is a bit more than I expected. While I expected the elevator to be 'stiffer' than my previous model (where I used Great Planes plastic pinned hinge tabs) I wasn't expecting it to be THIS stiff. I can place the elevator in any position and it'll hold that position regardless of whether I flip the stabiliser assembly right-side-up, upside-down or even gently shake it!

I guess my first question is, is this normal? If not then where have I slipped up and how can I rectify the problem?

Thanks for the assistance,
Neil.