Hi John and all other Dragon owners,

The latest update of Dragon has two bulkheads same as photo.We made this change to lessen the weight at rear fuselage.We didn't find the moving issue as in movie after thoroughly checking the stocked Dragon.If any of you have the similar issue as shown in movie,please send us e-mail and we will offer the drawings to make additioinal former at forward area of rear fuselage.

Best regards
John
E-mail: [email protected]
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John,

Thanks for your prompt response! Just for clarification, when you said the latest update of the Dragon has two bulkheads, didn't you mean that there are two in the tail section, one that support the stab/rudder and the other that simply supports the tail pipe and that the third bulkhead visible in my (white, yellow, blue) dragon has been deleted to lessen weight in tail?

My point is, that the bulkhead removed in the latest design carried a sleeve (secured with carbon) that allowed a much longer post (spar) from the rudder to slide into. Didn't the previous design have two carbon spars that connected to both bulkheads in stab area? I think this omission is what lead to the flex you see in Richard's video. With the single bulkhead that is in the latest design, you simply have a short square section of ply that provides the strength for the rudder. This is the piece we found broken after the maiden flight.

To make things clearer, the tail of Richard's Dragon did not have this flex prior to the maiden. He pushed it out to the flight line by the top of the tail (as most of us do) and it felt normal as compared to his previous Dragons. His flight consisted of mostly level laps around the field to trim in three different flight conditions (gear down/ flaps half down, gear down/flaps full down and gear up/flaps up) with a couple of rolls thrown in. I believe if I would have had the radio in my hands and flown it the way I fly mine (previous design) the outcome would have been worse.

I don't think that simply adding the bulkhead that you guys removed will give the strength to the tail that is needed without adding the sleeve to bulkhead and spar to rudder.

Have you considered adding the additional bulkhead and spar back to rudder? I am considering purchasing another Dragon but would not do so if these parts are omitted. This is a great flying airplane and the cost is very reasonable. Yes, we are having to add 16 ounces of lead to the nose but that number could be reduced by moving other componets forward vs. removing strength from the tail. No one likes to add unused ballast to a aircraft but in the case of the Dragon, it does not hurt its performance.

We will not fly this latest design without hearing from you.

Regards,

John Thomas