Been flying my LT-40, and loving every minute. However, the last day I was out, upon post-flight inspection, I noticed that one of the four hinges on the elevator had severed. It was the inboard on the port side. So, I sealed that hinge area, as well as the other three, checked the elevator for security, and flew her again. It worked fine. I intend to seal the entire elevator control surface gap before my next flight. My question is this. Should I be worried about losing the elevator? There's still three hinges holding it very securely, and there will be a tape seal all along the elevator. I don't see how I could lose it. I just don't know how I could replace that hinge without taking the whole elevator off, and I already had to do that during the build because of some snap in the elevator, so there's not much more room to make a new slot. Should I be concerned here? - Spool

yes. If a hinge broke it probably means your control throw is more than the hinges can move without binding. If it were me, I would cut off the elevator and replace all the hinges with "real" hinges like Robart Hinge Points. You can replace them with CA hinges if you want, but I wouldn't fly the plane as it is.

IMO, The best thing to do is cut the elevator off and rehinge. However somthing that would work vevy well would be to monocoat hinge the entire surface. You could do this without removeing the elevator. With the monocoat hinge, plus your 3 remaning c/a hinges it will last a very, very long time. I would decrease the elevator throw just a touch to releve the stress on your remaning c/a hinges. I've done this befor with no problems.

Darren

I actually agree with CafeenMan on this one. Robarts are THE WAY TO GO if you can get enough meat for them to mount into. CA hinges are fine but they can break if you dont have everything just right or a good quality hinge. With Robarts you slap a drill guide on there apply epoxy inside the hole, stick them in and they are bomb proof.

Another option would be to use Iron on hinges like Granite State used to produce. These hinges are no longer available on the open market, but are easy to make with a couple strips of fabric covering. These hinges are easy to install, and very strong. Plus have the added advantage of leaving no gaps between the surfaces. I use this kind of hinge almost exclusevly now.

And yet another option is cutting them all, and re-installing "Flex-Point" hinges. I have had many of the CA hinges fail (break), and went with these and it's a easy/quick and bulletproof "fix". I'm actually using these on any plane that I build that comes with the CA hinges. Try'em, I think you'll like them.

Gary

Check out http://www.flightlines.com/forum/For...ML/000053.html for some neat hinge ideas, allmost all if not all will be much better than CA hinges.