I have the Tower Trainer and it flies well. The guys at my field feel a plane with dihedral is a poor trainer. I have ordered a new set of wings and am going to try to build the with no dihedral. Has anyone else done this? I am getting good at landings with the original wings but am told it is better to fly and eisier to land without dihedral. Your opinions please.

The more dihedral you have, the more stable the plane is. The bad news is, with a lot of dihedral, it makes the plane hard to turn.

So yes, with less dihedral you will have better control.

A little dihedral is a good thing. The Tower Trainer .40 MkII ARF calls for 5 1/2" or so of dihedral (if one wing tip is flat against a table, the opposite side should sit 5 1/2" high from the same surface) if built per the instructions. Sanding out a bit of dihedral angle from the wing brace makes it easy to lessen the dihedral. I built mine with about 4" of dihedral and it flew very well, tracking nicely through loops and easily flying inverted.

If you build one with no dihedral, it will be as much sport plane as trainer. I think working for a 2" to 4" dihedral range will give you the best of both worlds - a sporty plane that flies aerobatics well but still can correct itself if you let off the sticks for a bit.

Most of the classic low wing sport planes still have dihedral built into the wings, it's just a matter of having the right amount of dihedral for how you want to fly.

Reducing dihedral to a point on a high wing cabin type is OK but totally flat will result in a poor flying airplane. When the wing is on the table I would go no less than one inch at each tip. Now if you go past flat into droop (anhedral, the airplane will once agine become a pleasant flyer and impart nice roll charactistics.


Doing anhedral on a high wing cabin type will put the airplane closer to that totally neutral roll stability point (the point most refer to as the stays where you put it feel). This is the reason most low wing aerobatics types have slight dihedral to acheive that neutral point, its the opposite of high wing cabin types.

John

I had a tower trainer for my plane when I go t back into the sport. The plane was built with recommended dihedral, flew great, you really dont need to change it, IMHO for what its worth. It was a great trainer, and had about the perfect amount of dihedral IMHO again. Good luck, it wont hurt to try the 0 dihedral wing though

The guys at your field feel a plane with dihedral is a poor trainer??!! Sounds like they don't do much training there!!

The best trainers made all have dihedral, and for a reason, it gives the plane self-righting characteristics that helps keeps newbies wheel-side down!

I would agree that a plane with dihedral would be a poor second plane, but the trainers have it for a good reason. Sounds like you've already got some stick time on the stock wing, so building a second wing with no dihedral as a follow-on is not a bad idea.