Do I spy tapered wings on the Beaver? Does the owner also have a Cessna with straight wings? And looking at all those extra windows does it suffer problems with an aft cg when loaded? :confused:

B307 - VertFin Rudder -- design REVOLUTION
 

About two slots above BA shows a Boeing B307 Stratoliner -- but that modern Vertical Fin and Rudder in that photo is AFTER the fatal upset/breakup of 18Mar1939.

Since Ralph Cram (Aero) was killed in that upset/breakup, Boeing brought George S up from Consolidated. GS and Eddie Allen worked through several iterations from the tiny Vertical Stab' with initial HUGE RUDDER aft of hinge.

AB -- ?maybe you can find IMAGES of the pre-mishap fin-rudder design on the web?? I have the early magazine images, the iterations were shown in the IAeS magazine:

Schairer, George S. "Directional Stability and Vertical Surface Stalling." Presented at IAeS Aerodynamics session, Ninth Annual Meeting, NY, 31Jan 1941. Published in IAeS' Journal of Aeronautical Sciences, May'41; pg 270-75; paper describes directional instability of prototype's Fin-Rudder design and excess Rudder Hinge Moment during flight with large Beta.

Cook, William H. Road to the 707. Bellevue WA: TYC Publishing, '91. pg 57, "rudder locked full over".

Regarding research on directional control: subsequent modifications of Vertical Fin (added dorsal fin) and Rudder (specifics on sizing to reduce hinge moments); and then added Rudder hydraulic boost). Later B-17s and other aircraft adopted lesson learnt, with the Fin-Rudder sizing to inhibit Rudder "lock-over". This was one of the major lessons in design, and measurement (with the knowledge that Sideslip Angle did NOT merely equal Yaw Angle).

Seattle P-I Sunday March 19th, 1939 front page headline, shown in large type spread across the top, reads "STRATOLINER FALLS, 10 DIE". Under the headline on that front page is a large photograph of the Stratoliner wreckage ...

P-I page two shows a photograph of NX19901 apparently in flight with #3 and #4 Props BOTH stopped, and the RUDDER deflected to the left (correcting for asymmetric thrust); no photo caption shown (perhaps a Boeing photo taken during a prior test flight). [This configuration, thrust asymmetry and associated sideslip angle, was described by WHC as likely at initial mishap-upset: with Rudder "lock-over" causing an unexpected yaw-rotation and spin in the direction of the "good" engines.]

HarryMann – the pressurisation was a modest 2½ PSI on the Boeing 307, in practice the pressurisation system had problems and was not used. Had the pleasure of seeing a gleaming polished metal 307 sitting on the ramp at Tan Son Nhut Airport in Saigon, Vietnam when I arrived late 1970.

Igh – this will be the photo to which you refer with #3 and #4 shut down. The prototype used the fin/rudder from the B-17C. Following the crash it was redesigned and in fact incorporated onto the B-17E when its tail end was redesigned to incorporate a tail gun turret.
http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...ham227/8-1.jpghttp://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m...ham227/9-1.jpg

It sure was a graceful airplane. In the late sixties/early seventies the last remaining 307 was based in Vientiane while operating a weekly sched service (unpressurised) for the ICC (International Control Commission?) to Hanoi and Saigon. Have no idea how they were never shot down!

Yes you do. That is a mod, the name of which I forget, where they add an extension to the wing outboard of the strut, plus an extended cabin, plus a fillet to the leading edge of the horizontal stab, plus that dorsal fin. I'm surprised one engine is able to lug all that ugly around. The only thing that could be done to make the airplane even more hideous would be to add the Edo 6100 floats. :yuk: