V Tails -as in Beech Bonanzas
 

Driving past Blackbushe today a lovely cream and green V tailed bonanza was visiting.

On the face of it a V tail looks a good idea- cant the hsrizontal stabilisers and elevators at 45 degrees and hey presto no rudder.
It got me wondering why it didnt catch on (Fouga magister and US Stealth Fighter aside.

Are there tricky control scenarios in some flight regimes? Is it weaker than a conventional tail?
Is the tail area the same and therefore as ehavier as with three surfaces ?

How do the elevators work as elevators and rudders when rudders since the movements required are different?

Anyone able to enlighten me on this

A quick google shows you this:
 

V-tail - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

287 posts on this forum and never heard of wikipedia?

More civility
 

Reimers, please, why not just answer the request? The article addresses one of the four questions, and not very well at that. I'm curious too.

Thanks both -Reimers, yes of course I have heard of Wikipedia but thought I might get a more opinionated answer on here as I thought the subject might not be that straightforward.

I did check Pprune to make sure there was no previous post and then posted -it was abit spur of the moment as I ahd happened to see a V tailed Bonanza that day-not a common site in my aprt of the world and that sparked the idea of a question.

I do have to say it surpises me the amount of angst often displayed on this site since it has been my impression from friends in the business (I am clearly a passenger) and general comments about aircrew training etc that airline pilots are supposed to be a fairly even tempered bunch and of course i know many here are not pilots let alone professional ones.

So why you couldnt just point out that there was a wiki article i just don't know, youare far from alone in answerign or commenting in that style but surely everyone who comes to pprune has an interest of one kind or another in aviation and that should be reflected in a more tolerant form of respons. excepting where people make personal attacks or waste peoples time and I do not think I am guilty of either.
Thank you again for pointing me in the right direction.

To answer the original question: I had a chance to fly a series 35 Bonanza some years ago. Although it was fast and powerful, I found the aircraft to be poorly damped in pitch and yaw, with a porpoise like ride in pitch if the air was less than smooth, and with lazy directional stability. Apparently later conventionally tailed models were much better. Just my opinion....

Beechtalk.com

Anything & everything you want to know about Beech Bonanzas, Barons, etc.

I used to own/fly a Monnet Moni with a V-tail. It was perfectly controllable in both pitch and yaw from my point of view, but the previous owner, after my first takeoff (it was a single seater) expressed surprise that I kept it stable in pitch whereas previous pilots had found it unstable (he'd watched me climbing out without any obvious PIO).
I never found any problem in pitch or yaw all the times I flew it, but when opening the ventral airbrake, there was a noticeable nose down pitching moment due to the change of centre of pressure which was easily trimmed out. The controls were so light anyway it didn't matter if you didn't re-trim.
When turning I found it no different from 'normal' aircraft, just a small amount of 'rudder' to counteract the adverse yaw from the full span ailerons.

Have never flown one unfortunately. They had a problem with tailfeathers departing many years back, I believe to to flutter for not properly balanced flight controls. I believe the structure was beefed up.

However, based on little and vague knowledge I would be suspicious if during a walkaround, after a paint job, paint drippings were found on the tail. I believe this was considered to be a cause of flutter on controls that are apparently quite easily out of balance. And if you did take it flying in such unanswered circumstance, avoid higher speeds.

IIRC the US magazine "Flying" looked at V tail v. conventional tail Bonanza's a few years back and reckoned the difference in accident rates due to configuration was very tenuous - ore likely to be associated with age of the airframe and associated equipment for flying into or avoiding thunderstorms than the V-tail itself

Many thanks to all for the responses and its been interestign doing abit more research

In my opinion (a very humble one when it comes to aerodynamics and strcutures) it seem to be one of those ideas that looks really good in theory but when it comes to implemntation there are alot of issues thata dd up to make it perhaps less satisfactory than the conventional one;_
Wetted area not very different
complicated airflow between the tail surfaces at the fuselage join
very complciated control mechanism to deal with the two operating modes

Again many thanks, it does make for a neat and attractice design on the Bonanza tho so i can see why Beech liked the idea and gave it a go
PB

dear pax

you are right, you should have gotten a decent , nice answer instead of just a reference to wikipedia. although wiki is a nice place to read many things.

I've flown a V tail doctor killer as they are known here in the USA. why? Only rich folk (doctors used to be rich) could afford the bonanza at one time...but they thought they were as good at being a pilot as they were at being a doctor...they weren't .

There is an episode of the TV show with Lucille Ball and Red Skelton flying a V tail Bonanza in Alaska...well worth watching as the Bonanza did acrobatics.

Once you are in the plane, flying it normally, you would forget in an instant that the plane had a "V" tail (perhaps a tribute to winston churchill?).

I think the idea was that there was a tiny bit less drag than the conventional tail and I think the V tail plane would do 1mph (it was miles then) faster than the same conventional tail version (they made them both).

There were some structural problems and the v had to be beefed up a bit. But the problem seemed to be people (those doctors) going too fast in rough air or losing control after an inadvertent encounter with IMC and not being very good at flying on instruments.

I think it is easier to build a conventional tail and that the center of gravity range is slightly larger with the conventional tail.

IF anyone ever has problems either flaring any plane for landing or some stability problem in flight...one must do a very proper weight and balance calculation. You would be surprised at how close one might be too either end of the envelope even with just two people on board some planes.

Ihope this helps a bit. But just remember that many of the best planes ever built did not catch on. We built the XB70 bomber almost 50 years ago. 2000mph, 70,000 feet, intercontinental range. Nothing like it (see it at the museum in dayton ohio if you get there) and it didn't catch on.

The v tail was a badge of honor for beech and made it distinctive from piper and cessna planes of the time. Though I have a preference for pipers in light planes anyway.

have fun, rent one some time if you can.