Elevators, Ailerons, and the differences therin.

[Fortunateson1969]

I have brought great shame upon my House.

I have been building planes for some time with limited success, until I was watching a video by WinterOwl where he explained the difference between Ailerons and Elevators. And how every plane I\'ve ever built is wrong.

So I looked it up and most planes have elevators on the tail, rudder there too, and ailerons on the wings. A couple of questions.

1.) Do all CS in KSP work in tandem-ie pitching back makes them all go back or what have you, and rolling right/left makes them do that appropriate action? Is is possible to arrest this action so I can have true ailerons/elevators...Is that even neccessary?

2.)Are there planes (that haven\'t killed their test pilots) that have the elevators in front in real life?

Thanks!

[duckunlimited2]

Yes, there are planes that have the elevators in front of the wings. They are called canards. The main reason why its possible to put the wings and elevators in different orders is because there functions are completely independent of each other. The wings pretty much generates 90-95 percent of the lift needed for flight. The tail, which contains the vertical and horizontal stabilizers, are for stability. As for control surfaces, elevators control pitch. When a plane changes pitch, it rotates like a see saw, with a pivot point somewhere in the middle. Elevators are positioned either on the front of the plane (conard) or the back (traditional) as a way to capitalize on that pivot point. Rudders aren\'t really used often. They are mainly used to correct from unwanted yawing which only happens in less than stellar flying conditions. Ailerons are used to roll the plane and are position on the tip of the wing as again, to capitalize a see saw effect. (the farther out a force is applied on a lever, the easier it is to lift things type of thing). And it makes sense to apply a role force on the sturdy middle then the far tips of the fuselage in my opinion.

When you do make a true plane in KSP, the elevators and ailerons don\'t seperate their jobs to their respective titles but do both jobs. If the elevators have two control surfaces on both sides (not one, if it is just one control surface, than it acts like a true elevator) it will assist in the role and act as an aileron when called to do so. The same thing goes for the ailerons when your pitching. It will act like an elevator. However, the aileron would deflect in the opposite direction then the elevator. I think its because the plane can recognize a pivot point and would deflect to what\'s appropiate given its position on the plane relative to the pivot point.

[White Owl]

I have brought great shame upon my House.

I have been building planes for some time with limited success, until I was watching a video by WinterOwl where he explained the difference between Ailerons and Elevators. And how every plane I\'ve ever built is wrong.

Oh, I hope not. I\'m a big fan of doing what works, not necessarily what\'s right.

1.) Do all CS in KSP work in tandem-ie pitching back makes them all go back or what have you, and rolling right/left makes them do that appropriate action? Is is possible to arrest this action so I can have true ailerons/elevators...Is that even neccessary?

In earlier versions of KSP - and possibly still in the demo, but I\'m unsure about that - it was possible to separate ailerons from elevators simply by turning symmetry on and off. Nowadays the game moves all available control surfaces, all the time. I would personally like to have a means of separating them again... but it isn\'t actually necessary.

2.)Are there planes (that haven\'t killed their test pilots) that have the elevators in front in real life?

Many! Starting with the Wright Flyer.

[Vanamonde]

I\'ve been extremely impressed that you can stick the same control surface or RCS piece any-old-where on a ship, and the software correctly utilizes it to achieve the effect you want, even if the same part is doing opposite things in opposing parts of the ship. The part knows what to do, based upon where it finds itself on the ship.