No vertical stab flying - possible?

[Emu]

Not sure whether this is the correct forum; however, I wanted to understand whether it would be at all possible to fly without a vertical stabilizer.  Generally, when I lose the vertical stabilizer, my plane just slowly falls to the ground, almost like a leaf; however, I was in a 109E over the weekend and my vertical stabilizer and rudder (obviously) got shot out. After an initial few seconds of instability, i was able to dive, recover, fly back to base, and land.  I am perplexed.  Anyone experienced this before or has a viable explanation?

[Latrobe]

I've never been able to fly very long without vertical stabilizers. Sometimes I can keep my wings level long enough to get a few rounds off at the guy who has just BnZ'd me and just overshot, but soon my plane will start sliding left or right and I loose control.

I know its possible to fly without ailerons or elevators. It'll just take more skills.

[Mace2004]

Not unless the airplane has some other means to control yaw (think of the B2).  

Some damaged aircraft have been able to make due with heavily damaged vertical stabs, usually multi-engine planes that can use the engines to control yaw but it's highly unusual.  A 109? Nope, ain't gonna happen.

[Emu]

Should this then be reported as a bug? I did turn on my film recorder once I realised I was flying without it.

[Lusche]

Originally posted by Emu
Should this then be reported as a bug? I did turn on my film recorder once I realised I was flying without it.

Better post that film here first, so we can assess what happened.

[bcadoo]

I would say 'possible' although rarely 'doable'

As long as you didn't get too far out of shape you could utilize adverse yaw.
(watch the ball when you make an aileron bank...you have to use pro-turn rudder to counteract the adverse yaw of the down aileron)  The other thing that would affect it is CG.  If you were nose heavy then there would be a natural tendency to go in the 'right' direction.

FYI

[Mace2004]

Originally posted by bcadoo
I would say 'possible' although rarely 'doable'

As long as you didn't get too far out of shape you could utilize adverse yaw.
(watch the ball when you make an aileron bank...you have to use pro-turn rudder to counteract the adverse yaw of the down aileron)  The other thing that would affect it is CG.  If you were nose heavy then there would be a natural tendency to go in the 'right' direction.

FYI

Ahhhh...no.  An airplane missing its vertical stabilizer normally has negative static stability unless there is an unusually large amount of aft fuselage depth which could give some small amount of yaw stability.  Once it deviates on that axis, the deviation will continue to increase unless you have some other yaw control such as differential thrust, speedbrakes or spoilers to apply a counter yaw moment. As the airplane yaws, dihedral will cause a roll which will rapidly overcome your aileron power and the airplane will go down.  Adverse yaw in an attempted turn is actually one of those things that will cause a deviation, it will not "fix" it.  CG has little effect in the yaw axis with the exception of the landing rollout (think ground loops here).

[humble]

I landed (ditched) an A-20 without the vertical slab not to long ago (think I have the clip somewhere). If you realize that your missing the slab you have a brief window in which you can stabalize things to a degree by rolling into the torque a bit and then balancing the torque vs the "lean" and going glider before it gets out of hand. I dont know how you could actually fly under power however except at very reduced power settings...

[Emu]

I could email or PM the film to someone who can then post it... I dont have a subscription to any free hosting site where I can post.  Any takers?

[Lusche]

Originally posted by Emu
I could email or PM the film to someone who can then post it... I dont have a subscription to any free hosting site where I can post.  Any takers?

You don't need subscriptions on most of those sites.
For example: http://www.mediafire.com

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Mace2004
Some damaged aircraft have been able to make due with heavily damaged vertical stabs, usually multi-engine planes that can use the engines to control yaw but it's highly unusual.  

Perhaps the most famous:  http://www.talkingproud.us/HistoryB52NoTail.html

- oldman

[Spikes]

Originally posted by Oldman731
Perhaps the most famous:  http://www.talkingproud.us/HistoryB52NoTail.html

- oldman

Thank you for sharing!

[B@tfinkV]

this happened to me once when i was dueling snap hook in a 109e. the rudder makes up a large area of the tail fin. when you lose rudder it looks like the vert stab it gone but there is a small section left. unless it definitely came up as vert stab in the damage report my geuss it you only lost your rudder.

[manurin]

As Bat says, big difference between rudder out (u can still come home), and the vertical stab out (u go right in the tower).

[Emu]

I'll post the film later today.