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The V-tail or ''Vee-tail'' (sometimes called a butterfly tail or Rudlicki's V-tailGudmundsson S. (2013). "General Aviation Aircraft Design: Applied Methods and Procedures" (Reprint). Butterworth-Heinemann. p. 489. , 9780123973290) of an aircraft is an unconventional arrangement of the tail control surfaces that replaces the traditional fin and horizontal surfaces with two surfaces set in a V-shaped configuration. It is not widely used in aircraft design. The aft edge of each twin surface is a hinged control surface called a ruddervator, which combines the functions of both a
rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, aircraft, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (generally aircraft, air or watercraft, water). On an aircraft the rudder is used primarily to ...
and
elevator An elevator or lift is a wire rope, cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or deck (building), decks of a building, watercraft, ...
. The V-tail was invented in 1930 by Polish engineer
Jerzy Rudlicki Jerzy Rudlicki (14 March 1893 – 18 August 1977) was a Polish pilot and aerospace engineer. Best known for his inventing and patenting of the V-tail (Polish Patent #15938), which is an aircraft tail configuration that combines the rudder and elev ...
and was tested for the first time on the Hanriot H-28 trainer aircraft, modified by a
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
aerospace manufacturer An aerospace manufacturer is a company or individual involved in the various aspects of designing, building, testing, selling, and maintaining aircraft, aircraft parts, missiles, rockets, or spacecraft. Aerospace is a high technology industry. ...
Plage and Laśkiewicz in the summer of 1931.


Variants

The X-shaped tail surfaces of the experimental
Lockheed XFV The Lockheed XFV (sometimes referred to as the "Salmon") was an American experimental tailsitter prototype aircraft built by Lockheed in the early 1950s to demonstrate the operation of a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) fighter for protecti ...
were essentially a V tail that extended both above and below the fuselage.


Conventional

The most popular conventionally V-tailed aircraft that has been mass-produced is the
Beechcraft Bonanza The Beechcraft Bonanza is an American general aviation aircraft introduced in 1947 by Beech Aircraft Corporation of Wichita, Kansas. The six-seater, single-engined aircraft is still being produced by Beechcraft and has been in continuous prod ...
Model 35, often known as the ''V-tail Bonanza'' or simply ''V-Tail''. Other examples include the
Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk is a retired American single-seat, twin-engine stealth attack aircraft developed by Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works division and operated by the United States Air Force (USAF). It was the first operational air ...
stealth attack aircraft and the
Fouga CM.170 Magister The Fouga CM.170 Magister is a 1950s French two-seat jet trainer aircraft that was developed and manufactured by French aircraft manufacturer ''Établissements Fouga & Cie''. Easily recognizable by its V-tail, almost 1,000 have been built in Fr ...
trainer. The
Cirrus Vision SF50 The Cirrus Vision SF50, also known as the Vision Jet, is a single-engine very light jet designed and produced by Cirrus Aircraft of Duluth, Minnesota, United States. After receiving deposits starting in 2006, Cirrus unveiled an aircraft mock ...
jet is a recent example of a civilian aircraft adopting the V-tail. Some gliders, like the
Lehtovaara PIK-16 Vasama The Lehtovaara PIK-16 Vasama ( en, Arrow) is a Finnish mid-wing, single-seat, FAI Standard Class glider that was designed by Tuomo Tervo, Jorma Jalkanen and Kurt Hedstrom, who were students at the Polyteknikkojen Ilmailukerho (PIK) and produce ...
, were designed with a V-tail, but the production Vasamas had a
cruciform tail __NOTOC__ The cruciform tail is an aircraft empennage configuration which, when viewed from the aircraft's front or rear, looks much like a cross. The usual arrangement is to have the horizontal stabilizer intersect the vertical tail somewhere ...
.


Inverted

The
Blohm & Voss P 213 The Blohm & Voss P 213 was a submission to the ''Miniaturjäger'' (Miniature Fighter) programme of the ''Luftwaffe'' Emergency Fighter Program towards the end of the Second World War. The ''Miniaturjäger'' was to be powered by a pulse jet but th ...
''Miniaturjäger'' was one of the first aircraft to have an inverted V-tail.
Unmanned aerial vehicle An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew, or passengers on board. UAVs are a component of an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which includes adding a ground-based controller ...
s such as the
LSI Amber UAVs include both autonomous (capable of operating without human input) drones and remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs). A UAV is capable of controlled, sustained level flight and is powered by a jet, reciprocating, or electric engine. In the twenty ...
,
General Atomics Gnat The General Atomics Gnat is an aerial reconnaissance UAV developed in the United States in the late 1980s and manufactured by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI). As initially designed, it was a simplified version of the LSI Amber in ...
and
General Atomics MQ-1 Predator The General Atomics MQ-1 Predator (often referred to as the predator drone) is an American remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) built by General Atomics that was used primarily by the United States Air Force (USAF) and Central Intelligence Agency ( ...
would later feature this type of tail. The
Ultraflight Lazair The UltraFlight Lazair is a family of Canadian designed and built twin-engine ultralight aircraft that were sold in kit form between 1979 and 1984. It was one of the first twin-engined ultralights. More Lazairs have been registered i ...
ultralights, of which over 2,000 were produced, featured an inverted V-tail, which also carried the rear landing gear.Hunt, Adam & Ruth Merkis-Hunt: ''Skeletal Remains'', pages 64-70. Kitplanes Magazine, September 2000.


Advantages

Ideally, with fewer surfaces than a conventional three-aerofoil tail or a
T-tail A T-tail is an empennage configuration in which the tailplane is mounted to the top of the fin. The arrangement looks like the capital letter T, hence the name. The T-tail differs from the standard configuration in which the tailplane is ...
, the V-tail is lighter and has less wetted surface area, so thus produces less
induced Induce may refer to: * Induced consumption * Induced innovation * Induced character * Induced coma * Induced menopause * Induced metric * Induced path * Induced topology * Induce (musician), American musician See also * Inducement (disambiguation ...
and
parasitic drag Parasitic drag, also known as profile drag, is a type of aerodynamic drag that acts on any object when the object is moving through a fluid. Parasitic drag is a combination of form drag and skin friction drag. It affects all objects regardless of ...
. However,
NACA The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) was a United States federal agency founded on March 3, 1915, to undertake, promote, and institutionalize aeronautical research. On October 1, 1958, the agency was dissolved and its assets ...
studies indicated that the V-tail surfaces must be larger than simple projection into the vertical and horizontal planes would suggest, such that total wetted area is roughly constant; reduction of intersection surfaces from three to two does, however, produce a net reduction in drag through elimination of some
interference drag Interference is the act of interfering, invading, or poaching. Interference may also refer to: Communications * Interference (communication), anything which alters, modifies, or disrupts a message * Adjacent-channel interference, caused by extr ...
. Light jet aircraft such as the
Cirrus Vision SF50 The Cirrus Vision SF50, also known as the Vision Jet, is a single-engine very light jet designed and produced by Cirrus Aircraft of Duluth, Minnesota, United States. After receiving deposits starting in 2006, Cirrus unveiled an aircraft mock ...
, the
Eclipse 400 The Eclipse 400 (formerly Eclipse Concept Jet, or ECJ) is a single-engine very light jet that was designed by Eclipse Aviation of Albuquerque, New Mexico. A development of the Eclipse 500, the Eclipse 400 was cancelled when the company went ...
or the
Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk The Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk is a high-altitude, remotely-piloted surveillance aircraft of the 1990s–2020s. It was initially designed by Ryan Aeronautical (now part of Northrop Grumman), and known as Tier II+ during development. Th ...
unmanned aerial drone often have the power plant placed outside the aircraft. In such cases V-tails are used to avoid placing the vertical stabilizer in the exhaust of the engine, which would disrupt the flow of the exhaust, reducing thrust and increasing wear on the stabilizer, possibly leading to damage over time. In military aircraft, V-tails reduce the number of right angles on an aircraft, improving its stealth characteristics.


Disadvantages

In the mid-1980s, the
Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...
re-assessed the Beechcraft Bonanza due to safety concerns. While the Bonanza met the initial certification requirements, it had a history of fatal mid-air breakups during extreme stress, at a rate exceeding the accepted norm. The type was deemed airworthy and restrictions removed after Beechcraft issued a structural modification as an
Airworthiness Directive An Airworthiness Directive (commonly abbreviated as AD) is a notification to owners and operators of certified aircraft that a known safety deficiency with a particular model of aircraft, engine, avionics or other system exists and must be correct ...
. V-tailed aircraft require longer rear fuselages than aircraft with conventional empennages to prevent yawing. This tendency, called "snaking", was apparent on taking off and landing on the Fouga CM.170 Magister, which has a relatively short fuselage.


Ruddervators

Ruddervators are the control surfaces on an airplane with a V-tail configuration. They are located at the trailing edge of each of the two
airfoil An airfoil (American English) or aerofoil (British English) is the cross-sectional shape of an object whose motion through a gas is capable of generating significant lift, such as a wing, a sail, or the blades of propeller, rotor, or turbine. ...
s making up the tail of the plane. The first use of ruddervators may have been on the
Coandă-1910 The Coandă-1910, designed by Romanian inventor Henri Coandă, was an unconventional sesquiplane aircraft powered by a ducted fan. Called the "turbo-propulseur" by Coandă, its experimental engine consisted of a conventional piston engine dri ...
's X-tail, although there is no proof that the aircraft ever flew. The later Coandă-1911 flew with ruddervators on its X-tail. Later
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
engineer
Jerzy Rudlicki Jerzy Rudlicki (14 March 1893 – 18 August 1977) was a Polish pilot and aerospace engineer. Best known for his inventing and patenting of the V-tail (Polish Patent #15938), which is an aircraft tail configuration that combines the rudder and elev ...
designed the first practical ruddervators in 1930, tested on a modified
Hanriot HD.28 __NOTOC__ The Hanriot HD.28 was a military trainer aircraft developed in France in the 1920s as a modernised version of the HD.14 for export markets. The principal difference between the types was that while the HD.14 had an entirely wooden struc ...
trainer in 1931. The name is a
portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsyaw (horizontal) control and the elevator provides pitch (vertical) control. Ruddervators provide the same control effect as conventional control surfaces, but through a more complex control system that actuates the control surfaces in unison. Yaw moving the nose to the left is produced on an upright V tail by moving the pedals left which deflects the left-hand ruddervator down and left and the right-hand ruddervator up and left. The opposite produces yaw to the right. Pitch nose up is produced by moving the control column or stick back which deflects the left-hand ruddervator up and right and the right-hand ruddervator up and left. Pitch nose down is produced by moving the control column or stick forward which induces the opposite ruddervator movements.


See also

*
Cruciform tail __NOTOC__ The cruciform tail is an aircraft empennage configuration which, when viewed from the aircraft's front or rear, looks much like a cross. The usual arrangement is to have the horizontal stabilizer intersect the vertical tail somewhere ...
*
Pelikan tail The Pelikan tail is an experimental tail design for fighter jets. It was originally conceived by Ralph Pelikan, who was hired by McDonnell Aircraft, later worked for McDonnell Douglas after the merger of McDonnell with Douglas and, after another ...
*
T-tail A T-tail is an empennage configuration in which the tailplane is mounted to the top of the fin. The arrangement looks like the capital letter T, hence the name. The T-tail differs from the standard configuration in which the tailplane is ...
*
Twin tail A twin tail is a specific type of vertical stabilizer arrangement found on the empennage of some aircraft. Two vertical stabilizers—often smaller on their own than a single conventional tail would be—are mounted at the outside of the aircra ...


References


External links


Simple Aerodynamics Of The V-Tail, from "Flying the Beech Bonanza" by Eckalbar, John C
{{DEFAULTSORT:V-Tail Aircraft tail configurations Polish inventions