Airplane Control Forces & Control Force Gradients

In this video you will learn about design requirements for airplane control forces and control force gradients, and how they are used to give pilots good feedback. Learn more at https://tamarackaero.com/insights/category/press-releases Subscribe on YouTube: http://bit.do/tamaracksubscribe Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/tamarackaero Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tamarackaero As we do our flight testing we're paying attention to control forces and control force gradients. Control forces are pretty easy concept to understand, basically the pilot shouldn't have to be a bodybuilder to fly the airplane normally. Regulations set limits for how much force is acceptable for long-duration and short-duration applications and what maneuvers they're accessible for. Control force gradients work a little like this; it should always take more force to make a maneuver more critical. In other words if you're in a shallow turn and it requires 10 pounds of rolling force to maintain that return, if you want to increase the steepness of the turn and tighten it should take 15 pounds of force. Increasing beyond that should take 20 pounds of force, just for example. This allows the pilot to anticipate and respond correctly to any maneuver that he or she might be trying to accomplish within the normal envelope. This is critical for safety which is why we spend so much time looking at this during flight testing.