Worth the extra weight? This was 8 years ago...where are the STOL planes built using this tech??

I have a full steam gauge backup in my plane in addition to 2 g-5's. I still run a generator. My plane is still gravity feed fuel.

I'll pass on all the extra stuff that can break. Probably not very lightweight either.

I was just admiring a Helio Courier yesterday. I'd be surprised if a droopable leading edge like those products above could out-perform the Helio's pressure-actuated slats. The (relative) simplicity of the Helio is awesome.

I played with a helios slats the other day (sounds vaguely disturbing written out) and was impressed by how smooth the mechanism was. Ive never flown in one but I hear they make quite a lot of noise extending/retracting.

I am recovering my experimental cub wings. Ive added a cuff which I copied off the Sportsman I put on my 170. My theory is that by lowering the leading edge these cuffs slightly increase the critical angle of attack. I have also bought VGs, but actually feel that they would have worked better on the old leading edge. What I think is that you can only increase the critical angle so far, either with leading edge profile or with VGs. Ill fly it without the VGs first.

daedaluscan wrote:I played with a helios slats the other day (sounds vaguely disturbing written out) and was impressed by how smooth the mechanism was. Ive never flown in one but I hear they make quite a lot of noise extending/retracting.

One of my instructors told me that she learned quickly that coordinating turns is extra important in order to asymmetric slat deployment. She also said there's are a lot of banging noises.

That's a LOT of moving parts spread across 2 full wings. What happens if the actuators in one wing jam? what happens if just a few actuators in each wing function? It seems way too complex with way too much potential for unintended consequences for me. I have some of the same feelings about "blown wing" designs with multiple electric motors turning small props along the leading edge of the wing. The idea is that you could have lots of airflow over the wing even without much forward speed. Again I haven't seen any discussion of the effects caused by partial failures of the system. Like many complex setups, I'm sure they are great when everything is working, but how dangerous are partial failures? Besides, I'm able to get in and out of every place I care to fly to with an old fashioned high lift wing with no complicated do-dads.

That said, this video of a blown wing plane landing is pretty darned impressive: