Tails to a Tee
It’s strange how myths and popular misconceptions start. Frankenstein was actually the scientist, not the monster. Greek marble sculptures were actually brightly coloured. The upper surface of a lifting aerofoil doesn’t have to be longer than the lower surface. Captain Cook didn’t discover Australia, and nor was his rank ever “Captain”.
And T-tails are dangerous. The tails fall off and you can’t recover from a spin, so goes the tale.
This myth, found in general aviation (but not in other parts of the aviation world), is usually tied to the Piper PA-38 Tomahawk. A T-tail is an empennage where the horizontal stabiliser is mounted on the top of the vertical stabiliser. This configuration makes a T-shape when viewed from behind. So the Tomahawk looked different to its competitors, and for this reason alone, had an uphill battle to prove itself. In the same way that canards have a stigma created by people who don’t know canards, the T-tail was the focus for naysayers.
It is often (correctly) quoted that the PA-38 has had a significantly higher number of stall/spin accidents than comparable trainers. But those comparable trainers include the Beech Skipper, which is an uncannily similar aircraft: same aerofoil, same configuration, same engine, same T-tail. It turns out it was not the T-tail that gave the PA-38 its reputation,
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