What Does Propeller Pitch Do
what is propeller pitch
Propeller pitch is officially defined as “the distance a propeller would move in one revolution if it were moving through a soft solid, like a screw through wood.”
Although this may by hard to grasp, the distance the propeller would move forward in one rotation can be adjusted by the angle at which the propeller sit on the propeller hub.
In this post you will learn how to alter the pitch of your propellers and its effects on your plane’s fight.
the effect to propeller pitch
decreasing propeller pitch
What happens when you raise the pitch of your propeller?
Decreasing the pitch will increase the rpm of the propeller. This alteration should be made if your plane is wright stuff plane is flying too high to fast. Lowering the pitch of your wright stuff plane will allow your plane to fly upwards at a slower rate compared to a high pitch propeller plane.
However, be aware of your plane’s characteristics before making any sort of changes onto your wright stuff plane. This is because even a small degree change on to the propeller pitch can lead to drastic effects onto your wright stuff plane’s flight.
To decrease the pitch on your propeller, you can simply take some pliers and twist each blade of the propeller downwards. When you do this, make sure that the propeller is oriented so that the front of the propeller is facing upwards.
increasing propeller pitch
What happens when you lower the pitch of your propeller?
Increasing the pitch will decrease the rpm of the propeller. This alteration should be made if your plane is wright stuff plane is not flying high enough before a high amount of torque is used. Increasing the pitch of your wright stuff plane will allow your plane to fly upwards at a faster rate compared to a low pitch propeller plane.
However, be aware of your plane’s characteristics before making any sort of changes onto your wright stuff plane. This is because even a small degree change on to the propeller pitch can lead to drastic effects onto your wright stuff plane’s flight.
To increase the pitch on your propeller, you can simply take some pliers and twist each blade of the propeller upwards. When you do this, make sure that the propeller is oriented so that the front of the propeller is facing upwards.
Flaring propeller pitch
So how do you get the best of both worlds?
Lowering the pitch will increase the rpm of the propeller and increasing the pitch will do the opposite. If you want to optimize the flight time of your airplane you want to have a lower pitch when your plane is flying upwards and a higher pitch when the plane descends.
But how do you change the pitch mid air?
Simple, use a flaring propeller. The blades of a flaring propeller bend to a higher pitch at the beginning of the flight to slow down the energy delivery of the motor and reduce the rate of climb.
This generally happens by the propeller being built with more area in front of the spar than behind it. The result is that either the blade or the propeller spar flexes and allows the blade to go to a larger angle or pitch.
The plan is for the propeller pitch to increase enough that the propeller stalls and can’t deliver enough thrust for the model to climb at its optimum rate. Besides reducing thrust the flared propeller also results in a drop in RPM which saves motor energy for the latter parts of the flight
