The skypup used a rudder bar. a long piece of wood that is centrally mounted with a bolt, with the rudder cables attaching to each end. I have never thought of this as a possible issue considering how tight these airplanes are assuming your feet always rest against the pedals. I am not familiar with the max's rudder system.

All springs experience rate changes and fatigue with time and use. Any less so than a stranded cable running around a pulley? Couldn't say.

Eventually I may change my rudder pedal layout to a 2 pulley system. This has the advantage of no load coming on the rudder pedals. The cable system can be rigged independent of the rudder pedals, and then later, the pedals will simply be connected to the cable. I will keep this project for next winter after initial flight testing is done. Right now I am leaving the rudder pedal layout 'as is' for the initial few flights. I have a bigger issue right now, which is that my aileron cables are too stiff, so I need to fix that before I do anything more with the rudders.

Quoted from Bill Metcalf

All springs experience rate changes and fatigue with time and use.

Like the time I was flying my Sonex and one spring broke and I suddenly had lots of left rudder trim.  That was the first plane that I removed the springs from and didn't look back.

Quoted from 509

The skypup used a rudder bar. a long piece of wood that is centrally mounted with a bolt, with the rudder cables attaching to each end. I have never thought of this as a possible issue considering how tight these airplanes are assuming your feet always rest against the pedals. I am not familiar with the max's rudder system.

Actually this system may work great on a Max too. I wish someone comes up with a concept drawing for a MiniMax with this system. No springs, no pulleys, no front cable and no rudder pedals too. And no slack in the cables aft of cockpit.

Okay, i have not fully read the build manual - how does one correctly tension a rudder cable in an open/springless circuit?

Quoted from Keith103

Actually this system may work great on a Max too. I wish someone comes up with a concept drawing for a MiniMax with this system. No springs, no pulleys, no front cable and no rudder pedals too. And no slack in the cables aft of cockpit.

Sounds good until you try to add toe or heel brakes.

Quoted from 437

Okay, i have not fully read the build manual - how does one correctly tension a rudder cable in an open/springless circuit?

With your feet.  You push equally hard on each pedal and everything is in balance.

Hey, this horse still has a heart beat!.. Lets beat it some more.
My interest is in the Airbike so I never paid too much attention to the minimax/himax.
I noticed the Max plans call for rudder cable turnbuckles.
Why? I can see no reason for it if the other end of the cable goes to the pedal/spring if you build to the plans, and even more useless if not using springs.
I gotta be missing something right?

So one can remove the tail.

Quoted from flydog

Hey, this horse still has a heart beat!.. Lets beat it some more.
My interest is in the Airbike so I never paid too much attention to the minimax/himax.
I noticed the Max plans call for rudder cable turnbuckles.
Why? I can see no reason for it if the other end of the cable goes to the pedal/spring if you build to the plans, and even more useless if not using springs.
I gotta be missing something right?

Besides what Bob said, turn buckles also help to adjust the rudder pedals back to your desired angle at neutral position, if either cable develops slack.

Bob, Keith, thanks for the reply.
With that in mind I took another look at the drawings and now see that the turnbuckle is attached directly to the rudder horn. Somehow didn't see that before. The Airbike does it differently.

TTT, you can get regular house door hinges that have an adjustable spring built into them.

The only downside I see is they do weight a little more.
https://m.lowes.com/pd/Hager-4.....-Door-Hinge/50035832

Or improvise a torsion spring(think PA-1. Different kind of pedal but I bet you could figure something out. Very little weight.

That smiley face is supposed to be an eight. Why did it do that? I even tried to change it with the edit feature. Still there.

The smiley is because you used an 8 followed immediately by an parentheses )

If you put a space between the 8 and ) like this:
8 )
Then it should not show up as an emoji.

But of course, makes perfect sense. NOT!
Some days I really hate computers