freedom of control movement, or lack thereof

[SkyChargerOne]

I finally had the opportunity to fly in a Kitfox 5 and loved every minute of it! I did have one question following the experience though. My father and I recently completed an RV-4 and the control movement in that design is almost perfectly free. Everything moves like it’s on ball bearings. On this particular Kitfox however, I had to purposefully place the controls where I wanted them to go. On the ground, the stick was notably heavy, and the rudders had a distinct weight to them, almost as if there was a friction control in the works. In flight it seemed like I had to really lean on the pedals to get a response. They were far from being “free floating” and seemed quite unnaturally heavy.

So is this a normal condition due to how the control linkage is engineered in the Kitfox, or perhaps the relative weight of the flaperons to standard ailerons?

[kmach]

Something doesn't sound right.

It should be light fingertip pressure on the stick and toe pressure on the rudder pedals.

The faster you are going the less inputs required.

[airlina]

Doesn't sound right to me either, on my Series 5 its fingertip control on the stick and I always wear light footwear so I don't overcontrol on the rudder. Just the weight of my foot resting on a pedal will get the incilinometer a 1/4-1/2 ball out of center. Bruce N199CL