Number one killer of servo motors and gear sets is long servo arms. In all my experience there has only been one case where more than the second hole on an arm has been 'needed' and that's on the Pike's elevator.
It has a long belcrank in the back and a short arm won't give enough travel down for landing comp.
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Gordy is right as far as he goes. A more accurate statement that improperly designed servo linkage is the number one killer of servo motors. Simply putting on a longer servo arm and decreasing the servo throw to give the correct surface deflection will do what Gordy says. Simultaneously Increasing the length of the surface horn by a similar amount will not increase the load on the servo. Servo linkage should always be designed to use the maximum amount of servo travel to give the desired control surface throw.
Back in "The good old days" we didn't have computer radios, reversing switches, and servo throw adjustments. We had to design the linkages correctly. Computer radios have gotten many builders into the bad habit of installing the servos and linkages the easiest way and using the computer to give the correct throws. Bad! It is much better to do a correct installation in the first place and use the transmitter program to fine tune the system.
Ref. Linkage 101 course I took circa 1951.
Chuck Anderson
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