Deformation equivalence of affine ruled surfaces

A smooth family $\varphi:\mathcal V\to S$ of surfaces will be called {\em completable} if there is a logarithmic deformation $(\bar {\mathcal V},{\mathcal D})$ over $S$ so that ${\mathcal V}=\bar{\mathcal V}\backslash {\mathcal D}$. Two smooth surfaces $V$ and $V'$ are said to be deformations of each other if there is a completable flat family ${\mathcal V}\to S$ of smooth surfaces over a connected base so that $V$ and $V'$ are fibers over suitable points $s,s'\in S$. This relation generates an equivalence relation called {\em deformation equivalence}. In this paper we give a complete combinatorial description of this relation in the case of affine ruled surfaces, which by definition are surfaces that admit an affine ruling $V\to B$ over an affine base with possibly degenerate fibers. In particular we construct complete families of such affine ruled surfaces. In a few particular cases we can also deduce the existence of a coarse moduli space.