YO,

I'd seen your Mark VIII video before. I'm waiting for the Mark IX you promised: a tube feeding a holding tank at the glider's CG. A level-sensing switch empties it at the appropriate time by closing a valve on the input side, pressurizing the tank using compressed air from a companion tank (charged on the ground or, in version IXa, by a small onboard 12v air compressor), and opening a valve to the discharge tube leading all the way back thru the fuselage to a tube that extends (a la Mark VIII) horizontally until it's aft of the rudder. Then, with an abundance of caution, it flushes the entire system each time with 50 cc of water from a connector to the water ballast system. I heard you had to make some adjustments after the air compressor accidentally pressurized your left water ballast tank and partially separated the wing skin from the spar. How could you have known that would happen? I agree a $2.99 check valve should fix that in the future. Teething problems like this are part of every great technological advance

Sign me up when it's ready. What good is technology if we don't use it? Besides, I'm tired of pilots complaining every time they see my wheel come down in a thermal.

Chip Bearden
JB