The difference between gliders designed in the last 20 years is quite small.. Some of the difference is explainable by wing loading. Here are the handicaps used in the US for a sample of gliders (in the US, lower numbers are faster):

JS3 - 0.83
ASH31-18 - 0.835
V3 - 0.84
ASG29-18 - 0.845
V2b-18 - 0.85
ASH26 - 0.855
LS6c-18 - 0.868
ASW27 - 0.878
LS8-18. - 0.88
Vb16.6 - 0.883

That means that on an 80 knot average day for the JS3, the ASH26 will do 78, and an LS8-18 75 knots. Put another way in a 4 hours flight the JS3 will arrive 7 minutes ahead of the ASH26 and 14 minutes ahead of the LS8. That is a lot of time in a race, but for pleasure flying nearly nothing. 7 minutes will be lost or gained many times in a 4 hour flight by luck or skill. If the 26 is leaching the JS3 it will be slowly left behind (which may be mentally disheartening, even if the difference is small) but will still be within Flarm range by the end of the day. If the S3 is loaded to 12 lbs/ft the difference is much greater - but primarily due to wing loading, not aerodynamic design. The science was pretty far advanced even 20 years ago. There has been more gained by increasing wing loadings than wing profiles. If you are racing at top levels, or the money is of little consequence to you, then by all means the newest gliders are faster. For the rest of us, hard to find the value proposition.

On Wednesday, October 14, 2020 at 1:02:34 AM UTC-7, krasw wrote:
On Monday, 12 October 2020 at 20:40:52 UTC+3, Ramy wrote:
The price tag of close to 200K for a new self launcher does not surprise me as I don’t think you can’t find much cheaper for any new motorglider?
What surprises me is the expectation that the 34 will not perform as well as the top standard class such as LS8 and Discus 2 and is marketed as a club glider. After all the claim of 48:1 glide ratio is as high as you can expect from a non flap ship, which is not bad. So why do you expect it will not perform as well?
I wonder why they don’t offer the same option in the 33?
I would like to hear thoughts on it.
As for why I did not switch to a motorglider myself so far, part of it is enjoying the “pure” and adventure aspect of pure gliders, part is that in the places I fly and with the support I have, pure gliders worked well for me, part is shying away from complexity, maintainace and extra cost. But I am getting older, and electric solution appeal the most to me, but I haven’t found the silver lining I am looking for so far..

Ramy
To be totally honest, pilots who contemplate over performance differences between LS8-18, D2c and AS34 are not going to fly a mile longer or knot faster with any of these types, or with LS4 for that matter. We are talking about gliders that are sold to sunday afternoon pilots doing 99% of the time few hour pleasure flights. Who cares if one of these is 0.001% better and 81.3 knot "speed range" than other?

If you want a glider that goes, you need to look at 18m racers such as V3, JS3 or AS33.