No, it did not need a bungee; it accelerated and launched fine from
its "railroad track". The weight-assist mechanism was added later for
their flights in Dayton, because they had trouble laying out a long
enough track.
Best Regards, Dave

"Martin Gregorie" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 10 Jul 2003 13:34:01 +0300, "iPilot"
wrote:

Interesting.

If one takes a sailplane and mounts an engine on it he gets a powered
sailplane. What makes me
thinking that Wrights plane was not a powered plane, but a motor glider
:-). A selflauncher to be
excact. Or a touring motor glider.


Not even self-launching. It needed a bungee launch even with the
engine running.

martin@ : Martin Gregorie
gregorie : Harlow, UK
demon :
co : Zappa fan & glider pilot
uk :