On Oct 6, 6:26 pm, Roger Hurley
wrote:
Plenty of interesting stuff in this lengthening thread.
Assuming (big assume I know) that the concept of one-design
racing, at the lower end of the performance range,
could be a good idea, could work like dinghy racing
classes, and could attract 'new' people to sporting
gliding, can we arrive at some king of concensus about
the spec. No, don't just say why not the LS4 or the
S-H D(a) because there are almost certainly liability
issues that would preclude an open and widespread re-start
manufacture of those, and they are anyway 'old-technology'
now.

The LS4 is being built by AMS Flight and the Discus is still in
production and available through SH (as the CS model, built in the
Czech Rebublic). The Discus is only just outclassed by newer designs,
and only when conditions are strong. Either should have been the one-
design, being competitive and easy to fly, especially so compared to
first-gen GRP gliders. Heck, so there's so many of both flying today
it would be easy to create a one-design class for either now.

However all that's beside the point. There no demand for a one-design
class. If you want cheap competition, you enter the Club Class and fly
against some of the best pilots around (including some _very_ talented
youngsters who have been flying since they could reach the controls)
with minimal cost. The class is accurately handicapped and nobody ever
complains that a glider has the wrong handicap - everything is down to
pilot skill. Mind you, getting a place in a Club Class comp can be
tricky - it's very popular.

BTW you can't make a "cheap" glider that could be priced competively
against older second-hand gliders. Gliders are hand-built and that
does not scale - they cannont be "mass produced". Neither is the cost
in the materials - the glass and resin in a 15m glider costs little
more than what's in a 13m one. The production cost is in the highly
skilled labour and time that building a GRP sailplane demands.


Dan