Glider Tail Stall
At my club we had some tail stall situations with a Cirrus Standard
during winch launches.
With some of the lighter pilots the glider would tend to overrotate on
takeoff and when the stick was pushed forward to lower the nose it
only got worse.
Since itīs an all flying stab, pushing forward would increase the
already large angle of attack and stall the tail. A fast thinking
pilot found that a quick pull on the stick would unstall it. Sometimes
it required īīpumpingīī a couple of times to regain full pitch
control.
After a few unpleasant launches we did a weight and balance and found
that the glider was tail heavy. After correcting this condition the
overrotation tendency was greatly reduced but itīs still possible.
I guess thatīs one of the reasons they donīt make gliders with all
flying stabs anymore.
Regards,
Juan Carlos
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