I want to find out the year when water ballast was
first used. I believe it was George Tabery who first
used it, but someone may prove me wrong.

I seem to recall reading that water ballast was used as early as the
late 1940s or early 1950s (even in an early Schweizer glider built for
competition?). But my recollection of the beginning of the "modern" era
was seeing Wil Schuemann's modified 301 Libelle at Chester one year
(1969?) with water installed. He'd been flying around for a few years
at absolute minimum weight--he even flew with his shoes off at one
contest.

Then, in one of the dramatic moves for which he became known, he took
the opposite tack. He ordered two 24-foot lengths of (IIRC) 4" extruded
Tygon tubing, sealed one end, made up fittings for the other end, slid
them into the Libelle wings, and filled up with 240 lbs. of water.

He may not have been the first guy to do it but he seemed to spark a
mad rush to jam water ballast (the original yellow [Jim] Smiley bags
that so many here in the U.S. bought) into every existing fiberglass
glider. Also about that time, water became available as a factory
option on some European ships (e.g., Libelle 201, Diamant 16.5). It may
have been one of those things where several people all decided at about
the same time that the empty leading edges of the new composite
structures were a wonderful place to put disposable ballast without
overloading the structure.

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"