2G wrote on 9/16/2020 9:10 PM:
On Wednesday, September 16, 2020 at 5:56:25 PM UTC-7, Ramy wrote:
The Carat has relatively low performance according to a pilot I fly with often.
For me (cost constrain, strong tendency towards simple low maintenance, reliable, simple, safe and quick to operate with small risk of getting into trouble, minimal performance compromise, as close to pure glider as possible) the only solution I can think of is adding Self launching FES option to my glider.
I figured it would have got me home 80-90% of the times I landed out, and to a better landout place the rest of the time, have the potential of saving my butt if I make bad decisions again, and may allow me to fly when the tow plane is grounded, there is a long line or I want to fly from somewhere else, and would allow me to explore further than I would otherwise, and overall reduce my dependency on others.
Range is not a significant constrain, I rarely land out more than 100km from home.
Unless someone convinces me I am wrong, I will seriously consider adding an FES to my ASG29.

Ramy

Personally, I am not satisfied with the reliability and safety of the FES batteries and would not fly with them. The percentage of installations that have had fires is unacceptably high. Eventually, the glider community will acquire millions of hours of operational data to establish its reliability (or lack thereof).

Tom

What is the percentage of installations that have had fires? What would be an
acceptable percentage of installations with fires? And are the hours you mention
motor hours or airframe hours?

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"
https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1