Suggestion: wind energy will make gliders cheaper

RichardFreytag wrote:
Sailplane designers,

Modern wind turbine blades are strikingly similar to glider wings.
They are now now coming out in sizes approaching 50 meters. The market
expansion for wind energy is expected to grow rapidly. The ensuing
economies of scale from mass produced wind turbine blades just might
offer significant cost advantages to glider manufactures.

I realize the "flight" regime of a glider wing and turbine blade are
not exactly the same but the cost advantage could be so significant
that the compromise is acceptable; you decide. Also many requirements
ARE the same: lightweight, long, strong, and low maintenance. Back to
cost reduction, economies of scale can reduce manufacturing costs for
things like CRTs factors of 1,000th to 100,000. Imagine a glider
market with wings costing 100th of what they cost now (would we throw
away wings like razor blades when they start crazing - crazy?).

Used as wing turbine blades would require regulatory approval (or do
they if used on an ultralight?). That could kill the idea right there.


In fact this idea is just CRAZY so don't bother telling me its crazy
and why it can't work. There are dozens of reasons not to consider
this. Nonetheless, I'm tossing this out so that some glider designer
might have in the back of his/her mind and some day pursue it in case
there is one way it might work.

I thought of something similar in the recent past. Wind turbine
manufacturers could probably build glider wings pretty easily. The
turbine blades themselves are wrong for aviation use, but I suspect
their aerodynamics, engineering, and fabrication techniques are very
similar to a gliders. Google found this:
http://www.compositesworld.com/hpc/issues/2004/May/450
Turbine blades are made big and in big numbers (The GE site said they
have nearly 3000 1.5 MW turbines out there. That's 4500 gliders worth
of wings!), but it's a young industry. The glider manufacturers would
do well to cross pollinate with the turbine manufacturers, and may do
well "borrowing" some of there manufacturing capacity.

Shawn