Short Wings Gliders

On Jan 30, 9:56*am, Andreas Maurer wrote:
On Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:34:56 -0800 (PST), Brad
wrote:

Maybe the younger generation and their quest for adrenalin laced
activites would find competitive soaring compelling, but how many can
afford their own sailplane?

Hi Brad,

I admit that - from a European point of view- I'm having difficulties
to understand why most US based glider pilots think that it's
necessary to own a glider.

Here in Europe by far most gliders are owned by clubs, making it
possible for the club members to fligh latest technology for a yearly
price that hardly exceeds $800.

For most clubs in Germany *it's common nowadays that student pilots
fly LS-4 or DG-300. Basic *training is usually done in ASK-21 these
days. Nearly any club clubs offer flapped ships (ASW-20, ASW-27) and
state-of-the-art doubleseaters (Duo Dicus, DG-505) to its members.
There is absolutely no interest in flying something inferior.

Why isn't it possible to do that in the US? A couple of US clubs whose
homepages I've seen seem to be able to do that.

Bye
Andreas

Lets see, why? Mmmm.... Population density differences. Differences in
geographic scale - i.e. borrowing glider to haul long distances to a
competition would often have more impact on a club in the USA. A long
history of established clubs in Europe that just is not here in the
USA. USA clubs and commercial operations with many klunky basic
trainers and natural inertia to get off this/sometimes a rigid belief
that is a much better approach than glass ships. Lower cost and more
interesting sports like hang gliding and paragliding that have been
particularly strong in the USA. A higher cost basis (e.g. less winch
operations in the USA) which suppresses ability to spend money on a
more modern fleet. A pilot licensing system that has nothing to do
with encouraging the sport or XC flying. A mishandling of XC training/
transition at many clubs and commercial operations that sees a huge
drop off in licensed pilots who never go XC let alone ever compete in
a contest (numbers comparing Europe to the USA would be interesting).
An economic inability to purchase newer fleets (remember the USA
buying power for European glass has been hurting). And on an on..

Instead of worrying about the gloom there are clubs in the USA that
get people into standard class and higher performance double seaters
ASAP and promote XC flying and loaning out gliders for camps and
safari's etc. I also strongly believe clubs need a Duo Discus or
DG-1000S class two seater ships for cross country mentoring and just
to have gliders in their fleet to interest/get new members to aspire
to. Bay Area Soaring Associates is an example or a club with a
DG-1000S and DG-505 (and a several standard class single seaters
etc.)

The other difference in the USA is there are relatively more
commercial operators than in Europe. And what is a club in one place
and a commercial operation can be all blurred. In California if I want
to fly something besides my ASH-26E I can rent an ASW-24 or similar,
Duo Discus and even an ASH-25 at very reasonable rates (and without
any hassles of club membership, maintenance etc). However as with
clubs what you find with commercial operators vary widely (clubs and
operators with gliders not set up for proper XC drive me nuts, crappy
varios, insufficient batteries, radios that don't work, no pee tube,
etc. and they wonder why they can't attract members...). Most
commercial operators are not going to want gliders leaving on safaris
or contests etc. (but it can happen at times).

Getting back to the original thread, adding another glider contest
class would do nothing to encourage an increase in gliding and is
likely to just make more work for everybody. If there is a informal
class of gliders that is organically successful and being held back
due to lack of formally organized contests or lack of class rules/
standardization between designs then by all means draw up another FAI
class. I suspect there is naturally something just anti-low cost
associated in establishing a conventional (not-one design) racing
class. Innovation within the class and the willingness of pilots to
pay for race winning designs drive up costs. And at the other extreme
where chasing a one-design type class where the performance is too low
to be an easy to fly XC machine - I think the oft used ~40:1 wisdom is
an interesting break point (there are two places I fly frequently
where a PW5, Russian or Sparrowhawk type glider is a non-starter since
I could not make typical final glide back from where the lift is).

If you want to lower costs you need reasonable volume and given the
thing is going to cost a reasonable amount of money you need to make
sure it is appealing enough to a wide audience even if that involves
stretching wingspan, and costs, to get into a performance sweetspot
(we can argue about what that sweetspot). Especially when compared to
the bang for the buck achieved when purchasing a used standard (or
15m) glider. Then just to top it off the World Class effort really
screwed up by having a design that just looks like a pregnant guppy. A
bit of a handicap in encourage the buzz and excitement a new class
would need. (Sorry PW5 owners, and I know many of you do some great
impressive flights in the PW5 and have blast in it.).


Darryl