Future Club Training Gliders

On Sep 15, 8:28*pm, Westbender wrote:
On Sep 15, 6:49*pm, "noel.wade" wrote:



On Sep 15, 4:40*pm, wrote:

My club has 25 junior members that must be blind according to your
criteria. They didn't know they weren't supposed to have fun and enjoy
learning to fly in th 2-33.

UH -

1) Note that I didn't participate in any comments about the '21 or the
other expensive glass ships in this thread.

2) I'm guessing your club has other things that are making it
attractive to younger members! *Either you have great instruction, or
a clear stepping-stone approach to flying better ships in the future,
or super-cheap rates, or they were recruited by existing club members
or some club outreach program that excited them, or something along
those lines. *They did not drop in to the club from nowhere, see the
2-33, and decide it was a good idea.

I'd love to know how your club is attracting so many students; and I'd
also love to know how many of them go on to complete their license and
continue to fly with the club.

--Noel

Is it really that hard to believe the 2-33 didn't scare everyone away?
Come one, why don't we stop this silly nonsense about how the 2-33 is
the reason why soaring isn't growing. For goodness sakes. Then there's
the "have to be retrained" boloney after learning to fly in a 2-33. It
serves the purpose it was designed to do very well. Basic training.

I don't recall a single prospective member of our club that came
calling because they saw a "cool looking ship" at the field, or backed
away after seeing the 2-33. All of our students are always clamoring
for instruction time in our trainers. They could care less about the
glass ships that are rigging/derigging/departing/arriving when
training flights are operating. They're not stupid. They all know the
2-33 is not the end of the line. It's only the beginning. If you'd
take the time to talk to new students or even prospective ones,
they'll tell you what their expectations and their intentions are. I
garantee you they understand the concept of basic training and
progression.

By the way, our club has a "stepping-stone" approach to better
performing ships, but we can only afford so much. 2 2-33s, 1 2-22, 2
1-26s, 1 1-34, 1 L23. Not all of our ships are on the flightline due
to instructor shortages (that's another discussion). Our students are
always eyeing the single-place ships and a couple of them already
purchased their own ships. Although they're keeping them in the barn
until they're ready to fly them. That's because they're intelligent
people and not lured around by a carrot dangling on a stick.

If we have to resort to "eye-candy" to lure people to soaring, then
it's not necessarily about flying is it? Maybe it's just a niche and
nothing more.

I wonder how many students are more likely to follow through and
become a licensed pilot or even an owner? One attracted by something
shiny? Or one that is driven by the desire to fly?

Unfortunately, I have seen the crestfallen look on prospective glider
pilots when they first looked at a 2-33 - many, many times. After
retirement, I worked at a commercial glider operation for a couple of
years. They used 2-33's and (tried to) fly 7 days a week.

A club down the field has a sleek fleet glass gliders. After a few
flights in our 2-33's, we'd see our customer training in a club DG or
Grob. I'd say we lost 50% of our students to the club. Speaking with
them, they'd say the 2-33 just wasn't what they were looking for in
the sport - or something much less kind.

The owner of the commercial school could only talk about how cheap the
2-33's were - as they sat unused.