LS10 info

wrote:
We are
flying nowadays old gliders. When I go to the glider port I see people
flying 20 and 30 + years old birds. Eventually those gliders will be
scraped. So, having said that, did anyone at this point in time thought
about what are we going to be flying 10 years from now?

In 10 years time I still hope to be flying my Open Cirrus. It will then
be 48 years old, but I can't see any reason why it should deteriorate
and be scrapped unless I break it. Admittedly I don't think it's capable
of flying a 750k in UK conditions (no water ballast), but then I'm
certainly not, even if the glider can. 500k is on, and I'll be trying
this year.

This seems to be true of nearly all the "old" glass gliders I see.

I've only been in the sport a decade, but I think from my reading that
the current "hot" ship has almost always cost substantially more than
the national average wage in a developed country, so the current prices
don't seem to have risen dramatically in real terms.

Top competition pilots and the very rich buy them, and in time they
trickle down to the rest of us.

Chris Reed wrote:

I've only been in the sport a decade, but I think from my reading that
the current "hot" ship has almost always cost substantially more than
the national average wage in a developed country, so the current prices
don't seem to have risen dramatically in real terms.

I have the original purchase records for my Mosquito (the original
owners didn't throw anything away):
$25,000 in June of 78. That's $75-$100k in 2006 dollars depending on
how you calculate inflation.
For an *almost* 40:1 ship with a tube trailer and oldtech instruments.
What's changed more is salaries of the masses, in the US at least. For
lots of reasons, average real wages have dropped for thirty years.
Schempp-Hirth and Schleicher can't influence that much. Of course,
given the economic (and potential political) status of glider pilots,
they could have some influence in growing the sport, rather indirectly.
Hmm "Vote Glider, Vote Democrat in 2008" I like it!

Shawn