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Best Overall Motorglider available today?



 
 
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  #61  
Old September 24th 20, 01:59 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Eric Greenwell[_4_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,939
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

Dave Walsh wrote on 9/24/2020 5:11 AM:
You won't need tow planes or winches when everyone has an electric self
launch: everyone just has to get a lot richer.
It's not a problem, our politicians have it all under control, look at how

well we Europeans are doing with Brexit & Covid.....
And, yes, it's raining.

There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and partnerships. With just
two people in a partnership, your purchase cost is one half, and you no longer
have to support a tow plane or pay tow fees. If you can fly near your home, you
can avoid travel and motel costs, too. The partners can fly whenever their
schedule and the weather permit, and even take advantage of marginal soaring
conditions without the inconvenience or expense of a retrieve, so the utilization
of the glider is higher than a towed glider.

So, instead of "a lot richer", you only have to be "modestly richer", and with
three owners of a glider, maybe not even richer at all, especially as the used
market for FES gliders increases in the next few years. A club might find an FES
glider a good value, particularly if they want to encourage cross-country soaring.

--
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
  #62  
Old September 24th 20, 04:04 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Dan Marotta
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Posts: 4,601
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

Well, then...Â* You'll need one or more old fart partners because there
are only two days in a weekend. :-D

Signed,
Dan (an old fart)

On 9/24/2020 6:59 AM, Eric Greenwell wrote:
Dave Walsh wrote on 9/24/2020 5:11 AM:
You won't need tow planes or winches when everyone has an electric self
launch: everyone just has to get a lot richer.
It's not a problem, our politicians have it all under control, look
at how

well we Europeans are doing with Brexit & Covid.....
And, yes, it's raining.

There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and
partnerships. With just two people in a partnership, your purchase
cost is one half, and you no longer have to support a tow plane or pay
tow fees. If you can fly near your home, you can avoid travel and
motel costs, too. The partners can fly whenever their schedule and the
weather permit, and even take advantage of marginal soaring conditions
without the inconvenience or expense of a retrieve, so the utilization
of the glider is higher than a towed glider.

So, instead of "a lot richer", you only have to be "modestly richer",
and with three owners of a glider, maybe not even richer at all,
especially as the used market for FES gliders increases in the next
few years. A club might find an FES glider a good value, particularly
if they want to encourage cross-country soaring.


--
Dan, 5J
  #63  
Old September 24th 20, 04:39 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
2G
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,439
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

On Thursday, September 24, 2020 at 6:00:01 AM UTC-7, Eric Greenwell wrote:
Dave Walsh wrote on 9/24/2020 5:11 AM:
You won't need tow planes or winches when everyone has an electric self
launch: everyone just has to get a lot richer.
It's not a problem, our politicians have it all under control, look at how

well we Europeans are doing with Brexit & Covid.....
And, yes, it's raining.

There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and partnerships. With just
two people in a partnership, your purchase cost is one half, and you no longer
have to support a tow plane or pay tow fees. If you can fly near your home, you
can avoid travel and motel costs, too. The partners can fly whenever their
schedule and the weather permit, and even take advantage of marginal soaring
conditions without the inconvenience or expense of a retrieve, so the utilization
of the glider is higher than a towed glider.

So, instead of "a lot richer", you only have to be "modestly richer", and with
three owners of a glider, maybe not even richer at all, especially as the used
market for FES gliders increases in the next few years. A club might find an FES
glider a good value, particularly if they want to encourage cross-country soaring.

--
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


That strategy has been in use since the Wright Brothers started selling aircraft, so it is not going to change anything. If an electric towplane can only make 2 launches per day you will need more towplanes and the much higher cost would have to be passed on to the same number of club members.

Tom
  #64  
Old September 24th 20, 08:02 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Martin Gregorie[_6_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 699
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

On Thu, 24 Sep 2020 08:39:05 -0700, 2G wrote:

On Thursday, September 24, 2020 at 6:00:01 AM UTC-7, Eric Greenwell
wrote:
Dave Walsh wrote on 9/24/2020 5:11 AM:
You won't need tow planes or winches when everyone has an electric
self launch: everyone just has to get a lot richer.
It's not a problem, our politicians have it all under control, look
at how

well we Europeans are doing with Brexit & Covid.....
And, yes, it's raining.

There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and
partnerships. With just two people in a partnership, your purchase cost
is one half, and you no longer have to support a tow plane or pay tow
fees. If you can fly near your home, you can avoid travel and motel
costs, too. The partners can fly whenever their schedule and the
weather permit, and even take advantage of marginal soaring conditions
without the inconvenience or expense of a retrieve, so the utilization
of the glider is higher than a towed glider.

So, instead of "a lot richer", you only have to be "modestly richer",
and with three owners of a glider, maybe not even richer at all,
especially as the used market for FES gliders increases in the next few
years. A club might find an FES glider a good value, particularly if
they want to encourage cross-country soaring.

--
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...ions/download-

the-guide-1

That strategy has been in use since the Wright Brothers started selling
aircraft, so it is not going to change anything. If an electric towplane
can only make 2 launches per day you will need more towplanes and the
much higher cost would have to be passed on to the same number of club
members.

The least exploited strategy is electric winches, since they can be run
off the mains and, with a battery bank you get off-peak charging and/or
to ability operate off a relatively small trailer generator.

We looked at using electric winches a few years back, but dropped the
idea when we found out what wiring up our usual winch points would be
(we'd ideally wire up three or four, with two being at the opposite end
of the runs to the clubhouse & mains supply, (we are on an ex-RAF bomber
field and regularly launch on 04, 22, less frequently on 340 and
occasionally on 160). We have a pair of Skylaunch winches that run on LPG.


--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

  #65  
Old September 24th 20, 08:56 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Eric Greenwell[_4_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,939
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

Exactly! And us OF's are ready to do our part! But, we may not need to: these
days, with so many people working remotely, or can otherwise shift their working
hours around, it's not just OF's that can fly during the week. You don't have to
live near each other, either: rotate the glider among the owners' airports every
week or so, making it practical to have owners that don't live in the same town.

Dan Marotta wrote on 9/24/2020 8:04 AM:
Well, then...* You'll need one or more old fart partners because there are only
two days in a weekend. :-D

Signed,
Dan (an old fart)

On 9/24/2020 6:59 AM, Eric Greenwell wrote:
Dave Walsh wrote on 9/24/2020 5:11 AM:
You won't need tow planes or winches when everyone has an electric self
launch: everyone just has to get a lot richer.
It's not a problem, our politicians have it all under control, look at how

well we Europeans are doing with Brexit & Covid.....
And, yes, it's raining.

There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and partnerships. With
just two people in a partnership, your purchase cost is one half, and you no
longer have to support a tow plane or pay tow fees. If you can fly near your
home, you can avoid travel and motel costs, too. The partners can fly whenever
their schedule and the weather permit, and even take advantage of marginal
soaring conditions without the inconvenience or expense of a retrieve, so the
utilization of the glider is higher than a towed glider.

So, instead of "a lot richer", you only have to be "modestly richer", and with
three owners of a glider, maybe not even richer at all, especially as the used
market for FES gliders increases in the next few years. A club might find an FES
glider a good value, particularly if they want to encourage cross-country soaring.




--
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

  #66  
Old September 26th 20, 01:01 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
[email protected]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 148
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?


There is an alternative to getting a lot richer: clubs and partnerships.


I've been in several partnerships, and they all were much better in every way, than owning a glider alone (which I also have done). Better financially, and by having helpers, and when I landed out the nice feeling that someone else had a large interest in getting the glider (and me) back home.
  #68  
Old September 28th 20, 07:18 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Slawek Piela[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

Why nobody mentioned Antares 20/21E?

S
  #69  
Old September 28th 20, 02:57 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Dave Walsh[_2_]
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Posts: 52
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

At 06:18 28 September 2020, Slawek Piela wrote:
Why nobody mentioned Antares 20/21E?

The Antares 20E is a very nice handling machine with a good high speed
glide angle, comfortable (crash resistant) cockpit and excellent simple
engine controls (one lever does it all). The climb rate is very good (a
large, 2m diameter, slow revving prop and engine doors that are closed
during climb all help). The build quality is very nice.
In EASA land you can extend the actual ARC inspection to every three
years; the A/C can generate its own system reports which can be sent to
your inspector, if all is well a physical inspection is not required
annually.
However the total full power engine run time is only about 13 minutes so
after a ~3000 foot climb (I've averaged 6 minutes/launch over the last 5
years) you might have 50 - 60% battery capacity remaining: realistically
this will give you one further good climb so for many pilots the limited
battery capacity is seen as a problem.
The A/C is electrically/electronically very complex, the engine doors, the

engine erection/retraction and the U/C are all electro-hydraulic: even in
Europe any serious issue might mean a trip to Lange Aviation,
Zweibrucken, NW Germany.
It's expensive; it's the nicest motor glider I've owned/operated. Things
that could be better: -
(i) Engineers & inspectors with experience of Antares maintenance are
thin on the ground.
(ii) The official Flight & Maintenance Manuals are in still in German!


  #70  
Old September 28th 20, 03:04 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Dave Nadler
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Posts: 1,610
Default Best Overall Motorglider available today?

On Monday, September 28, 2020 at 2:18:07 AM UTC-4, Slawek Piela wrote:
Why nobody mentioned Antares 20/21E?


Before you purchase any motorglider, you will want to talk to a few owners
about their ownership experience, especially reliability and factory support.

 




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