Old Folks Poll

I was thinking about one thing that remarkably hasn't changed: 47 years ago I soloed in a glider being towed by a Cessna L-19. This weekend past I was training towpilots in a Cessna L-19. Who would have imagined that tow planes would stay essentially the same for 50 years?
ROY

On Monday, November 9, 2020 at 8:56:33 AM UTC-5, Roy B. wrote:
I was thinking about one thing that remarkably hasn't changed: 47 years ago I soloed in a glider being towed by a Cessna L-19. This weekend past I was training towpilots in a Cessna L-19. Who would have imagined that tow planes would stay essentially the same for 50 years?
ROY

We still tow with the Super Cub we bought in 1977. Over 40,000 tows on it. On it's second engine. Got our money out of that $8000 buy.
UH

1970's to now.

LD - 30 to 50+
GPS and Instrumentation has been a massive change and the last 10 years especially so.
Turbo's and self launchers

Cost. With the cost of a new supership outstripping the cost of a house in many parts of the world one has to wonder how much longer we can go on.

Ian, when you adjust for cost of living increase and inflation I'm not sure it's that dramatic a change. I have a memory back in 1975 of being shocked when the late Doug Gaines was advertising his then new ASW-17 for sale at $45,000 USD. I bought my first "starter" house that year (in Worcester Massachusetts) for $28,000 USD.

It's interesting that nobody has mentioned simulation based training (maybe because we dinosaurs aren't familiar with it). This past season I trained my first student who had studied extensively on the "Condor" simulator and he managed to solo the "real" ASK 21 in 20 lessons, which I thought was better than the progress I usually see. I wonder what this means for the future of training in the sport.
ROY

On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 4:39:42 AM UTC-8, Roy B. wrote:
Ian, when you adjust for cost of living increase and inflation I'm not sure it's that dramatic a change. I have a memory back in 1975 of being shocked when the late Doug Gaines was advertising his then new ASW-17 for sale at $45,000 USD. I bought my first "starter" house that year (in Worcester Massachusetts) for $28,000 USD.

It's interesting that nobody has mentioned simulation based training (maybe because we dinosaurs aren't familiar with it). This past season I trained my first student who had studied extensively on the "Condor" simulator and he managed to solo the "real" ASK 21 in 20 lessons, which I thought was better than the progress I usually see. I wonder what this means for the future of training in the sport.
ROY

Home built gliders have all but disappeared! In the 70’s we had Cherokee’s, BG-12’s, Dusters and HP-11 & 14’s in our local flying clubs. I built my Duster sailplane from a kit...........$2800 bucks! We had 5 Dusters in a local handicapped contest. In those days it was believed that a new factory built sailplane would cost about the same as a new car, now days that will get you a 30 year old bird that probably needs refinishing!

GPS has made a world of difference in my flying, before GPS, I would spend half my time figuring out where I was...........don’t know how much altitude you need, if you don’t know exactly where you are!!!
JJ

On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 2:37:33 PM UTC-5, John Sinclair wrote:
On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 4:39:42 AM UTC-8, Roy B. wrote:
Ian, when you adjust for cost of living increase and inflation I'm not sure it's that dramatic a change. I have a memory back in 1975 of being shocked when the late Doug Gaines was advertising his then new ASW-17 for sale at $45,000 USD. I bought my first "starter" house that year (in Worcester Massachusetts) for $28,000 USD.

It's interesting that nobody has mentioned simulation based training (maybe because we dinosaurs aren't familiar with it). This past season I trained my first student who had studied extensively on the "Condor" simulator and he managed to solo the "real" ASK 21 in 20 lessons, which I thought was better than the progress I usually see. I wonder what this means for the future of training in the sport.
ROY
Home built gliders have all but disappeared! In the 70’s we had Cherokee’s, BG-12’s, Dusters and HP-11 & 14’s in our local flying clubs. I built my Duster sailplane from a kit...........$2800 bucks! We had 5 Dusters in a local handicapped contest. In those days it was believed that a new factory built sailplane would cost about the same as a new car, now days that will get you a 30 year old bird that probably needs refinishing!

GPS has made a world of difference in my flying, before GPS, I would spend half my time figuring out where I was...........don’t know how much altitude you need, if you don’t know exactly where you are!!!
JJ

JJ
The homebuilts & one-of a kinds have also disappeared from the national competition scene. I crewed at the '75 Open Class Nationals in Hobbs and in addition to the factory built gliders (Nimbus2s, ASW-12s & 17s & 604s) there was the Applebay Mescalero, the Chase 101, the Schuman Libelle, Klaus Keim's BSK, and DB had the prototype 604 with more water capacity than we had ever seen in anything. Except for Concordia, that's all gone now.
ROY

On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 5:39:42 AM UTC-7, Roy B. wrote:
Ian, when you adjust for cost of living increase and inflation I'm not sure it's that dramatic a change. I have a memory back in 1975 of being shocked when the late Doug Gaines was advertising his then new ASW-17 for sale at $45,000 USD. I bought my first "starter" house that year (in Worcester Massachusetts) for $28,000 USD.

It's interesting that nobody has mentioned simulation based training (maybe because we dinosaurs aren't familiar with it). This past season I trained my first student who had studied extensively on the "Condor" simulator and he managed to solo the "real" ASK 21 in 20 lessons, which I thought was better than the progress I usually see. I wonder what this means for the future of training in the sport.
ROY
Was he studying a simulator syllabus from one of the sources, or just self-studying. Would he have done better if he'd worked on Condor with an instructor.

Frank Whiteley

On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 3:00:45 PM UTC-5, Roy B. wrote:
JJ
The homebuilts & one-of a kinds have also disappeared from the national competition scene. I crewed at the '75 Open Class Nationals in Hobbs and in addition to the factory built gliders (Nimbus2s, ASW-12s & 17s & 604s) there was the Applebay Mescalero, the Chase 101, the Schuman Libelle, Klaus Keim's BSK, and DB had the prototype 604 with more water capacity than we had ever seen in anything. Except for Concordia, that's all gone now.
ROY

Many of those one-of-a-kinds were production gliders that the owners modified to tune them up or enhance them. If you were serious, you had to. The gliders coming out of the factory lacked control surface and other seals, fairings, and sometimes even symmetrical (left to right) airfoils and angles of incidence. Some benefited from wingtip extensions (Open Cirrus, Nimbus 3), others from radical changes to the wing (AJ Smith's and Wil Schuemann's ASW 12s). "Blueprinting" a glider, sealing it, contouring the wings, adding exit air ports, etc., was just part of the game. Listen to a few of the sessions at the old Byars & Holbrook sessions in the 1960s for more.

Today mostly what I see is pilots paying increasing sums of cash to upgrade their instruments and avionics, trying to get all the components talking to each other, and praying that nothing goes wrong at a contest because it can be very difficult to decipher the one little configuration setting or loose cable or communications protocol gone bad. Dick Schreder won a day at the 1966 Reno Open Nationals (where he was the overall winner) using an ancient (even then) Pioneer rate-of-climb instrument as his vario. And as JJ notes, we were still using sectional charts and compasses then for navigation.. We've made a lot of progress, and it's certainly less stressful to navigate than before, but sometimes I find myself wishing we could have a good old "low tech" contest where all the gadgets have to come out. A lot of the top names would still be on top but I suspect the standings would be reshuffled in the layer below them.

Chip Bearden
JB

On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 5:48:02 PM UTC-5, wrote:
On Friday, November 20, 2020 at 3:00:45 PM UTC-5, Roy B. wrote:
JJ
The homebuilts & one-of a kinds have also disappeared from the national competition scene. I crewed at the '75 Open Class Nationals in Hobbs and in addition to the factory built gliders (Nimbus2s, ASW-12s & 17s & 604s) there was the Applebay Mescalero, the Chase 101, the Schuman Libelle, Klaus Keim's BSK, and DB had the prototype 604 with more water capacity than we had ever seen in anything. Except for Concordia, that's all gone now.
ROY
Many of those one-of-a-kinds were production gliders that the owners modified to tune them up or enhance them. If you were serious, you had to. The gliders coming out of the factory lacked control surface and other seals, fairings, and sometimes even symmetrical (left to right) airfoils and angles of incidence. Some benefited from wingtip extensions (Open Cirrus, Nimbus 3), others from radical changes to the wing (AJ Smith's and Wil Schuemann's ASW 12s). "Blueprinting" a glider, sealing it, contouring the wings, adding exit air ports, etc., was just part of the game. Listen to a few of the sessions at the old Byars & Holbrook sessions in the 1960s for more.

Today mostly what I see is pilots paying increasing sums of cash to upgrade their instruments and avionics, trying to get all the components talking to each other, and praying that nothing goes wrong at a contest because it can be very difficult to decipher the one little configuration setting or loose cable or communications protocol gone bad. Dick Schreder won a day at the 1966 Reno Open Nationals (where he was the overall winner) using an ancient (even then) Pioneer rate-of-climb instrument as his vario. And as JJ notes, we were still using sectional charts and compasses then for navigation. We've made a lot of progress, and it's certainly less stressful to navigate than before, but sometimes I find myself wishing we could have a good old "low tech" contest where all the gadgets have to come out. A lot of the top names would still be on top but I suspect the standings would be reshuffled in the layer below them.

Chip Bearden
JB

How about flying the 1-26 Nats? Still pretty even in aircraft, whizzy stuff does not overwhelm the pilot ranking...
;-)