Motorglider Tug

Who is using a motorglider as a tug? Please send details!

Your location. Country. Field surface, length, elevation,
temperatures.

What type of tug?

What gliders towed?

Good, bad, and ugly of using the motorglider.

Who insures? Costello, here in America, will not insure
a motorglider for towing.

Thanks,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

Most motor gliders of the "Katana Extreme" variety do not have enough
"oomph" (HPower) to get a regular glider into the air. You may find that
some have done duty to tow ultralights aloft. Check out the USHGA web pages.

Most motorgliders (older types) do not have enough HP to get them selves
into the air on hot high days here in the mid-west. Although I do understand
that the DG808B does very well, but the Grob109 is very anemic. I've read
reports that the older DG400 was "doable" at a very poor climb rate.

BT

"Ray Lovinggood" wrote in message
...
Who is using a motorglider as a tug? Please send details!

Your location. Country. Field surface, length, elevation,
temperatures.

What type of tug?

What gliders towed?

Good, bad, and ugly of using the motorglider.

Who insures? Costello, here in America, will not insure
a motorglider for towing.

Thanks,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

BTIZ wrote:
Most motor gliders of the "Katana Extreme" variety do not have enough
"oomph" (HPower) to get a regular glider into the air. You may find that

Wrong.

We're using the Katana Extreme itself (100 oomph, which isn't even the
strongest one you can get) for towing in Niederoeblarn (concrete, 700m
runway, 650m elevation, up to 35 degrees Celsius). Up to moderately
loaded glass single seaters. Also possible for light dual seaters.

some have done duty to tow ultralights aloft. Check out the USHGA web pages.

Ultralights themselves are used to tow gliders hereabouts. There was a
towing competition in Zell am See recently, and the best ultralight was
comparable to a Husky (don't remember how many oopmh).

Cheers
-Gerhard
--
Gerhard Wesp o o Tel.: +41 (0) 43 5347636
Bachtobelstrasse 56 | http://www.cosy.sbg.ac.at/~gwesp/
CH-8045 Zuerich \_/ See homepage for email address!

My Ex-Club has bought a Scheibe SF-25 with a Rotax 100HP. They do tow with
this and it seems to work. The field is only 830m long.

I don't know if they do it on a regular basis, because normally they use a
whinch.
Here is a fotograph of the SF-25 towing a ASK-21 if I am right:

http://www.segelflug.de/vereine/gram...ik/schlepp.jpg

Sebastian
--
Sebastian Fischer

I know that the faulkes foundation use a falke to tow their DG505s arround
see http://www.fffoundation.co.uk/mgliders.html
for info
rgds
Stephen

"Ray Lovinggood" wrote in message
...
Who is using a motorglider as a tug? Please send details!

Your location. Country. Field surface, length, elevation,
temperatures.

What type of tug?

What gliders towed?

Good, bad, and ugly of using the motorglider.

Who insures? Costello, here in America, will not insure
a motorglider for towing.

Thanks,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

In article , Stephen Haley
writes

I know that the faulkes foundation use a falke to tow their DG505s arround
see http://www.fffoundation.co.uk/mgliders.html

It must be pointed out that this is the 105 hp "Rotax Falke", not the
original Scheibe Falke with the 45hp Stamo engine!

We also have a Rotax Falke at Lasham with a tow hook and occasionally
use it for towing light gliders like K-6 and glass 15m ships. Lasham is
a 2000 yard field in the E/W direction. However, we have a fleet of 5
dedicated tug aircraft as well. So the Rotax Falke does not get used
that much for towing, but is for exercises in field landing, navigation
and soaring generally.

Its handling in a thermal is better than earlier Falke designs and it
goes up reasonably well engine-off, even in our weak English thermals.
Where it loses out to a straight glider is in L/D. A very useful
instructional aircraft, though, and at a small gliding club with a
reasonable length of field, can be used as a standby towplane, perhaps
when the main towplane is out for servicing or when a large queue
develops for tows. I would not use it as the sole towplane but buy a
second-hand towplane to take the main air tow load at the field.

--
Ian Strachan
Lasham Gliding Centre, UK

BTIZ wrote:

Most motor gliders of the "Katana Extreme" variety do not have enough
"oomph" (HPower) to get a regular glider into the air.

I don't know where you read this. Here in Europe, Super Dimonas (aka
Katana Extremes) are very commonly used as tug planes. Mostly the 115hp
version. Climb is not breathtaking, but it surely works even with two
seaters.

Stefan

Culdrose gliding club (Cornwall, England) uses a Dimona (S?) as a tug. Very
pleased with it. If you have any contatcs there, might be worth an email.

Keith

"Ray Lovinggood" wrote in message
...
Who is using a motorglider as a tug? Please send details!

Your location. Country. Field surface, length, elevation,
temperatures.

What type of tug?

What gliders towed?

Good, bad, and ugly of using the motorglider.

Who insures? Costello, here in America, will not insure
a motorglider for towing.

Thanks,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

650M in elevation is approximately 1800-2000ft?
take that up to 3000ft or more on a 45C day.. our 235HP tow with a heavy 2
seat glider can manage about 400fpm rate of climb, now add some down draft
(sink) or rotor and I've actually had negative climb rates.. I would not
want to be doing that in a 100hp tug

BT

"Gerhard Wesp" wrote in message
...
BTIZ wrote:
Most motor gliders of the "Katana Extreme" variety do not have enough
"oomph" (HPower) to get a regular glider into the air. You may find that

Wrong.

We're using the Katana Extreme itself (100 oomph, which isn't even the
strongest one you can get) for towing in Niederoeblarn (concrete, 700m
runway, 650m elevation, up to 35 degrees Celsius). Up to moderately
loaded glass single seaters. Also possible for light dual seaters.

some have done duty to tow ultralights aloft. Check out the USHGA web
pages.

Ultralights themselves are used to tow gliders hereabouts. There was a
towing competition in Zell am See recently, and the best ultralight was
comparable to a Husky (don't remember how many oopmh).

Cheers
-Gerhard
--
Gerhard Wesp o o Tel.: +41 (0) 43 5347636
Bachtobelstrasse 56 | http://www.cosy.sbg.ac.at/~gwesp/
CH-8045 Zuerich \_/ See homepage for email address!

BTIZ wrote:
Most motor gliders of the "Katana Extreme" variety do not have enough
"oomph" (HPower) to get a regular glider into the air. You may find that
some have done duty to tow ultralights aloft. Check out the USHGA web pages.

Most motorgliders (older types) do not have enough HP to get them selves
into the air on hot high days here in the mid-west. Although I do understand
that the DG808B does very well, but the Grob109 is very anemic. I've read
reports that the older DG400 was "doable" at a very poor climb rate.

BT

"Ray Lovinggood" wrote in message
...

Who is using a motorglider as a tug? Please send details!

Your location. Country. Field surface, length, elevation,
temperatures.

What type of tug?

What gliders towed?

Good, bad, and ugly of using the motorglider.

Who insures? Costello, here in America, will not insure
a motorglider for towing.

Thanks,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA






Urban Air Samba and Lambada do quite well, apparently the Pipistrel Sinus is
also quite good.

One reason being that despite lower horesepower, they are flying in their noraml
operating speed range when towing. As opposed to many of the other types that
are right at the lower end of their speed range and have high induced drag at
towing speeds... They are 60 year newer designs than the Cubs for example, and
hence benefit from better efficiency too.