Ray,

Get in touch with Uli at Airscapes. They've recently ramped up a
winch.

Frank Whiteley

Ray Lovinggood wrote:
Bill,

Oh, if we only had a winching legacy in the U.S.!
Blame those Wright boys from Dayton for inventing the
expensive towplane!

I would love for our club to have a two-drum winch
with about 5,500' of the new poly rope (rather than
the steel wire) on each drum and a couple of 'Lepo's'
to retrieve the rope. Of course, I wouldn't get rid
of the towplane we have, but supplement it with the
winch. I haven't been winched in about 20 years, not
because I don't want to, but because there isn't a
winch operation where I fly. But my first winch launch
(a 'cat' launch?) was in the back seat of a G103 and
I was elated and impressed. Wow, what a way to fly
a sailplane! Also nice was the lack of noise at the
start point. The wing runner picks up the wing, the
slack in the towline is taken up, then, the glider
is just wisked away. Somedays, we could hear the winch
and somedays we couldn't. Just ambient noise and the
glider is GONE. Now, we are subjected to towplane
noise and, in our situation, the noise of power planes
as they taxi by to take off. And, oh yea, they have
to do their engine run up about where we are staging
for launch. Noisy buggers.

Yep, a nice winch would be great and would make launching
A LOT cheaper!

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA



I understand where you guys are coming from but it's
instructive to look
carefully at the actual costs of learning to fly gliders.
Glider rental
rates are not the big factor. Launch fees are more
than half the total
cost.

Most airplane training operation use trainers that
cost far more than a new
ASK-21 yet they seem to still have lots of customers.
Sleek glass gliders
are a big draw. Clunky old trainers drive more people
away than they
attract with low costs.

Training costs do need to be reduced but attack the
launch cost with a winch
and keep the glass gliders.

Bill Daniels