In the US they're considering a Light Sport aircraft category to go with their Recreational Pilot Licence. The idea is to have an aircraft certification category to equate to the Australian style ultralight aeroplane category and expanded across all Categories of aircraft. (Sorry for the use of "category" in two ways but these are the international definitions - aircraft category and certification category).
They are possibly looking at two sub-classes of lightweight sailplane - one with an empty weight of 70 kg to fit the existing US ultralight rules, and another suggested by Prof Piero Morelli in a recent AG article (but the 415 lb maximum weight also fits this as it may well be based around 220 kg MAUW). 32:1 at 45 kt; still 22:1 at 75 kt, min sink 123 ft/min and a 32 kt stall speed at max weight. Something like this is definitely NOT for home-building, though some kit-finishing may be available. In the simplest version of things the RPL would let you fly something like this - with add-on ratings for heavier gliders up to about 560 kg which would cover all Standard class and most 2-seaters in general club-type use. You could also go to a PPL and CPL without these weight restrictions under the proposed rules, automatically covering JAR22 certificated gliders. http://www.windward-performance.com/ gives the details of this glider. Carbon fibre with 3-axis controls and top-surface Schempp-Hirth airbrakes, so it meets what some would call a "real" glider! :-) Gary Osoba has been flying one in a recent record camp in Texas, where a HG goal distance of about 530 km and open distance over 700 km have been set. See http://www.davisstraub.com/OZ/Ozv6n117.htm for more info on this. Wombat -- * You are subscribed to the aus-soaring mailing list. * To Unsubscribe: send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] * with "unsubscribe aus-soaring" in the body of the message * or with "help" in the body of the message for more information.
