....And to back up JJ a bit...

My partner and I bought our first LS-6a, the 1985 world champion (flown by
DJ), from the estate of it's previous owner. He'd come down through a power
line and a fence and died in the crash. Streifeneder (Sp?) was brought over
from Germany and repaired the ship to what looked like factory new
condition.

My partner crashed that ship in a low altitude stall/spin (he survived!) and
Fidel at Applebay's shop created a new nose by taking a mold of another LS-6
fuselage. He repaired the tail boom (broken in two places), the twisted fin
and tail mount, and the wings. All this ship needs is cockpit controls,
seat, and instrument panel and someone to step up with the money to finish
the job.

Anyone who's seen Fidel's work would have no problem owning this ship.

"JJ Sinclair" wrote in message
...
On Friday, October 4, 2013 8:57:22 AM UTC-7, Andy wrote:
As I've said many times the damage was not ever disclosed to us.



I'm now in possession of photographs of this damage and you can call it
what you like but it was major damage with large holes punched through the
wing, etc., and again there was never any mention of this by the seller or
the inspector.



It wasn't until we were sent logbook # 1 and saw that it was in English
that we realized something didn't seem right. We then got in contact with
the original owner and got the whole story.



I've never said there's anything wrong with the glider now, the and while
the repair may be perfect you can't sell a glider without disclosing all
of the damage history. We were only told about damage to the rudder hinges
from being backed into a hangar wall.



On Friday, August 9, 2013 9:19:47 AM UTC-4, Andy wrote:

Our club was going to purchase Puchacz SZD-50-3 S# 2199 directly from
the seller in Poland. We had it inspected, looked at many pictures and
we were pretty confident it was a good glider right up until we got a
hold of logbook #1 which was in English......







Turns out this glider was totaled by the insurance company when owned by
a Canadian soaring club. The seller never made us aware of this fact.







Buyer beware.







Andy



Post Mills Soaring Club

Not to belabor the point, but the owner is seldom a good source of
information as to the reparability of his or her broken ship. I once got a
G-102 out of the Vancouver club who had flown it into a fence. It had 4 big
holes in the wings, all readably repairable. All it needed was someone like
me who was willing to work at half shop rate to do it. Ships like this
become "shop projects" and are worked on during slow months. The Vancouver
Club told the Canadian FAA that the ship was destroyed and de-registered it!
I needed the Canadian registration to import it and register it in the US.
Luckily, I was able to get Transport Canada to put it back on Canadian
registration, so I could properly de-register it in Canada and re-register
it in the US.

For sure the repair station must disclose the full extent of all repairs. I
remember a repair shop (no longer in business)who advertised a ship that had
experienced an un-assister landing.............The pilot bailed out!! Can't
call that full disclosure, now can we? Speaking of bailouts, we did repair
an LS-3 that the owner had bailed out of, well we got a set of good wings
from a Texas "landing in wind shear", accident and pieced the fuselage back
together with parts from both ships. I test flew it and the owner willingly
climbed in and strapped that puppy on for another go!

While I'm on my soap box, lets cover some pet peeves I have with "totaled"
gliders. First off the instruments no longer belong to the previous owner.
When the insurance company pays the insured value, (minus deductible), the
listed instruments now belong to the insurance company. If I am awarded the
high bid, they now belong to me! Many times I have had to contact the
adjuster who in turn contacts the club president who in turn contacts the
club members who walked off with what ever they liked.

Next problem; Just because the ship has been in a serious accident, doesn't
mean it is destroyed (see Vancouver club above). Please take it apart with
the same care you used in assembling it. I once got a Cirrus that had the
control rods hack-sawed off not 6 inches from the quick disconnects! Then
there was the G-103 that the club members had used a crowbar to remove the
wings (aft lift fitting was slightly bent, so wings wouldn't slide out
easily.

Sorry about the rant..............I feel much better now!
JJ