On Wed, 23 Nov 2016 08:36:45 -0800 (PST), Tango Whisky
wrote:

Bob, I've flown about 40 different types of gliders, and did voluntary spins with about half of them, wingspans ranging from 10 m to 26 m.

And the ASW20C was stunning in this respect - pulling from cruise into thermal a bit sharply, and the sky turns green although the glider just felt perfectly normal. In Germany in the mid-eighties, this behaviour did kill a couple of ASW20C pilots. Moving the CoG forward changes the behaviour to "normal".
The only other glider I came across having this behaviour was a Fox - but then, this one is designed to do exactly that.

So, there ARE gliders out there that bite without barking first.


Hi Bert,

the ASW-20 is a nice example of how little airfoil differences can
make huge differences.

I've flown two different ASW-20's.

The first was a 20L with slightly modiefied leading edge radius.
Performance-wise it was probably the best ASW-20 ever, and, stalled
with flaps 4, it had that sudden departure into a spin that you
descibe.

The other one was an ASW-20C. As docile as it gets - it was even
possible to thermal it with flaps 4 and less than 80 kp/h without the
slightest sign of a stall, not to mention that it didn't even drop a
wing if stalled.
CG a little bit more forward than in the 20L, though. This pilot got
heavier over the years.


And then there are those open class ships. I was quite surprised how
smoothly the Nimbus 3D went into a spin when I was checking out its
low-speed thermalling manners...



Viele Gruesse aus der Pfalz
Andreas