At 18:17 14 February 2018, AS wrote:

Kevin - you got it!
There is nothing wrong with the TwinII or the K21 except most
TwinIIs in the US are essentially single seat gliders with a large
luggage compartment due to multiple repairs while the K21s are
few and far between and when one comes up for sale, it still costs
a fortune. We need an affordable, well performing fiberglass
trainer that prepares future pilots for the V3, D3, etc.

Uli

'AS'

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That's why my brother and I have been importing Twin 1's.

-They can still be had for a reasonable cost.

-Handling is improved if one puts STC approved Z-Tape in front
of the control surfaces.

-L/D = 38/1 - better than Twin II or ASK-21, and qualifies with
insurance companies for pilots wanting to fly higher performance
gliders. 38/1 is the cut-off, so Twin II and ASK-21 don't qualify.
Twin 1 actually climbs better too, as it can comfortably fly slower
than the Twin II.

- payload of 506 Lbs (NDH of course) allows for 66 Lbs of damage
repairs before one ever even gets down to the 440 Lbs NEW NDH
payload of a Twin II !!

-12,000 hour service life compared to 5-6K hours on Blaniks.
(and then go try and get any kind of factory support for a
Blanik in the USA - good luck...)

_LTB Lindner in Germany has taken over all Grob glider patents,
rights, molds, dies, spare parts, STC, etc. They provide pretty
much "factory" service. If they don't have a spare part on hand,
they can make one, so there is good service support available.

-The Twin 1's were to a large extent the "DUO" discus of their day.
Most training was done in Ka-7's and ASK-13's. The Twin 1's were
often "sacred cows" which only the best pilots got to fly on XC
training, etc. So, percentage wise, Twin 1's generally have been
more pampered and less damaged than the Twin II's which were
put right into the training routine with accompanying breakage.

Yes, ground handling is harder due to the tail dolly, etc. Yes,
the back seat has the gear well protruding into the seat area
which takes some arranging of cushions in order to get
comfortable. Yes, the controls are a little stiff, (commensurate
with a 1970's era 17m glider) but can be made noticeably more
effective with the use of Z-Tape But for us, the positives far
outweigh the negatives, and our club has found that this is a
solution which we can live with comfortably. We currently operate
between 2 and 3 Twin 1's at any given time. Every time we think
of an ASK-21, or DUO, we come back to saying that we can have
2-3 Twin 1's for the price of one of those newer gliders.

RO