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Old August 24th 18, 05:00 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Steve Leonard[_2_]
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Default Perlan High Altitude Tow Plane

On Friday, August 17, 2018 at 8:55:12 AM UTC-5, AS wrote:

Stu,
I think that has actually been done already in Russia a while back. I put a reference to an article describing that process in our 'winchdesign' forum but since Yahoo got hacked, most of the links to those references are lost.
The glider was towed up like a normal aero-tow. Then, the line was paid out and the tow plane started a descent which allowed the glider to climb like it would in a winch launch.

Uli
'AS'


Described in the book "Without Visible Means of Support" by Richard Miller. A very good read.

Oh, and the Russians also did testing where they towed a glider up and intentionally jettisoned parts of it in flight to determine controlability.

Steve Leonard