On 3/15/2011 11:17 PM, Derek C wrote:
On Mar 15, 9:36 pm, wrote:
Didn't one person think that glider would best be dealt with using a
box of matches?
I witnessed the rebuild from paint scrapers and a belt sander to
rigging and blasting up the Sierra Nevada.
Couldn't believe it when Gerhard referred to the design as "a mistake
of my youth".

A slippery high performance glider with no airbrakes that relies on
tailchutes to stop it has to be a mistake by Mr Waibel!

I recall Gerhard saying that the ASW12 taught him a lesson
(paraphrasing): "Every high performance ship will sooner or later be
bought by a lower performance pilot, and that is the pilot you must
design for, not just the very best ones". He apparently learned well,
and went on to bring us some very high performance ship the "the rest of
us" could easily fly.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)
- "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation Mar/2004" Much of what
you need to know tinyurl.com/yfs7tnz