Grob 109

Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of it.
Just what do I need to know about it, I have had people say stay away from
it others say it is good if you know how to fly it ?

Brien wrote:

Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of it.
Just what do I need to know about it, I have had people say stay away from
it others say it is good if you know how to fly it ?

The first question you must answer is what do you want to do with it.
(Yeah, fly, I know... but what kind of flying.)

On Sep 14, 7:02*am, "Brien" wrote:
Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of it.

On Sep 14, 3:02*pm, "Brien" wrote:
Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of it.

underpowered for departures on hot high density altitude days..
so part of the question will be.. where will you be doing most of your
flying.
around Whidbey .. most likely not a problem..
at Max GW in the Nevada or southern California desert at 2-4pm.. may not be
a good idea

BT

"Brien" wrote in message
om...
Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of
it. Just what do I need to know about it, I have had people say stay away
from it others say it is good if you know how to fly it ?

"Brien" wrote:

Thinking of buying a 109A need to know the good the bad and the ugly of it.
Just what do I need to know about it, I have had people say stay away from
it others say it is good if you know how to fly it ?


The wing section is much thicker on the 109A, and pretty poor IMHO.
The A will spin of a 50kt turn, and don't ever think of attempting a
take-off with water on the wings. I saw one go through the upwind
boundary because the under surface got wet from the grass.

It has a 2 litre Limbach engine, while the 109B has 2.5 litre.

I have over 800 hours in motorgliders, half of that in the G109.

Here is the scoop:

- Grob is no longer represented in the US. Parts availability is
starting to be a problem.

- It's not a good power plane (probably the performance of a C152) and
it's not a good glider either. (heavy and glider ratio of 27)

- Over density altitude of 7000', forget it. You will scare yourself,
and must be ready for slow climb, using thermals to get up. Had to do
that at the end of the runway once, which kind of stopped anybody
behind me from departing...

- You MUST sign to the G109 Yahoo list, where all the G109 and G109B's
owners are trying too help themselves with maintenance, tips,
pictures, etc...
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/G109_P...ec=group&slk=1

- The canopy in the first model (there is no A model per say) is a
pain in the butt. Lot of them have cracked as results. This was
corrected in the B model which has two doors instead.

- Taxiing in the first model is also something to get used to. This is
different in the B I understand, although I've never flown it.

- You can't beat using only 4G/hr, and you can soar quite some
distances. I flew from Vegas to the Lake Powell once, a 6 hrs flight
only using the engine 2 hrs. Pretty amazing and fun!

- Never put yourself so low that if the engine does not start, you are
going to crash land it somewhere. It is still a glider after all, not
a get out of jail card.

- Once the engine has restarted airborne, plan on losing another 1500'
before you can move the throttle forward. Just a technique, but one
which will preserve cylinder temps.

- In case of an engine failure on take-off, you will be able to come
back to the runway from 300'AGL. This assumes gross weight, near sea
level, no wind. Practice first at altitude, or with an experienced
CFI.

- In the pattern, you will be wearing two hats: T/O like a power pilot
with your left hand on the stick, right hand on the throttle. From
half downwind, change your hat to a glider pilot, throttle idle, with
left hand on the airbrakes, and right hand on the stick!
Different mentality. If you are already rated in airplanes, this
should be an easy transition. Otherwise.... Well, it's good training
anyway...:-)

Motorgliders are definitely fun, and I've had some good flights in
them, but the Grob is a different animal as it is getting old, and
maintaining them are going to be challenging...

"jeplane" wrote in message
...
Motorgliders are definitely fun, and I've had some good flights in
them, but the Grob is a different animal as it is getting old, and
maintaining them are going to be challenging...

Perhaps 15 years ago, we had a G109 at our local field. I was lucky enough
to use it for the first few hours of my glider flight training. On the surface,
a motorglider seems like a wonderful idea. It is a glider (sort of) and as a
power plane it cruises faster than a 152 on much less gas. The reality was not
so great.

In the year that I knew it, the engine was off several times, twice for major
work (they are notorious for burned valves) and at least once to simply replace
the generator belt (yes, you have to remove the engine to do that). It once
suffered a prop strike in a bad landing and sat for over three months waiting on
prop parts from Germany.

It barely had enough power to taxi on grass. The technique to start it
rolling was to apply full throttle and then fan the rudder to sort of jar the
thing into motion. A push from a bystander was a much better option if
available. Once in motion, it was OK.

All-in-all, my impression was it might still be an OK plane for a careful,
mechanically-inclined owner, but you must go into the deal understanding its
limitations.


--
Vaughn

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On Sun, 14 Sep 2008 09:15:27 -0700 (PDT), Cats
wrote:

I was
told it is well capable of doing aerotows of quite heavy gliders.

Onle the G109 Turbo which is equipped with a Limbach 2400 DT engine
with 135 hp (compared to its standard engine of 80 or 100 hp).



Bye
Andreas

Andreas Maurer wrote:

Onle the G109 Turbo which is equipped with a Limbach 2400 DT engine
with 135 hp (compared to its standard engine of 80 or 100 hp).

I'm not sure this option is available for the A model. The turbo charged
engine surely transforms the B model into a pretty powerful touring
airplane and adds tow capability. (Range around 500nm, cruise speed 110
knots, fuel consumption between 4 and 4.5 gph, and service ceiling over
18.000 ft!) I sometimes use it in winter to do "power flights" on my
glider pilots license. I rarely fly it in glider mode.

These numbers are with the new supercharged engine. This new engine
isn't exactly cheap, though.